Updated on Dec. 10, 2007

By Stowell P. Watters
Staff Writer
    Joyce Butler is writing the history of Kennebunkport, one person at a time.
    “Right now it is a matter of digging history up, you can’t just go on the Internet, you have to talk to real people and read the letters written by real people,” said the Kennebunkport resident.
    Butler’s aim is to pick up the history of the community in 1837, where the widely used resource “The History of Kennebunk” by Charles Bradbury, leaves off, and bring the history of the town— up until 2005— to life in a book. Her scheduled completion date is October 2008, but the way history is unfolding, she said, she has her work cut out for her.
    “There is so much and with each new piece of information the puzzle gets more complex, and you begin to really see the cause and effect of history,” Butler said. “History is alive.”
    Nearly a year and a half ago Louis T. Graves Memorial Library employee Linda Wade asked Butler to do something about Kennebunkport’s largely unpublished history. Butler, no stranger to historical writing, was reluctant at first.
    “There is a huge market for history, but not a lot of publishers willing to take the projects on,” she said.
    In 1972 Butler was a fledgling reporter for a local newspaper, writing articles about town meetings, politics and events of interest in the Kennebunks when her editor asked her to cover a story about the South Congregational Church in Kennebunkport. Butler published the piece, admiring the architecture of the old building and becoming enthralled with the history of the structure.
    “It was my first real work of historical writing, and I was hooked,” she said. Her article is still in print and, with a few modern upgrades, serves as the church’s primary historical resource, according to Butler.
    In 1972 she also started a column  with the paper, which has since been compiled, published and reprinted several times. Butler, who has lived in Maine all her life aside from her college years at Boston University, wrote about life in the Pine tree state.
    “People really responded to those articles, so much that my original plans of writing fiction began to take a back seat to my historical writing,” Butler said.
    Indeed her English degree was being put to good use, but not for fiction as she had originally intended. She began working with the historical society on a series of works about the buildings of the town, which can be obtained through the society.
    Butler’s most successful work, Wildfire Loose, The Week Maine Burned, is about the 1947 Kennebunk wildfires that destroyed much of the area and left hundreds homeless. It has been in print for 28 years, printed in three different editions and serves as the authoritative resource on the fire, according to Butler.
    In addition to her six published works and many pamphlets, articles and guides on the history of the area, Butler is also the official Kennebunk Town Historian. After some thought, she decided to take on the history project and supply the town with a much-needed resource, she said.
    Included in the book will be photos and maps, loaned to Butler by residents, as well as a lengthy appendix of the names of Kennebunk veterans who served in various battles and wars. This endeavor, admits Butler, is the most tedious.
    “Right now we are trying to get as much information from the town’s people as possible, we want to honor our veterans in the book, but it is a monumental task just gathering all of the information,” said Butler, who urges anyone who has letters from veterans, photos or even just a few names to call her at 967-0513 or contact the Louis T. Graves Memorial Library at 967-2778.
    One of the most interesting things Butler has discovered through her research is the way Kennebunkport’s history is intertwined with the history of the rest of the world.
    In 1883 a volcano on the island of Krakatoa (in the Sundra Straight near Indonesia) became extremely active. The eruptions are still considered the loudest sounds ever produced on our planet, according to the Discovery Channel Web site. Pumice and ash rained down over the land and water, blacking out the sun and choking away the lives of thousands. 36,417 people died as a result of the eruptions.
    Butler found the ship log of Master Sailing Captain Daniel W. Dudley, from Kennebunkport, in which he gave a detailed account of seeing, first hand, human corpses suspended on top of the water, adrift thick layers of pumice.
    “The history of Kennebunkport is oftentimes the history of the world,” she said.
    Although Dudley was from Kennebunkport, Butler said the history of the Kennebunks has often been intertwined. For example a group of farmers in 1895, growing distraught with a plan to construct a water main through the village of what was then North Kennebunkport, broke off with the town, forming modern day Arundel, according to Butler.
    “With the ship building and the international connections there and the former president’s estate on Walker’s Point we can see that this area is not unknown to the world, and I think there is a large, vested interest in this project in the historical community and elsewhere,” Butler said.
    Also, Butler is fascinated by the manner in which history seems to repeat itself. For example she cited past school consolidations and issues with property taxes.
    “History is pro-log,” she said.
    In writing the history chronologically, Butler hopes to show not only the cause and effect of past events but also the development of local legends. The Wedding Cake House, she said, is largely considered to have been built by a newly married sea captain who had to leave his bride in a rush, and constructed the intricate parts of the house while at sea because he hadn’t even had time to enjoy a real wedding cake with his wife.
    The true story of the George W. Bourne House (The Wedding Cake House) in Kennebunk is much more grave, and encompasses a Mt. Washington hike gone horribly wrong. In the midst of freezing temperatures Bourne hiked toward a hotel on the mountain with his niece Lizzie Bourne, but the inclement weather halted them on a hillside for a night. A stone’s throw away from the entrance to the hotel young Lizzie froze to death over night, inciting a deep sorrow within George who turned his sadness into work, keeping busy fashioning the house to look like the Cathedral of Milan. The name “Wedding Cake House” comes from the reaction of a journalist who, upon visiting the structure, took a picture and told his editor it would make a lovely post-card were it headlined “The Wedding Cake House.”
    “A large part of the book will be devoted to setting these legends straight once and for all,” Butler said.
    Helping her by providing what resources and information she can is Graves Library Director, Mary Lou Boucouvalas. The library is funding and publishing the book.
    “We are so thrilled (Butler) is taking this task on, it will be a fabulous resource for anyone interested in the history of Kennebunkport and the surrounding towns,” Boucouvalas said.
    Many of the proceeds from the book will go back to the library, and as history unfolds in front of Butler’s eyes she only grows more excited.
    “What a great project for one to do, to see the evolution of a town and to write the story for generations to come. Every day I wake up to something new, something alive,” Butler said.