MSSPA dedicates new intake barn in Windham

By Ed Pierce

Abused and neglected horses now have a “Safe Place to Land” to heal and recover as the Maine State Society for the Protection of Animals has officially opened and dedicated a new 2,400-square-foot intake and quarantine barn on its farm in Windham.

Guests tour the new 'McCulloch Family Barn' during a 
dedication for the new equine intake barn and facility at
the Maine State Society for the Protection of Animals
in Windham on Sunday, May 31.
PHOTO BY RICHARD SAWYER

MSSPA Advancement Director Peg Keyser said as the number of horses arriving at MSSPA has surged in recent years with many coming from cases of severe neglect, abuse, or with significant medical challenges, the urgency for a dedicated space where incoming horses can receive care they desperately need continues to grow.

She said the new intake and quarantine barn is designed to offer every horse a safe and supportive beginning to their journey of healing.

“The horses coming into this new barn are in quarantine and as you can imagine, many horses come to us with challenging health concerns, and often with no medical records or medical history,” Keyser said. “Many have not had much,if any, vet care. All horses are quarantined for 28 days while they receive an intake exam, do necessary bloodwork, receive vaccines, and begin their journey to rehabilitation.”

A horse will not be integrated into MSSPA’s resident herd until staff there have a thorough understanding of its health challenges and have begun the process of re-feeding, caring for, and returning the horse to optimum health.

“Even after quarantining for 28 days, some horses will stay in the McCulloch Family Barn if they have medical challenges that keep them from joining the resident herd,” Keyser said. “Some need more time simply to get strong and gain weight.”

A $1.5 million fundraising campaign was created last spring to build the new intake barn and facility under the leadership of Kathy Woodbrey, MSSPA’s Executive Director and it immediately got a huge boost when MSSPA received a matching gift of $500,000 from the McCullouch Family of Southern Maine who were extended the opportunity to name the new barn as the “McCulloch Family Barn.”

Dave McCulloch and other members of his family were on hand Sunday, May 31 as the new barn and intake facility was dedicated. During that event, MSSPA staff, volunteers and community supporters got a chance to tour the barn and explore what it has to offer.

The barn and its paddocks and adjacent pastures sit on seven acres at the farm. It has eight stalls, with two stalls each opening into one of four corner paddocks. Each corner paddock also has two run-in enclosures – three sided, covered open enclosures, so that while horses are out in a paddock, they have a place to go into to get out of the elements, sun, rain, and snow.

“Many of the horses that come to us have lived outside 24/7, so unless they are critically compromised or ill, they do well outside with a run-in shed for protection around-the-clock,” Keyser said. “This barn gives us amazing flexibility to accommodate horses in all stages of health and to also receive larger groups of horses. Now we can do that safely and efficiently.”

She said that the fencing was designed and installed so there is no nose-to-nose contact between paddocks.

“We even re-did much of the pasture fencing so that those large pastures also feature no nose-to-nose contact,” Keyser said. “That entire corner of the farm gives us many options to receive small and large herds of horses in varying stages of health.”

According to Keyser, the MSSPA’s goal for each horse is rehabilitation and a new home, but if no suitable adoption is found, horses may live out their natural lives at the organization’s farm.

During the dedication ceremony, Keyser said MSSPA has teamed up with the Safe Voices Domestic Violence Program of Lewiston to create a “Safe Shelter” program to offer respite care to the horses of domestic violence survivors who need to house their horse somewhere while they flee an abusive situation.

“We are very proud of this program, and we have already welcomed one horse whose owner was able to leave her abusive situation and work to re-establish a new residency,” Keyser said. “That horse left the farm last week to re-join his mom. Those incoming Safe Shelter horses will also be housed at the McCulloch Family Barn.” 

Along with the Safe Voices program, MSSPA teamed with RedRover and Greater Good Charities for grants to secure funding and support of the “Safe Shelter” program.

For 154 years, the Maine State Society for the Protection of Animals (MSSPA) has been a sanctuary for Maine’s most vulnerable horses including those rescued from abuse, neglect, and heartbreaking circumstances. Its mission is to provide refuge, rehabilitation, and placement of seized equines. MSSPA does not charge for its shelter services and seeks no reimbursement from any public source. Horses cared for by the MSSPA come from Maine law enforcement officials and most of them have been abused or neglected.

The new intake barn was funded thanks to 269 donations and gifts, Woodbrey said.

J.M. Brown was the contractor, sitework was done by Shaw Brothers Construction and fencing completed by Main Line Fence. The site plan was done by Andy Johnston at Atlantic Resource Consulting, and the Owners Representative was Blaine Buck at Cordjia Capital Investments. <

Lewiston presentation reaffirms faith in human spirit for Windham poet

By Ed Pierce

A Windham resident who believes that written words can soothe emotional pain presented a framed copy of a 14-line poem he composed to Lewiston city councilors during their meeting on Jan. 23.

