Warren's Funeral

This photo of Warren was displayed
at the entrance to the Little Cranberry
Island grange, where the community
gathered after the funeral to share
reminiscences.

I managed to get to Little Cranberry Island to attend Warren Fernald's graveside funeral service on Monday. When I arrived in the harbor around noon aboard the ferry, the Island Queen -- a boat I've been riding since I was a little boy -- Bruce Fernald had just unloaded some lobsters and was putting his new boat on the mooring. I caught up with him in the parking lot at the head of the wharf. He was about to climb into his rusting old pickup, head home, and change from his smelly fishing clothes into a coat and tie for his father's funeral.

"Good that you got in a morning of fishing today," I said.

Several lobster traps and
a bunch of Warren's buoys decorated
his gravesite during the service.
He was buried next to his mother,
who died when he was a boy.
(photo: Sarah Corson)

Bruce nodded.

"It's what he would have wanted me to do," he said.

In the cemetery an hour later, someone remarked that it was the most people he'd ever seen at a graveside service anywhere. The crowd overflowed into the street. I saw old acquaintances I hadn't seen for years. The weather was spectacular. It was sad, but Warren's wife Ann seemed profoundly energized by the gathering of souls in remembrance of her husband.

After the service I waited in a long line to throw a handful of dirt into Warren's grave.