Traditional Kennebunkport Parade : Bush Has Neighborly Holiday

On a rainy, chill Memorial Day, amid the bunting and brightly hued umbrellas of this coastal town, the recently deceased Alberta Redmond got more notice from Vice President George Bush than did President Reagan or Atty. Gen. Edwin Meese III.

For a brief time, Bush was more an ordinary New England neighbor than the nation’s deputy commander as he stood front-and-center at a virtuoso performance of small-town Americana, Kennebunkport’s traditional holiday parade.

A slightly off-key high school band marched past Dock Square’s memorial statue, where the vice president stood grinning. Boy Scouts and wrinkled veterans proudly carried flags. Children tooted the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” on plastic penny whistles.

Sure, Reagan’s Moscow trip was a theme of Bush’s brief remarks, but so too was a 102-year-old woman who had always loved the festivities.

Fixture Gone

“It’s not quite the same this year,” Bush said as he opened his remarks with a reference to Redmond, who before her death last week was a fixture at the parade’s wreath-laying.

That tribute, a reminder of their joint interests, was a pointed reassurance to Kennebunkport residents, who have grown up friendly with George Bush yet are quietly concerned that a victory by him in November could spell ruin to their charmed town.

For if things have been not quite the same in Kennebunkport since Bush won the vice presidency in 1980, the presidential race has brought the potential traumas of traffic, security and hordes of tourists all the more into focus.

“We’re all a little--what would be a good word?--we’re anxious to preserve Kennebunkport,” said Jane Duncan, the town manager of this village of 1,700 residents, restored homesteads and idyllic scenery where Bush’s family has spent summers for decades.

Often Glossed Over

It is a concern often glossed over by reticent Mainers, but laid out exactingly by a few blunter ones.

“There’s some negative--and the positive is only in people with retail places,” said Sheila Baiguy, who runs a T-shirt shop off Dock Square. “The people that are living here and vacationing here are a little bummed.”

Bummed or not, Kennebunkport is as yet remarkably untouched by hoopla. But some changes are noticeable.

Just last Saturday, the first obvious signs of pre-presidential commercialism turned up--T-shirts silk-screened with a caricature of Bush, selling for $11.95 in Baiguy’s shop. Demand is not overwhelming.

“More than anything, we get a lot of people just laughing,” she said.

Book by Terrier

In the town’s bookstore, visitors can also buy an official 1981-vintage “Bush-watching” book allegedly written by a Scottish terrier named Thistle McTavish, who purports to have been a friend of the Bushes’ late dog, C. Fred.

“Visit Maine in winter. Watch George shiver,” one chapter recommends.

The author hastens to note that he can tease Bush because he admires him, even though the vice president is “from away”--not native to Maine, an obvious character flaw to folks here.

And on Monday, in a move that could become commonplace if votes go Bush’s way in November, about 60 protesters marched down Ocean Avenue to the vice president’s family retreat to display their opposition to American policies in Central America. Down a two-lane road past oceanfront mansions, they carried white graveyard crosses and a sign: “Real Men Don’t Need Nukes.”

Gone Out of His Way

But as most of those who tease Bush have taken pains to accentuate their warmth toward him, so too has Bush gone out of his way to assure Kennebunkport residents that he will try to steer a wide berth.

Last week, at the beginning of a press conference, Bush told local lobstermen that they would not, as a Secret Service agent had suggested, have to pull their lobster pots from the cove adjacent to his estate or run afoul of his security system.

The Memorial Day parade, by turns silly and touching and consistently rain-drenched, served to reinforce the good will between Bush and Kennebunkport. Bystanders hollered, “Hi, George!” and received shouted greetings--by name--in return.

“Hi, Bob! How come they let you drive?” Bush joked to one man traveling in the parade.

‘Give Me a Holler’

“Hi, Emile!” he said when he spied another. “Give me a holler, next couple of days!”

When Bush’s baby granddaughter, Ellie, toddled unsteadily toward reporters, Bush joshed to her: “Tell ‘em what we decided to say.”

The neighborly banter was broken only briefly, when Bush wandered over to reporters and confirmed that he had met secretly with Atty. Gen. Meese earlier this month, before Meese’s firing of his spokesman set off another round of calls for the attorney general’s resignation.

Bush confirmed that Meese told him he would do nothing to harm Bush’s presidential campaign, but he refused to comment further. “Now that that secret is no longer a secret--why, I prefer to let him discuss that,” Bush said.

‘Veterans’ Day’

Then it was back to the parade. Bush invoked Reagan’s name, telling the crowd that the President would meet with Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev later Monday to discuss arms control. He paid tribute to veterans, twice mistakenly referring to the holiday as “Veterans’ Day.”

Then, with his family in tow, he walked off to waves from the crowd, leaving parade-goers to scurry out of the rain.

Town Manager Duncan was left touched.

“This is a very personal type of event for the community . . . and that tone was maintained,” she said. “He’s been a good neighbor to Kennebunkport.”