In this 1970s photo, Bob Bryan, left, and Marshall Dodge, the Down East Maine humorists behind Bert and I, in Maine.The Associated Press
Bob Bryan, one half of the comedy duo Bert and I, which had fun at the expense of Maine Yankees and popularized the immortal punchline, “You can’t get there from here,” has died at his home in Sherbrooke. He was 87.
Mr. Bryan and the late Marshall Dodge created punch lines in a dormitory room at Yale University, and their 1958 album was the first of several that shaped the state’s humour and image.
Uttered in exaggerated Down East accents, the jokes have withstood the test of time, including the one about the tourist who befuddled a Mainer by asking for directions. The native concludes with a famous punchline: “Come to think of it, you can’t get there from here.”
Mr. Bryanwas a native of Long Island, N.Y., who picked up the local vernacular during summers spent on a lake near Ellsworth, Me.
The stories, often involving a fancy-pants tourist and a laconic Mainer who gets the last word, set the stage for regional humourists who followed.
“They didn’t write from scratch all of these stories. They adapted them. A lot of them were off colour, from lumber camps or fishing wharfs. They’d rewrite them. They took them to the next level,” said Dean Lunt from Islandport Press, which sells the Bert and I albums.
Humourist and storyteller Garrison Keillor recalled playing cuts of the Bert and I albums during his early stints as a morning disc jockey. And the original Bert and I album made comedian-magician Penn Jillette’s list of the top 12 comedy albums of all time.
The pair set off in different directions after selling thousands of albums.
Mr. Dodge toured the country as a comedian before his death in 1982 in Hawaii, where he was struck by a hit-and-run driver while bicycling.
Mr. Bryan, a divinity student who went on to be ordained as an Episcopal priest, used some of his Bert and I earnings to buy a float plane. As a bush pilot, he flew his plane to the rugged fishing villages in Northern Quebec to minister to local residents.
He created the Quebec-Labrador Foundation with a goal of supporting rural communities and the environment of Eastern Canada and New England.
Mr. Bryan leaves a wife, three daughters, several grandchildren – and a heap of stories that have withstood the test of time, said Cherie Hoyt, a friend of Mr. Bryan’s who produced the Bert and I ... Rebooted recording with Mr. Bryan and Maine humourist Tim Sample.
“You can listen to a good story many times without getting sick of it,” Ms. Hoyt said. “I know them by heart, but I still find them funny. I still smile. I still chuckle.”