Working Waterfront

Guests find motel romantic, fisherman- and mink-friendly

I customarily do an end of year wrap up of the summer’s high points at the Tidewater, the motel on Vinalhaven I own and operate. It’s a great business to be in. Almost without exception, every visitor is delighted to be here, happy to be on vacation, relieved to be… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Recipes made immortal in vintage cookbook

Sometime in the 1930s, the members of the Islesboro Women’s Club spent hours typing out recipes they collected from their membership and neighbors and assembled it into a cookbook that they covered with canvas. Embroidered on the front were the words “Cook Book” and a figure of what appears to… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Quoddy Tides chronicles maritime community

The Quoddy Tides bills itself as the “Most Easterly Newspaper Published in the United States.” That’s neither an idle boast nor an irrelevant fact. As editor and publisher Edward French chats with me about the paper’s history and role at its office on the Eastport waterfront, he glances out the… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Sometimes, the gulf left by loss must remain

Much has been written about the way loss resonates in small communities. The way grief echoes in the empty space where a friend once was. How not one person is unaffected by the lack of balance. North Haven experienced such a loss at the end of the summer. Greg Quinn,… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

The bittersweet season is upon me

When I look back on what I’ve written for this column in Septembers past, the theme is regularly similar and the ache familiar, year after year. Do other people experience a September transition like I do in the Cranberry Isles? I’ve wished for something, gotten it and am not quite ready… SEE MORE

The Toll of the Sea memorial on Chebeague Island.

Working Waterfront

Chebeague dedicates ‘Toll of the Sea’ memorial

Islanders know first-hand the inherent dangers of living and working around the sea. Many have survived close calls on the water, but have also lost family and friends. So it is not surprising that more than 220 people turned out to attend the dedication of Chebeague’s Toll of the Sea… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Island lessons carry through teaching job

Reflections is a monthly column written by Island Fellows, recent college grads who do community service work on Maine islands and in remote coastal communities through the Island Institute, publisher of The Working Waterfront. Maggie Small is a former Island Fellow who served on Peaks Island The dictionary definition of community… SEE MORE

A lobster boat cruises through Portland Harbor with the Nova Star

Working Waterfront

Tweaking a model waterfront

Imagine stumbling onto an undeveloped shoreline. Protected by islands, this mile-long waterfront has deep water at one end and a gravel beach at the other. If that shoreline were to be developed for various maritime uses, how would you organize it? Portland’s waterfront developed the way most have, with ever-changing… SEE MORE

The former Chapman farm in Damariscotta will be home to the Inn Along the Way.

Working Waterfront

Damariscotta area builds ‘pocket neighborhood’ for seniors

Every day, seniors call the state’s area agencies on aging in crisis. Some catastrophic situation has happened and they need to move out of their homes immediately. They need a new place to live that they can afford and suits their social and physical needs. That’s when they learn there’s… SEE MORE

Community

Students line up to enter the Longfellow school on Great Cranberry Island. The school reopened on Sept. 1.

Working Waterfront

Community celebrates reopening of island school

If there were any doubt about the role schools play in island life, they were set to rest by the ceremony marking the reopening of the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Elementary School on Great Cranberry Island. About 200 people from Great Cranberry and neighboring Islesford (Little Cranberry Island) showed up for… SEE MORE