Windham poet Bob Clark was honored by members of the
Lewiston City Council during a meeting on Jan. 23 for a
poem he wrote last October recognizing the bravery shown
by Lewiston residents following a mass shooting there on
Oct. 25 which killed 18 people and injured 13 others.
COURTESY PHOTO     

Bob Clark composed the poem “Our Candle Vigil” in response to the Oct. 25 news of two separate shooting incidents in Lewiston in which 18 people died and 11 more were injured by a lone gunman.

“I wanted to communicate support for people victimized by the deaths and wounds,” Clark said. “I wanted to acknowledge the collective bravery being shown by citizens as they were directed to shelter in place. Peoples’ plans shifted, and a manhunt was on. I became fearful since Windham was within striking distance of the shooter’s escape. Eventually the danger ended, allowing recovery to begin.”

Clark grew up and spent a great deal of time only a few towns away from Lewiston and said that his aunt had graduated from Bates College there. He had worked for an adult education program in Lewiston after serving in the U.S. Peace Corps in El Salvador in 1980 and has many connections to the area.

“I felt unsettled learning of death and injury details. The ugly truth was on my mind, so I wrote and edited and placed feelings directly into poetry,” he said. “Once the lyrical stanzas were complete, I contacted the Lewiston Sun Journal in the hope that if it was published it might ease some of the shocking pain. In that way, I wanted to communicate with victims that they were not alone in their grief.”

His poem “Our Candle Vigil” was published in the Lewiston Sun Journal in its Nov. 4 editorial section.

At the end of December, Clark visited Lewiston Mayor Carl Sheline and took him a copy of the poem. That led Sheline to invite Clark to present a framed copy of “Our Candle Vigil” to the Lewiston City Council at its next scheduled meeting.

According to Clark he is thankful to have found the will to compose the poem and feels it has had a positive effect upon a grieving community.

“It was not pleasant work to align tortuous words that questioned reality and at the same time reflect feelings of agony,” he said. “By contrast it was uplifting to convey the strength of community-wide solidarity. The poem includes both types. Many candlelight vigils have taken place. Those images became my visual connecting point. Above the poem’s title I presented to the council is pictured the glow of 18 candles. This assault is nothing I take lightly.”

Clark told Lewiston city councilors during his presentation that the community showed resolve and determination during the ordeal.

“So, these traits continue and no doubt in the same way that Bostonians showed strength in their battles of Breeds and Bunker Hill. These traits are helping heal and helping move forward, and to gain our footing again,” he said. “Learning about those October crimes caught me off guard and in disbelief. I was listening, watching, and fearful. Realizing the senseless harm, and injury, and death just plain hurts. Soon after, in open grief, gatherings started taking place, community prayers were raised, and candlelight vigils were held. As heartfelt as ideas are, no words erase scars or do away with pain but this short poem arrangement I hope will serve, alongside others, to honor victims of this gruesome assault.”

Since its publication, Clark says that responses to his poem and the Lewiston City Council presentation have furnished him with faith in the importance of humane connections.

“The composition of ‘Our Candle Vigil’ became positioned with an unexpected outcome. My usual writing themes relate nature to people and people to nature, I’ve never characterized crime or punishment,” Clark said. “The events had jarred my senses. I related with deeply seated sorrow. I was hopeful it could bring some comfort. The poem seems to carry that affect. Work with words is a labor of love, I feel rewarded to realize the use of poetical lyrics does benefit recovery.”

He said that the events before and during the Lewiston shootings had a dismal effect on him and for his home state of Maine.

“I never envisioned a type of support that would have me reading a poem at a televised, open city council meeting. But it has happened,” Clark said. “Words are surely not a medical remedy for the fatigue of emotional pain, though they are a way to communicate. They can relate a positive intent. They can show concern. They can calm nerves. I am gladdened that my words have found a positive place in all the stress and madness of these past crazed events. I am also being inspired to find that compassion remains at the ready, it continues to be reliable. I am glad to have joined in to help victims heal from the shooter’s mind-numbing cruelties.” 

Our Candle Vigil

What pain is there when too much has been ground

Into the heart as if a dagger speared

Would cause to suffer wild screaming sounds

’Til eyes are left to grieve alone in tears?

What prayer verse could have been keeping guard

Where people work and prosper next to each

Among their kin and friends from yard to yard

And ask to only practice what they preach?

These shocking deaths for whom we now do bear

A witness to when love is lost to hate

Does rob us all of playfulness and cheer

Until the burden heals its own weight.

Tonight our candle vigil air is filled

With light that reaches far into the hills.