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Estcourt Station (elevation: 671 ft (205 m), pop. 4) is a village in Big Twenty Township, Aroostook County, Maine, United States. It is the northernmost point in Maine and New England.
Contents
Map of Estcourt, ME 04741, USA
Description
Estcourt Station is located on the Canada–United States border between Maine and Quebec, at the southern end of Lake Pohenegamook in the North Maine Woods region. It derives its name from the adjacent village of Estcourt, Quebec, which is part of the larger municipality of Pohénégamook. The border control stations on both sides of the international boundary are staffed only several hours daily, usually for processing logging trucks that access Maine's North Woods to haul timber to Quebec saw mills.
The populated part of Estcourt Station is essentially a sliver of the village of Estcourt that was cut off when the international boundary was properly surveyed through the area (see Webster–Ashburton Treaty). It consists of a row of several houses along Rue Frontière, a street on the Quebec side of the border, some of which were built before the survey and which the border now passes through. There is also a general store and a small gas station.
Although the US census reports that four people live in the village, according to a Canada Border Services Agency agent no one lives in Estcourt Station full time as of 2016. A few US residents live in the village during the summer. They must follow the hours of the border control stations, so after 5 pm on Friday cannot leave until 9 am Monday. Anyone attempting to enter the US through Estcourt Station illegally would have to travel on hundreds of miles of private logging roads in northern Maine that are difficult to navigate during spring and summer rains, and almost inaccessible because of snow during the winter. Likewise, Estcourt Station uses Quebec's area code 418 for telephone service, and is connected to Hydro-Québec for electricity. The community receives drinking water and other municipal services from Pohénégamook.
Canadian National Railway's transcontinental main line between Halifax and Montreal passes immediately north of Rue Frontière.
Michel Jalbert incident
In October 2002, there was a border incident, described by Secretary of State Colin Powell as "unfortunate", that saw a Pohénégamook resident, Michel Jalbert, imprisoned for 35 days in the U.S. after purchasing gas in Estcourt Station outside of the U.S. Customs Service's normal operating hours. U.S. Border Patrol agents said that Jalbert was a convicted felon (convicted in Canada for breaking and entering in 1990 when he was 19 years old) and was in illegal possession of a firearm; he reportedly had a shotgun in the back of his truck – a common occurrence in the area during partridge hunting season.