Historic building blown from Lubec to Canada by blizzard being saved

LUBEC — A historic Maine fishing industry shed that was dislodged from its pilings and set adrift by a blizzard and wound up in Canada is being saved.

The Bangor Daily News reports a Canadian contractor and an American contractor will remove the brine shed’s remains from New Brunswick’s Campobello Island in the coming week and return it to its original site off Lubec, Maine.

The McCurdy Smokehouse's brine shed, seen in 1997, was blown from its mooring by a blizzard on Jan. 4. Staff photo by Gordon Chibroski

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The landmark shed is on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. It’s among five buildings known as McCurdy’s Smokehouse that comprise the last traditional smoked-herring facility in the U.S.

Lubec Landmarks is trying to transform the buildings into a living museum to tell the story of the fishing industry and Down East Maine.

Officials originally worried the structure could be doomed to deteriorate in the crashing surf because of legal tangles including salvage rights.

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