From The Editor

HAMILTON'S

india restaurant Notes Front The Underground

It'sfunny, but it's 11:30 p.m., and all I can think about is tunnels. In fact, I'm fascinated by them, because I believe there are secret tunnels everywhere below Portland.

I've just learned that when you drive on Congress Street between the Franklin Arterial and City Hall, you cross over a tunnel.

The newspaper owns it.

How old is it? Is it safe? Some marvelous and sublunary evening, will it cave in while I'm driving over it? Are there life-support devices down there? Does it drip like a cistern? Does it have a sandwich machine?

I'd like to go down there, looking for Injun Joe.

I'll probably get a letter now. It's a fine tunnel, the letter will say. It's quite a modern tunnel, not the Luray Cavern you make it out to be. For excellence in tunnels, look no further.

My search for tunnels has taken me to Exit 3 on the Maine Turnpike as well.

There's a sealed-off tunnel that used to allow travelers to walk between the old

Howard Johnson's Restaurant on the southbound lane and the old Howard

Johnson's Snack Bar on the northbound lane.

I used to love to shout in that tunnel.

The best tunnel I know of is so good that it probably doesn't exist. I've many times been told that the Tate House used to be part of the Underground

Railway, and that a secret tunnel beneath it led to a waiting rowboat in the Stroudwater marshes.

Other subterranean passages form a network below Fort McKinley (Great

Diamond Island) and Fort Williams.

And we should also touch lightly upon the cave on the airport side of the West· ern Prom, where rum-runners used to . hide their Canadian Club high above the railroad tracks.

Visionaries speak of a subway system below Portland to ease parking in the 21 st century. But they haven't talked to the geologists, who dabble in precious realities like ledge and metamorphic rock. -

And they haven't; of course, secured pennission from the other tunnel owners!

The city is riddled with tunnels, you know. Please write us the location of your favorite tunnel, and we'll flood your dungeons with light.

Thanks for a great first year - we hope you enjoy this, our second April

Issue.

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