To the editor:
In regard to the woodstove and smoke dangers described in a recent Bangor Daily News article by Jackie Farwell, someone should have told me about wood smoke a long time ago. I was born during The Depression when woodstoves were widely in use. The wood stove heated the house, cooked the food and heated the water. In those days I had to walk two miles to school, and in the winter I had to walk past 20 homes that burned only wood. The article mentioned that one stove does as much pollution as five old diesel trucks. That means I was breathing the cumulative amount of pollution of 100 old diesel trucks during my winter walks to school.
I have been burning wood all my life except for two years of military service during the Korean War, four years of college education and three years as a carpenter in New York. All other years involved burning wood.
I am now 82 years old. I still work my six days a week, 52 weeks a year. I pay my taxes and support government programs. With all the negative talk about burning wood, maybe I am sick after inhaling all that poison.
Wil Labbe
Caribou
