OTIS, Maine — On a bright summer day on Beech Hill Pond, a few things are sure to happen.
The loons eventually will call.
A flock of young ducks will follow their mother along the shoreline, looking for handouts.
And at some point — or, more likely, throughout the day — a parade of boats will make their way to a massive piece of granite, where swimmers will clamber to the top, socialize a bit, then hop into the cool water below.
“This is Junk of Pork Rock,” Bangor Daily News reader Patti Herrick wrote in an email that included a photo of that iconic swimming spot. “My family, friends and I have been jumping off this rock for 40 years. Beech Hill is a beautiful lake, and we’ve been fortunate to live on it for a long time.”
Some boats drop anchor not far from the rock while others drift or motor back into position after dropping off that day’s rock hoppers.
“Every weekend, there are boats lined up dropping their people off to climb the rock and jump,” Herrick wrote. “You are not a real ‘Beech Hill Pond Resident’ until you’ve jumped!”
At lakes around the state — and in plenty of other locations — there are huge chunks of stone that have captured the imaginations of generations of Mainers.
On land or in lakes, these are “our rocks.” They serve as landmarks, signposts and, in the case of rocks such as Junk of Pork, can provide milestone moments in the lives of Mainers and guests alike.
According to retired University of Maine geology professor Harold Borns, there’s even a Maine Geological Survey website that lists some of the most impressive. Just search for “large rocks in Maine,” and you’ll find that site.
And if you’re curious about how those rocks came to rest where they have, Borns is the man to track down.
Those rocks are glacial erratics, Borns explained. As world events go, their relocation to the spots you find them today didn’t happen all that long ago.
“[The last glacier] cleared the state about 10,000 years ago,” Borns said.
That was just the latest glacial period that has happened over the past 2.5 million years, the geologist said. At one point, ice spread from the St. Lawrence River Valley in Canada all the way across Maine and about 300 miles into the Atlantic.
At its peak, Bangor was under ice 2 miles thick, Borns said. The glacier would move 3 or 4 feet per year and would melt as it moved. And along the way, the glacier picked up many objects in its path including rocks.
“As the ice moves along, it picks up the ledge wherever it can,” Borns said. “Most of the ledge is pretty soft stuff, and those rocks tend to travel and get worn down. They’re rubbing on other rocks and rubbing on ledge underneath. They get pretty well ground down to sand and gravel and mud and silt.”
Then there are rocks such as Junk of Pork. They’re different.
“If you have a very, very strong rock, like granite, it doesn’t work quite that way,” Borns said. “And the big rocks [you see] around the state are most always granite.”
Those granite hitchhikers traveled with the glaciers and eventually touched down elsewhere.
“Let’s say the ice is moving across Bangor and it gets down to Holden and it gets to the Dedham granite immediately,” Borns said. “Those mountain tops are quite high. [The ice] will pull apart large granite masses along those crack systems.”
Then those pieces take a ride.
“You can find pieces of that [Dedham] granite sitting on top of the pink granite down in Bar Harbor,” Borns said. “The classic case is that so-called Balance Rock on The Bubbles. That’s Dedham granite.”
All good rides come to an end. When the glacier continued to melt, those erratics found their new homes atop strange mountains or in lakes or in blueberry barrens.
Today, many Mainers adopt them as their own.
Down on Little Sebago Lake in Gray, Amanda Ruth’s family has enjoyed jumping off a good-sized erratic with a decidedly understated name: They call it “The Rock.”
Over in Columbia, Leslie Howe shared a photo of a monstrous rock that is very special to locals, even though you can’t leap from it and land in a cool lake.
“I want to introduce you to Frog Rock,” Howe wrote. “Now, it’s not in the water, but in the middle of blueberry ground. Why [is it] important? Frog Rock lets you know you’re almost at Schoodic Lake in Columbia/Cherryfield.”
And the locals apparently love their brightly painted rock.
“I’m the administrator of the town of Columbia’s [Facebook] page, and I took this picture last week,” she wrote. “With everybody heading out to the lake for the Fourth [of July], I knew it would bring up lots of fond memories for people.”
She was right.
“Our little Facebook page has a very small viewership, [but] this picture so far has over 1,600 views and multiple shares,” Howe wrote. “The comments are all loving and nostalgic regarding summer fun out at Schoodic Lake. So this is our rock!”
