Franco-American Pathways

English Summary:

In this episode, Robert Daigle shares his experiences with the French language in Maine and beyond. A French teacher at the Fort Kent Community High School and Valley Rivers Middle School, Robert grew up between two languages. As a child, he gradually lost contact with his maternal tongue due to an educational system that did not value French. He nevertheless made a commitment to his ancestors’ tongue through studies in Orono, Maine, and Quebec City. He worked as an interpreter for the U.S. embassy in Paris and returned home to pass the torch to a new generation of St. John Valley residents.

Here, Robert discusses the challenge of honoring the distinct vocabulary, idioms, and pronunciations of the St. John Valley while ensuring that his students can engage with a larger francophone world. He has led an annual exchange with high school students from Cholet, France, for many years and hopes to bring to fruition intergenerational activities that will help young people acquire French. The discussion explores the history of the region especially as a meeting point between the Acadian culture of the Maritime provinces and French Canadians from the St. Lawrence valley of Quebec. The issue of bilingual education is also addressed.

Further, we hear from Robert’s mother, 88-year-old Béatrice (Jacques) Daigle, who continues to live independently in Fort Kent. Béatrice’s Jacques ancestors have their own interesting Franco-American journey through New York State, Massachusetts, and Maine.

Dans cet épisode, Robert Daigle partage ses expériences avec la langue française dans le Maine et ailleurs. Professeur de français à la Fort Kent Community High School et à la Valley Rivers Middle School, Robert a grandi entre deux langues. Il a perdu contact avec sa langue maternelle pendant sa jeunesse en raison d’un système éducatif qui ne valorisait pas le français. Il a repris le fil de la langue de ses ancêtres notamment en étudiant à Orono, Maine, et à Québec. Il a travaillé comme interprète pour l’ambassade américaine à Paris pour ensuite rentrer chez lui et tendre le flambeau à une nouvelle génération de gens du haut fleuve Saint-Jean.

Ici, Robert discute du défi d’honorer le vocabulaire, les expressions et les prononciations caractéristiques de la vallée du fleuve Saint-Jean tout en veillant à ce que ses élèves puissent interagir avec une francophonie plus étendue. Il anime depuis plusieurs années un échange avec des élèves du secondaire de Cholet, en France, et espère concrétiser des activités intergénérationnelles qui aideront les jeunes à apprendre le français. La conversation explore l’histoire de la région en tant que point de rencontre entre la culture acadienne des provinces maritimes et la population canadienne-française de la vallée du Saint-Laurent, au Québec. La question de l’éducation bilingue est aussi abordée.

Nous entendons également le témoignage de la mère de Robert, Béatrice (Jacques) Daigle, âgée de 88 ans, qui continue de vivre de manière indépendante à Fort Kent. La lignée de la famille Jacques a son propre parcours franco-américain intéressant à travers l’état de New York, le Massachusetts et le Maine.

In this episode, join Anna and Maureen as they interview poet Jeri Theriault on her new book, Self Portrait As Homestead. In this book, Jeri explores place, time, and gender as well as familial bonds, and her Franco-American roots. Theriault grew up in Waterville, Maine.

Here's a link to Jeri's website to learn more about her work: https://www.jeritheriault.com/.

Interested in looking more closely at the poetry book Corra and Anna talked about in the archivists corner? Here's where to get a look at it online: https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/fac-marie-jeanne-laurendeau/3/.

Special thanks to Jeri Theriault for her interview with us, and to WMPG for the use of their studio space.

Interviewers:

Anna Faherty & Maureen Perry

Editor:

Anna Faherty

Narration & Socials:

Corrali St. Pierre

Music: Robert Sylvain

Narration: Anna Faherty & Corra St. Pierre

Editing: Anna Faherty

Hello! and welcome back to Franco-American Pathways, a podcast from the University of Southern Maine’s Franco-American Collection. In this episode of our Voices of Fort Kent series, we present you with footage from our tour of the Acadian Archives with Patrick LaCroix and Madeline Soucie. 

We also have some tape to share of a walk to Fort Kent’s historical Blockhouse. Unfortunately traffic and wind made it a little noisy, but Patrick had some fun tidbits to share about the historic building and the landscape of the town - make sure to look at the blog post that corresponds to this episode for photos! This episode has a more casual feel to it, and I think it would be particularly interesting to folks who already work in archives and libraries - or have a desire to do so! Think of it as a full episode dedicated to our Archivist's Corner segments.

Thank you, and happy listening! 

Merci, et très bonne écoute !

Production Site: WMPG

This podcast is a production from the University of Southern Maine's Franco-American Collection and USM Libraries.

For more from the Acadian Archives, click here!

In this episode, we are bringing you the second installment in our Voices of Fort Kent series, an interview with Patrick Lacroix, the director of the Acadian Archives at UMFK.

We relished the opportunity to get to know our new colleague at the university’s northernmost campus. Patrick’s professional and personal history is impressive and, however reluctant he was to talk about himself, it is abundantly clear that he is dedicated to the preservation and proliferation of the history of the St. John Valley. During our conversation, Patrick gave us the broad strokes of his professional life, including some compelling context for our journey to Maine's borderlands and the history of Franco-Americans and Acadians in New England. 

