It's The Maine Attraction

Kobritz spanned the continent in search of baseball knowledge. He had cards made up saying JORDAN KOBRITZ, PROFESSIONAL SPORTS CONSULTANT, which granted him entry to many minor league ball parks. He talked with baseball people of all stripes, relying heavily on scouts. "Scouts love to talk, and they have an opinion on everything," says Kobritz. When his odyssey was completed, he sat down in his study and wrote a year's worth of impressions in two weeks.

Kobritz isn't exactly a small-town lawyer. He graduated from Georgetown University and the Cornell University Law School, and he taught business law at the University of Maine. "The one thing I learned in law," says Kobritz, "is not to be awed by anything or anyone." In the summer of '82, he decided to buy the Charleston (W. Va.) Charlies, the weakest franchise in the International League, and move them to Maine.

THE TOWN

Enter Old Orchard Beach. Jerry Plante is the town manager and also the tax collector, welfare commissioner, roads commissioner, chairman of the School Building Fund, former chairman of the Centennial Committee and weekend helper at Papa's Pizza on The Pier, which is owned by his wife. Plante actively wooed Kobritz. "We've an entertainment-oriented area, and what better, cleaner family fun can you have than a baseball team?" says Plante.

Plante is a lively, gregarious salesman, the Old Orchard Babbitt, so to speak, and as the Guides' No. 1 fan he wears a No. 1 cap to most ball games. His 14-year-old son, Dean, a Guides bat boy, hits the nail on the head when he says, "My father isn't at a loss for words." Plante became town manager seven years ago. "People used to think I was Attila the Hun," he says of his managerial manner. "At least now when they wave at me, they wave with all five fingers."

In January 1983, the Town Council granted Kobritz the option of purchasing about 50 acres of town-owned land for $50,000. When the Maine Guarantee Authority balked at giving Kobritz the backing for a $2.5 million industrial revenue bond to build the stadium, the town said it would purchase the park in the event of a default. Last June 23, groundbreaking began in Mosquito Hollow.

Old Orchard Beach has 6,400 year-round residents, which makes it an unlikely home for Triple A baseball, but it's only 15 miles from Portland, a city of 65,000, and in the summer it fairly bursts at the seams with tourists. The July population is about 100,000.

The town has two nicknames. One is the French-Canadian Riviera. After Le Jour de St. Jean Le Baptiste, June 24, hordes of Quebecois, or Kebeckers, as they say in Old Orchard, arrive. Many of the stores along the main drag carry ICI ON PARLE FRAN�AIS signs. And the beach is known for the fetching women it attracts, to the delight of the single players on the Maine Guides.

Old Orchard Beach is also known as The Coney Island of the North. In addition to the customary roller coaster and Ferris wheel, there's the Flight to Mars, the Liquid Litenin' and the Himalaya. There are pizza parlors galore. There's the L&L Tattoo Studio, which accepts VISA and MasterCard. There's Dave Glovsky, 75 years young, who'll guess your weight, age and profession, 50� a guess, three for a dollar, as he did for Louis Armstrong (1956), Ed Muskie (1958), Dion (1962), Liberace (1963) and Gary Merrill (1969). "Only celebrity who ever refused me was Bette Davis," says Glovsky. Dave is good at ages, excellent at weights, but he has a little trouble with professions. A group of Maine Guides, including Shanie Dugas and Dave Gallagher, tried him out recently.

"Let me goose you—I mean guess you," said Glovsky. "Let me see your hands. You're policemen or security guards. No? Technicians? Salesmen? I don't know, I give up."