In 1928, Roland T. Patten, owner/editor of the Independent-Reporter newspaper in Skowhegan, commissioned a series of photos to be taken of himself and friends canoeing at the Carrying Place Rips, a historic spot on the Kennebec River upstream from Moscow, Maine. This site was then slated to be flooded by the Wyman Dam which was completed in 1931. Here Patten describes an event from that series.

"This shows a canoe in midstream, at Carrying Place Rips. Note the white water, indicating a boulder just passed, and the foam rising around the paddle where the man in the stern is presumably applying power vigorously. This one of the most interesting spots in the navigable portion of the Kennebec.

~ Roland T. Patten, Custodian of Historical Views, 1929"