Seniors Come To Enjoy Presque Isle

Presque Isle (The Star City) is the commercial center and largest city in Aroostook County, Maine with a population of about 9,400. If you are one of the thousands of tourists who visit Presque Isle every year, senior visitors will be pleased to learn that Presque Isle’s hospitality includes “small-town” friendliness with the amenities of a “big-city” without urban sprawl and congestion.

Originally known as Fairbanks for its founder Dennis Fairbanks, Presque Isle was settled in 1828, in the far northeast corner of Maine. Presque Isle was named an All American City once upon a time, and that tag is always significant, at least for this Editor.

Senior visitors will find the University of Maine Presque Isle campus is well worth a visit. Today you will find, along with the throng of annual visitors, plenty of things to see and do.  Be sure to put the Aroostook State Park in your agenda as it rates high with plentiful supply of moose.

 Senior Visitors Find Vibrant, Dynamic Community

Presque Isle’s vision of the future and ability to adapt to change have created a vibrant, dynamic community. Never far from their rich historic past, Presque Isle citizens have a deep respect for the tradition that brought people to this community more than 150 years ago.

The first industry to form in Presque Isle (the French term for Peninsula) was the lumber industry. By the 1880s, industry included two lumber mills, a gristmill, a wool carding mill, a furniture factory, a carriage factory and a tinware factory.

During the last 30 years of the 19th century, agriculture became important, and the entire county became noted for its production of potatoes. Presque Isle became an agricultural as well as an industrial center.

The New Brunswick Railroad and the Bangor and Aroostook Railroad opened the area for further development. Presque Isle became a busy war center during World War II. It became a vital air transport installation when the federal government established an air base from the local airport for planes going to and from Great Britain.

 Snowmobiles, Beauty, Color and Northern Lights

Know anything about a biathlon? A couple of years back (2014) Presque Isle hosted the IBU Youth/Junior World Championships Biathlon. You can fly directly from Boston to Presque Isle in a little over an hour. Cars are available at the airport and senior visitors are on your way to the getaway of a lifetime.

All of Central Aroostook County offers beauty and interesting vistas every season. As the leaves change color and start to drop, folks prepare for the incredible snowmobile season, cross country skiing, alpine skiing, biathlons, skating, and star gazing.

They say that there is nothing that compares with star gazing and the Northern Lights in Aroostook County. Seniors, set your GPS for Presque Isle and enjoy the comfort of down-home hospitality all four seasons.  -jeb