Island Journal

The ‘Undeclared War’ on the Reviled Cormorant

One summer morning in about 1963, I was fooling around in my 14-foot flat-bottomed punt near the beach on Mackerel Cove. Probably I was wrestling as usual with the oversized 15-horse Johnson outboard that was attached with clamps, twine, and hope to the punt’s frail transom, I can’t remember exactly.… SEE MORE

Island Journal

When the Irish Invaded Canada

Less than a year after Robert E. Lee relinquished his sword at Appomattox Court House, a band of battle-hungry Mainers boarded a steamship in Portland. Armed with revolvers and Bowie knives, the volunteer soldiers had no intentions of traveling south to reignite the Civil War. Instead, the Irish immigrants sailed… SEE MORE

History

Island Journal

What We Mean When We Say ‘From Away’

Back in the early 1960s, we’d pile into the wood-panel station wagon and drive from our house within mystic earshot of the Two Lights foghorn to Massachusetts to visit my father’s family. The North Shore seemed interminably far away. We kids preferred the shorter drives to our mother’s sisters’ homes… SEE MORE

History

Island Journal

A Century Ago, Children Were Seafood Processors

Phoebe Thomas went running home down the busy Eastport street from the sardine cannery before the work shift was over. She was crying. It was an August day in 1911. Phoebe was eight, not quite as old as the century, and had sliced her thumb with a sharp knife while… SEE MORE

Island Journal

An Island Funeral

Mrs. Moore died last Thursday and was buried Saturday it was thought to be the largest funeral ever attended on this island. The Cutter from Bass Harbor brought over a great many, and other boats from various places in Tremont . As described in the diary of one Susanna Gott,… SEE MORE

Island Journal

Henri, Bellows, and Luks: The Ashcan School in Maine

Storm Tide, Robert Henri, 1903. Oil on canvas, 26 x 32 inches Whitney Museum of American Art At the end of the 19th century, something of a battle began in American art, between the academicians and a group of independent artists. The former, represented by the National Academy of Design… SEE MORE

Island Journal

Betsy James Wyeth

The publication you are reading was inspired by Betsy Wyeth. When Betsy, whom I first met when I was eight years old, bought 450-acre Allen Island, six miles off Port Clyde, she asked me to help her figure out what to do with it; within a month or so Philip… SEE MORE

Island Journal

Islands of the Dawnland

When Gluscabe was young, he watched his grandmother Woodchuck fish to feed the two of them, and saw she had a hard time catching fish. He decided to help her. Gluscabe built a large fish weir across the entire mouth of the river, with a single opening in the middle.… SEE MORE

group of young adults in early 2000s clothing

Island Journal

Two Decades of Fellows Changes Communities

It’s a beautiful coincidence that 2020 is the 20th year of the Island Fellows program at the Island Institute. Twenty years ago, the designers of this program may not have known the level of reach it would have. Fellows came from states thousands of miles away, their projects have touched… SEE MORE

Island Journal

Fishing, Fowling, and Navigation

In this part of the world, the tide comes in and the tide goes out twice a day. Each time the tide goes out, it exposes cobbles, mudflats, tidepools, rockweed, and cool wet sand. Who owns this intertidal zone depends on the law of the land on which the tide… SEE MORE