At an overlook bordered by a wood rail fence, a wayside exhibit features an informational panel angled atop a rectangular stone base. This vantage point offers a view of the wide Otter Creek and rolling hills in the distance. A stone causeway with three arches spans the shallows.
The exhibit's title, "Once a Busy Waterfront," appears beneath a historic map showing Otter Creek in the 1880s. A label on the shore reads "You are here." Text explains that, to preserve the area, John D. Rockefeller Jr. purchased land around the waterfront and donated it to Acadia National Park in the 1930s.
"Since the early 1800s, Otter Creek has been the site of a fishing village with wharfs and fish houses on the waterfront and homes on the hills. Residents caught fish, dried them on racks along the cove, and shipped them to Boston and other cities. Families also sold lobsters, worked in granite quarries, cut firewood, farmed, and later, provided services for summer residents and tourists. Today this community is completely surrounded by Acadia National Park. For some residents this adds scenic values and quiet to their lives, but for others this causeway impedes access to the inner cove by boat and disrupts traditional patterns of fishing. Although most of the old fish houses are gone, generations of the same families still live here. Today, the Aid Society of Otter Creek promotes community life and preserves historic buildings in the village."
Three historic photographs appear next to the map. The first photo features two tall towers and a cluster of small frame buildings on the shore. "Towers of the US Navy's World War One radio station overshadow fish houses in the early 1900s...."
Another photo shows four men gathered near a pile of lobster traps next to a fish house. "Residents used fish houses to repair and store gear, to prepare bait, and for social gatherings."
The third photo features a painting by Frederic E. Church, a leader of the Hudson River School of artists. His painting depicts the area's mountains, hills, and rocky shoreline.
A quote: "Cod fish was one of the best dried fish. And practically everybody would dry them on flakes either on the shore down there or at home." - Gerald Norwood, in The Waterfront of Otter Creek: A Community History report, 2012.
