I just learned that my wild old falconer friend Mark died in a car accident returning from hunting in Texas to Maine. He was 76. Hs wife survived the crash.
Mark was virtually the founder of falconry in Maine. He was a wild man, a teacher of science but also a happy barroom brawler who liked to challenge loggers in their bars up north. I first met him in 1990 when he drove to my house in southern Massachusetts with a newly caught passage Goshawk on his fist and a case of beer on the seat. He drove back the same night, which was typical.
He also married his wife and true love (and lifelong hunting partner) when she was his high school student. She was also of a different class-, unmentionable then as now, but important ; blue collar, stock car racing folks, of French descent, touchy and proud. Cyndi simply handled all situations and challenges with aplomb, whether they required diplomacy or a bigger wrench; she became a high official in the Falconers’ club, but would always call a spade a fuaking shovel. She was with him when he was killed, many years later, and we send her condolences in her grief…
The photo was taken ca. 1990, on Mark’s farm on the Saco river when I had briefly taken refuge from the the chaos around Betsy’s death. . That is me on the right. Mark is in the middle, with a bird —”T G'” (Top Gun)— in his youth I think. The other character is the late quadriplegic adventurer and writer Bill Wise. He deserves at least a page himself.
The household included me; Eric Wilcox, already selling serious carpets while still lingering in law school; and the wild banker Ricjard ‘Moose’ Marden, utterly one of a kind—long -bearded and tall, who collected and crashed vintage Cadillacs, and sang his own obscene versions of pop standards into his tie (which became his microphone), after he had consumed enough rye whiskey. He trained racers at the track (the ones that pull those little carts) for money, after polishing off his nightly fifth. Moose was a true Yankee. original.