A MEMORIAL TO THOSE WHO HAVE DIED

This is a memorial to those who have died or lost their life in Acadia National Park.  The Park Service has told us they do not keep such statistics so we have had to do a lot of research to come up with the information we have.  Gaps between dates does not mean no one died or lost their life in the park that year, it only means we have yet to locate any deaths for those years.  We never realize just how precious life is until someone we love loses theirs.

 April 2016 - Timothy Philpott, age 50, remains found on Parkman Mountain in Acadia National Park.

June 2016 - Mark Simon, age 68, fell from a bluff between Sand Beach and Thunder Hole while attempting to get a photo of a sunset.

July 2016 - Nathan Savage, age 39, died after swimming across Echo Lake.

Sept. 2016 - Abdulrahman M. Alamer, age 21, died after crashing his motorcycle on the Cadillac Summit road.

June 2015 -  Christian Linwood Emigh-Doyle, age 23, died after falling from Duck Brook Bridge along the Paradise Hill Road.

June 2012 - John Baer, age 85, found dead along Schooner Head Trail - the death was not suspicious.

July 2012 -  Shirley Ladd, age 22, died after a fall on the Precipice.

July 2012 - 38 year old man committed  suicide atop Cadillac Mountain.

Jan.  2011 - Duncan Rosborough, 52, was found dead in the park on the Paradise Hill loop trail around 6:45 a.m. Sunday,  after he failed to show up after doing some sking.  It appears he died of nature causes.

Aug. 2009 - Clio Dahyun Axilrod, age 7, was swept off rocks by waves during Hurricane Bill and drown.

Aug.  2000 - Man falls to his death on the Beehive.

Oct. 2008 - Corey O'Brian, age 23, died in the park after a fall from his skate board.

June 2007 - Faith M. Wise, age 56, drown in the area of Schoodic Point.

Aug.  2005 - Stephen Chan, age 22, drown while swimming in Echo Lake.

March 2004 - Benjamin A. Ellis, 21, found dead on Great Hill, an apparent suicide.

April 2004 - Stephen Kennedy, age 63, died after crashing his bike into a closed gate on the Otter cliffs road.

2004 - Emil Lin, in his 20's, drown at Otter Cliffs after attempting to retrieve his shoe from the ocean.

2004 - Joanne Demartini, age 50, dies after falling from a cliff near Sand Beach.

Oct. 2000 - Leslee R. Larson, age 50, murdered after husband pushed her from Otter cliff to collect insurance money.

1999 -  Robert Croteau, age 51, and his wife Margaret, age 63, posed for a photo by the water at  Schoodic Point when a wave swept them out to sea - both drown.

1997 - Michael Domino, age 37, died after falling from an icy ledge on the Precipice.

1997 - Shon Lewis died at the Hulls Cove Visitors Center parking lot after losing control of his snowmobile and crashing into tree's.

Aug. 1993 - a 17 year old boy died after falling from a cliff along the ocean behind Blackwoods Campground.

Oct. 1993 - Douglas Rose, age 20, a student at college of the atlantic, drown after becoming trapped by rising tide in Anemone cave.

1989 - Bartholomew Keohane, age 50, a Prist, died after falling from  Mansell Mountain.

June 1977 - Leslie Spellman, age 27, murdered while on vacation in Acadia National Park, her body was discovered in the tranquil Asticou Azalea Gardens in Northeast Harbor - her murder has still not been solved.

Oct. 1977 - Fritz Millett, age 22, died from a fall on the Beehive.

June 1970 - Air Force Captain Robert McGaunn died after crashing his plane during bad weather into the side of Cedar swamp Mountain.

1969 - David McKinney, age 19, swept to sea by waves at Great Head while attempting to explore a cave.

Sept. 1963 -  Gerard D.F. Poisson, drowned by Thunder Hole.

1949 - Mrs. Millicent Quinn, age 39, swept off rocks by waves Sept. 1949 and drowned along Ocean Drive.

July 1939 - A young boy working with the C.C.C. Clarence D. Thurlow, died after falling from  a cliff on Beech Mountain.

Nov. 1938 - Park Ranger Karl Andrew Jacobson, while on boundary patrol in Acadia National Park, died after being shot by a  poacher.

