Working Waterfront

‘On the road’ to a life in music

Among my favorite summer activities is sitting by a campfire in my yard. My firepit backs up against several acres of woods and offers views over the house of the Big Dipper, North Star, and even the edge of the Milky Way on dark nights. I usually have music accompanying… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Biblical echoes in Maine community life

Speak to the Winds By Ruth Moore, Islandport Press edition, 2022, first published 1956 Review by Tina Cohen Ruth Moore (1903-1989) was born on Gotts Island off Mount Desert Island. Growing up there, she witnessed the transition of that small fishing village into more of a summer colony with its… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Young lobsters not surviving first weeks

There is a crustacean conundrum in the Gulf of Maine. Despite increased numbers of lobsters being born in recent years, the number of adolescents has declined. Something is affecting the survival rates of lobsters in their first few weeks of life, and researchers from Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences and… SEE MORE

“Studio Still Life Tremont Avenue Bronx, NY” (1962) 35 x 48 inches, gift of the Ashley Bryan Center.

Working Waterfront

Ashley Bryan’s ‘Beauty in Return’ at Farnsworth

[caption id="attachment_32028" align="alignleft" width="400"] “Family Gathering, Tremont Avenue, Bronx, NY” (1962) 48-inches by 48-inches, gift of the Ashley Bryan Center.[/caption] The exhibition “Ashley Bryan: Beauty in Return” is now on display in the Farnsworth Art Museum’s Rothschild Gallery in Rockland through Dec. 31. The show recognizes the work… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

A dog life remembered

I was born ready, ready to love without condition. So simple were my needs that to be adopted 13 years ago by a human family represented complete fulfillment. Over the years I found a real home on this island. This is a real Dog Town. From the beginning I went… SEE MORE

A Kosti Ruohomaa photo from the Penobscot Marine Museum’s collection shows a herring fisherman.

Working Waterfront

An outsider’s sharp eye on Maine

[caption id="attachment_32007" align="alignleft" width="350"] A Kosti Ruohomaa photo from the Penobscot Marine Museum’s collection shows a herring fisherman.[/caption] A herring fisherman or “herringer” of Hugo Lehtinen’s crew pulls on a line from a purse seine while standing in a wooden skiff in Penobscot Bay in the photo featured in this… SEE MORE

James Fitzgerald, “Saltin' Mackerel ca. 1960, oil on canvas, 30 by 40 inches. Monhegan Museum of Art and History, promised gift of Stephen S. Fuller and Susan D. Bateson

Working Waterfront

James Fitzgerald paints Fish Beach

During his life as a painter, James Fitzgerald (1899-1971) knew firsthand a number of working waterfronts. After completing his art studies in his home city of Boston, he took to the sea, shipping out of Gloucester, ostensibly to sketch and paint. On later trips to the Grand Banks aboard the… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

The finer points of protecting working waterfront

Most Mainers understand and appreciate the need to protect the working waterfront, those access points and infrastructure necessary to make a living on the water. But how, exactly, does it get threatened and how does it disappear? Imagine you’re a clam harvester who has an agreement with a local person… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Island doctor reflects on personal costs

Island Medicine: Life, Healing, and Community on a Maine Island By Dr. Chuck Radis (Down East Books, 2022) Review by Tina Cohen Dr. Chuck Radis’s first book, Go By Boat: Stories of a Maine Island Doctor, was published in 2021. Now his second is out, Island Medicine: Life, Healing, and… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Looking for balm in wake of violence

Oh how I wish our country would do what New Zealand did after its last mass shooting, in Christchurch, in 2019. What if our government would reinstate its ban on military-style semi-automatic weapons and install an immediate program to buy them back? Funds that are already earmarked to buy weapons… SEE MORE