Merci et très bonne écoute !

Written and edited by Julia Rhinelander

Music: Robert Sylvain

Production site: WMPG

This podcast is a production from the University of Southern Maine's Franco-American Collection and USM Libraries.

Learn more about the Bates Fabriques with our interviewees Norm Marcotte and Larry Charest.

Welcome back to Franco-American Pathways! We know it is dark and cold out this time of year, so we decided now was the perfect time to talk about one of our favorite winter sports to get those neurons firing. Of course I’m talking about hockey! Lewiston has a long history of hockey teams, figure skating, and other ice related activities. Today we will be talking about one particular hockey team–the Bates Fabriques! I’ve been so excited to share all the neat artifacts we have about this team! 

The Bates Fabriques were sponsored by the Bates Manufacturing company, and competed regionally and nationally against other teams of similar standing. Many textile manufacturers supported sports teams, including Cabot Manufacturing in Brunswick and Pepperell in Biddeford. But did you know that the Bates Fabriques won a national hockey championship in 1950 and traveled to Europe to compete internationally? Today’s interviewees are here to tell us all about it.

Bonjour, hello and welcome back to Franco-American Pathways, a podcast from the University of Southern Maine’s Franco-American Collection. Life at the university has had its twists and turns, but we are so grateful to be back to share with you our trip to Fort Kent last winter. Patrick LaCroix, who had then just taken up the post of Director of the Acadian Archives at the University of Maine at Fort Kent, graciously welcomed us to Madawaska last March and arranged for us to meet some folks who could help us deepen our understanding of this truly unique and fascinating region.

In the first installment of our Voices of Fort Kent series, you'll meet Lisa Lavoie. Lavoie is an assistant professor in Clinical Rehabilitation Counseling at UMFK, and was born and raised in Fort Kent. In 2015 she received her masters degree in Maine Studies through the University of Maine and her thesis focused on the effects of 9/11 on the borderlands of Northern Maine. This thesis is what interested us in her perspective on this region, both as a scholar and as a Madawaska native.

Big gratitude to Robert Sylvain for offering music from his album Memere’s Notebook for our show.

Thanks as well to WMPG, USM’s community radio, for sharing their resources with us and making the production of our show possible.

Merci et très bonne écoute !

Bonjour à tous et à toutes !

It has been a minute! This episode, set to air at the start of the summer, got waylaid. There was a Covid case or two, a trip to Hawaii, and shifting work schedules in the mix, but, at long last,  it is our pleasure to introduce the work of our spring intern, Corra. We are so proud of all that they accomplished for the Putting History to Work internship in the spring; the depth of their research and the nuance of their insights will speak for themselves. This episode diverges a bit from our normal format: Corra, a young Franco and Lewiston native, explores her own family history and how it intersects with her queer identity. Using public records and the resources available at USM's Special Collections, Corra does a deep dive into researching the life of their late Aunt Linda, a family member with whom they had a deep connection. Their research culminated in a rich conversation at the WMPG studio about queer culture and identity with our producer, Julia, and one of USM's Instruction and Outreach Librarians, Megan MacGregor.

Be sure to check out our blog to see photos of Linda and read more about Corra's story and where they did they research. 

We are still editing tape from our Mapping Franco Fort Kent and Brunswick trips, but because of schedule changes, the work is just going a bit slower than before. Not to worry though! New content is coming this fall and we are so excited to share our work with you.

Merci, et très bonne écoute!

This episode was written by Corra St. Pierre.

It was produced and edited by Corra St. Pierre and Julia Rhinelander

Music: Robert Sylvain

Bonjour! This month, we’re bringing you the second half of our Mapping Franco Biddeford episode! If you didn’t listen to part one, we highly recommend going back and giving it a listen; part two will make a whole lot more sense. Last fall, a few days after our Osher visit, Emma Bouthillette, Biddeford native and author, met the Franco-American pathways team and Libby Bischof to take a historic walking tour of Biddeford. We made connections to the maps and documents we’d viewed just a few days earlier.

Our visit concluded with a stop at the McArthur Library where Renée Burkett and her team in Special Collections gave us a tour of their space and their extensive collection of artifacts relating to Franco Biddeford.

Music for Franco-American Pathways was composed and performed by Robert Sylvain and is available for purchase on his website, robertsylvain.com.

Special thanks to Dr. Libby Bischof at the Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education, Emma Bouthillette, and Renée Burkett for making our mapping of Franco Biddeford possible.

All editing and production for this episode was done at WMPG, USM’s community radio.

Merci, et a la prochaine !

This month, we present you with the first part of one of the larger projects we tackled in 2021: a second Mapping episode, this time focusing on the city of Biddeford. Today, we take you back to the Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education with Dr. Libby Bischof, as well as another special guest: Emma Bouthillette, a Biddeford native, yoga teacher, and writer. Emma is the author of A Brief History of Biddeford, a book about this historic mill town that was shaped by the Franco-American exodus at the turn of the century.

True to form, Libby met us in the reading room of the map library ready with every table covered in maps and documents relating to Biddeford. I would suggest heading over to our blog to take a look at the documents we viewed as you listen along.

Bienvenue et très bonne écoute !

Music: Robert Sylvain

Production: Julia Rhinelander and Corra St. Pierre