Aug. 1934 - Miss Emily McDougall, age 25, was washed out to sea by waves and drowned by Thunder Hole.

Aug. 1932 - Joseph Meuse - age 12, died Aug. 1932 whilr playing at Bakers Island Lighthouse.

May 1931 - Bert H. Young, drown on Long Pond following a boating accident.

Sept. 1929 - Dennis Doonan, dynamite man for the Mccabe Company, was killed after a blasting accident while helping construct the Cadillac summit road.

Dec. 1909 - Adren L. Peach, age 9, fell through ice and drowned at Eagle Lake on Christmas Day wearing a pair of ice skates he recieved as a gift that morning.

Aug. 3, 1853 - Lucreatia K. Douglas, age 12, died after falling from a ledge near the Great Cave.  She may be the youngest person to have died on the Precipice.

TWO DEATHS I WILL NEVER FORGET

For me, there are two deaths that I will never forget which occurred in Acadia National Park.  One was a close friend of my son's, his name was Christian Linwood Emigh-Doyle and he was only 23 when he somehow fell from the bridge over Duck Brook.  I had seen him in town often and he had been over to our house now and than to see my son.  Three days before his death i remember answering a knock at the door, it was Christian, he was wearing a pair of sunglasses and smiling, he wanted to know if my son was home and I told him he wasn't, that he might be in town.  He said to tell him he had stopped by and left, it was the last time I saw him alive.
The other death was a total stranger, the young mans name was Michael Domino, and he was only 37 years old.  It is not something that is easy to talk about because it was a death that did not have to happen.  That night me and my oldest son were making out way down the Bear Brook Trail on Champlain Mountain, we had gone up earlier in the day, but got slowed up because the trail was very slippery, and we found ourselves running out of light.   We had to use flashlights as we got closer to the bottom of the trail, I had a thick winter hat on and a hood over my head and thought I heard a sound behind us.  We stopped and stared upward for a few minutes but saw no sign of any lights, and turned and continued back down the trail when Michael Domino came up behind us - I was shocked, not because he was out on the mountain with no light, but because of how he was dressed.  He had on a light jogging suit and a pair of sneakers, that was it...no winter hat, no gloves, no coat, this guy was dressed for a summer jog in the middle of winter on a night when it was cold as hell.  I said to him, you didn't just hike this mountain dressed like that, did you?  He laughed and said he had, that he hiked this mountain as often as he could.  He said he was from a state that had no mountains and that he had become fascinated with the Precipice trail.  We came off the trail and down onto the loop road and I asked him, you didn't hike up the Precipice Trail tonight did you?  He laughed and said, yeah, it was his favorite trail to hike.  I told him how dangerous that trail was in good weather and that people had fallen off it to their death. he just smiled and said he planned on hiking the Precipice tomorrow night.  He said he worked at Jackson Lab and left his car over in the parking lot when he hiked the precipice after work, with that he smiled and wished us a good night and jogged off into the darkness in the direction of the Bear Brook Picnic Area, which makes sense since there is a short cut path that goes right into the Jackson Lab parking lot.  I turned to my son and said, can you believe the way that guy was dressed...we just spoke to a dead guy.
By that, I did not mean nor expect the guy to die the following day, what I meant by that statement was that anyone who did not respect nature and the weather was not going to be around long.  One does not hike the Precipice in the middle of winter dressed like that many times and live to tell about it.
The following night we were into it, a major storm, and I was setting in front of the TV set with a hot cup of coco when I heard over the police scanner that some ones wife had called and reported her husband had not come home and that she was worried about him.  The police located the guys car over at the Jackson Lab parking lot, I heard it on the scanner but never thought they might be looking for the very guy we had run into the night before.  The weather was so bad they didn't locate the guy that night and the following day I heard they had finally located his body on the side of the Precipice below a ledge, his body was said to be twisted in a way that there was no question he was dead.  It than hit me, because i heard the guy was not dressed for this kind of weather, that this very well may be the guy we talked to the night before, and as it turned out it was.

And what makes it even more tragic is the fact that he left behind a wife and a 6 year old daughter.