EASTPORT, Maine — Revelers in Downeast Maine will take part tonight in a cross-border celebration honoring their close friendship with Canada and their hometown roots.
The Tides Institute & Museum of Art is hosting the 21st New Year’s Eve Sardine & Maple Leaf Drop, which organizers say is likely unique among celebrations nationwide.
“As far as we know this is the only one, even across the country, that has this cross-border tradition,” said Kristin McKinlay, the institute’s assistant director.
At 11 p.m., the institute will lower a maple leaf as the clock strikes midnight over in Canada, which is just across Passamaquoddy Bay. Then an hour later, they will drop a large lighted herring to honor the city’s heritage industry of hauling, cooking, packing and shipping millions of cans of sardines.
McKinlay said they’ve looked into celebrations in other parts of the country, from dropping peaches to pickles to a red high heeled pump. Across Maine, Bangor will drop a beach ball, Kennebunk will drop a blueberry and in Auburn, which boasts the largest celebration in Maine, they will ring in the new year with fireworks at 8:30 p.m.
But in Eastport, a city of 1,200 that’s home to lobstermen, scallop draggers and artists, they are celebrating their close ties with Canada and those who were there thousands of years before the Europeans — the Passamaquoddy.
“Where we are here, it’s really one community,” McKinlay said. “I think the geopolitical border is not really seen as much within the community because so many people have families on either side of the border. We have the Passamaquoddy community here too which of course does not see those geopolitical borders.”
And while the city hosts a popular Salmon Festival each Labor Day Weekend, when it came time to choose a New Year’s symbol, they chose the sardine.
For thousands of years, the Passamaquoddy fished for herring, also known as sardines, in local waters. Then in the mid-1870s, Eastport got its first commercial sardine cannery. There would be more than a dozen canneries, with the last one closing in 1983. At one point, Eastport was known as the “Sardine Capital of the World.”
With cold but clear weather, McKinlay expects a couple hundred people to gather for the celebration, likely ducking inside for some hot cocoa between the leaf and sardine drops.
There will be music, crafts and activities for all ages.
McKinlay expects some Canadian neighbors to join in the fun and said in past years they’ve had visitors from as far away as Florida, Ohio and Georgia.
For McKinlay, the New Year’s Eve celebration offers a special way to ring in 2026.
“We wanted to create something that was site-specific based on the region and our unique location on the Canadian border,” she said.
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