Correction — and more information

Lincoln resident Stewart Coffin in a July 4 parade in Lincoln. Photo courtesy Alaric Naiman.

The July 2 “News acorns” included a photo of a past July 4 parade participant that was misidentified. The photo of the gentleman bicycling in the 1983 parade while carrying a canoe on his head was not Mike Farny but rather Stewart Coffin, another legendary Lincoln outdoorsman. 

“My plans for biking across Labrador in 1983 hit a snag because of an impending Quebec North Shore and Labrador Railway strike. So I started considering alternate plans, but none were ever very practical, so this was really just a stunt,” Coffin told the Lincoln Squirrel. “The canoe is my 50-lb. Kevlar [Big Dipper] that I made. I am riding my wife’s bike, much easier that way. Went the whole parade distance. Would not attempt it in traffic.”

Coffin, who now lives in Carlisle, moved to Lincoln in 1964 and became known for his hand-made canoes and paddles, voyages through the Maine and Canada wilderness (some of which are described in his book Black Spruce Journals), and skill at making three-dimensional puzzles. His daughter Margaret Coffin Brown and her family still live on the Old Sudbury Road property. He gave an illustrated talk, “Stew Coffin Lives in Lincoln,” in 1983 (video here).

A Fourth of July footnote: Coffin was not the most famous cyclist in the history of Lincoln’s annual parades. That would be Norman Hapgood, who rode a unicycle along the route for many. years.