Maine vacationers have always liked to send postcards of lobster traps, lobster boats, and lobsters. This one must have received lots of attention in the 1920s. Here Eldridge Stone is holding a lobster that probably weighs more than 8 pounds. Its size far exceeds today’s legal catch, which has a size limit of 5 inches from the eye socket to where the tail starts. The average lobster on a dinner plate weighs 1¼ or 1½ pounds.
Stone was quite a colorful character in Port Clyde. He was said to be a rumrunner during Prohibition, who would take his boat out to a cove, sink it when the police were after him, and then raise it after things quieted down. He also liked to make gifts to friends of fresh fish he helped himself to from someone else’s catch.