“Old age is like everything else. To make a success of it, you've got to start young.” – Theodore Roosevelt

Not long ago, Larry Rines of Wiscasset telephoned suggesting I might help in finding the oldest Wiscasset resident so the selectboard might pass along the Boston Post Cane to them. Larry, a native of “Maine’s Prettiest Village,” and who grew up on Churchill Street, is active in the town’s Senior Center. Too young to qualify for the cane himself, he said he knows several Wiscasset residents in their 90s who would. I promised him I’d do what I could. Before I go any further, it might be best to explain about the Boston Post Cane for those of you unfamiliar with it, or the bittersweet custom of passing it to the oldest resident.

For starters, it’s actually more of a walking stick than what we think of as a cane with a curved handle. The custom of passing it on to a community’s most senior resident is unique to New England, sort of like celebrating Patriots’ Day. The tradition started way back, 114 years ago and many towns continue to carry it on. It began in 1909 when Edwin Grozier, the publisher of The Boston Post, was trying to come up with a way to increase his newspaper’s circulation numbers.

After giving the matter some serious thought, he came up with a pretty good idea. Grozier had 700 canes made and then gave them away to communities in Massachusetts, Maine and New Hampshire asking they be given to the oldest man in town. The recipient could keep the Boston Post Cane for as long as he lived, after which it would be passed along to the next oldest man. In the 1930s, the custom changed to include women, although from the outset some towns never distinguished between the sexes when they awarded the cane. The nearby town of Woolwich was ahead of the curve in this respect because in 1914 their town fathers passed the Boston Post Cane to Sarah McKenny, their oldest resident.

All of the canes were manufactured by J.F. Fradley & Co. based in New York City. Each was hand-turned from seasoned, African ebony imported from the Congo and topped with a round, 14-karat gold head. The tops were engraved with the following inscription: “Presented by the Boston Post to the OLDEST CITIZEN. (To be transmitted).” Transmitted meaning, “to be passed on from one person to another.”  A blank space was left to add the town’s name. After the Boston Post newspaper went out of business in 1957, the tradition of passing on its canes went on and continues today.

As you might surmise, it’s a delicate task for town officials to retrieve the Boston Post Cane after its holder has left this earthly world. Over the years some towns have lost track of their canes or, like Wiscasset, made copies and held onto the original for safekeeping.

Another problem that comes up now and again is not everyone likes the idea of being known as the oldest person in town. A few years back the tradition stopped here in Wiscasset because nobody wanted the Boston Post Cane. Longevity runs in my wife’s family. Her grandfather on her mother’s side, Robert Lingham of Littleton, Massachusetts, was a Boston Post Cane recipient in the 1990s when he was in his 90s. After very reluctantly accepting the cane he kept it tucked away in the hall closet and only brought it out if someone insisted on seeing it. He politely refused to have his picture taken with it. When Grandpa Lingham died at the age of 101 in 2001, no one thought to have his obituary mention he’d been a holder of the Boston Post Cane.

I recall the late Larry Gordon, a Wiscasset selectman for 27 years, telling me of several residents who flat out refused the Boston Post Cane when it was offered to them. “Most people are like Jack Benny. They don’t ever like to admit how old they are,” is what he told me when I interviewed him on the subject. For my younger readers, Jack Benny was an early television comedian who used to joke he wasn’t a day over 39 years old; he was in fact almost twice that age.

The Wiscasset selectboard purchased a replica of the Boston Post Cane in 2017; the original is locked away in the town vault for safekeeping. In April that same year, the selectboard renewed the tradition by giving the new Boston Post Cane to Ruth Applin, age 100. Sadly, Mrs. Applin, who resided on Churchill Street, passed away just a few months later in August. By coincidence, her brother, Arthur Jones, age 99, was holding the Boston Post Cane in the town of Nobleboro at the same time. He passed away a year later in 2018, also at the age of 100. I referred to this earlier as a bittersweet custom. Although it’s exciting to claim the honor of being the oldest person, it is sad, too, because it means the previous holder of the Boston Post Cane has passed away.

Now to the tricky part. That is finding the oldest person in Wiscasset and seeing if they’d like to become the next holder of the almost new replica of the Boston Post Cane. Are there any takers?

Phil Di Vece earned a B.A. in journalism studies from Colorado State University and an M.A. in journalism at the University of South Florida. He is the author of three Wiscasset books and is a frequent news contributor to the Boothbay Register-Wiscasset Newspaper. He resides in Wiscasset. Contact him at pdivece@roadrunner.com