Last week, I returned to our office in Savannah, Georgia, from producing upcoming segments for our next season on public television. Among them is a story on Tide Mill Farm, near Edmunds, ME.

Tide Mill is a spectacular 1600-acre farm with 6 miles of coastline that has been in the Bell family for nine generations. Robert Bell emigrated there from Scotland in 1765. Led by the local Passamaquoddy tribe to a site on the easternmost Maine coast, he built a grist-mill powered by the powerful flow of the area’s 28-foot tidal waters. Today, Robert is buried in one of two family cemeteries that overlook the farm and its surrounding tidal lakes.

Almost two-hundred and fifty years later, several Bell families spanning four generations now operate the farm.

The original Bell farmhouse still stands and is today operated as a B&B. We had the great fortune to stay there during our production and to eat wonderful meals made from the bounty of the farm. Each morning at six a.m., I drank milk from one of the Bell’s cows, as I watched Aaron from the kitchen window milking his herd.

For more on Tide Mill Farm, and to meet the Bells, look for the upcoming segment in our weekly show on public television. (This segement will appear some time after January). Here are some of the things you’ll see:

• The restored family farmhouse — once destroyed by fire, and rebuilt in part from the timbers of a three-masted schooner beached at the old Tide Mill wharf.
• The giant stones of a partially still-standing dam — built by hand and without mortar in the early 1800s, the dam controlled the flow of water, making it possible to operate a sawmill.
• The timbers of the old wharf and the old sawmill – deep below the frigid waters, their algae-covered outlines are revealed twice a day by the retreating tide.
• A millstone from Robert’s grist-mill – lying in the grass between the farmhouse and the site of the mill. The children of the 9^th-generation played on it as we shot an interview.

In the meantime, the Bells invite you to visit the Tide Mill website @ http://www.tidemillorganicfarm.com/

By, Michael Jarema, Producer for Farmers’ Almanac TV

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