Working Waterfront

From the Great Lakes islands: Falling for the falls

By Jim Nies I’m fortunate enough to live (seasonally) in Ontario’s prettiest village, Kagawong, on Manitoulin Island in Lake Huron. I know it’s prettiest because a sign at the top of the hill leading down to the waterfront announced that fact for years. It may seem an outrageous claim—until you… SEE MORE

A portrait of Nancy Hopkins-Davisson that was featured in the exhibit

Working Waterfront

Three love letters to North Haven

By Courtney Naliboff The sun is dipping down to the horizon earlier and earlier these days, and the air is suddenly cool. Summer, though over, was notably filled with three loving homages to the island, opportunities for us all to pause and marvel at the human ecosystem we occupy. The… SEE MORE

Opinion

A man rows to the dock on Islesford in late autumn of 2017.

Working Waterfront

A new approach to the ‘sweet decline’ time

By Barbara Fernald This year, as I anticipated my annual sense of melancholy for first two weeks of September, I realized something was different. I could easily summon an aching loneliness, but it was not ever-present. I had spent the summer finding ways to cope with my grief over several… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Year-round housing makes it or breaks it

By Courtney Naliboff More than a decade ago, my husband Bill and I were at a crossroads. We were renting a gorgeous home on North Haven, but there was a catch—it was a ten-month rental only. Summer residents kindly allowed us to live in it from September to June, but… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Drought and our estuaries

By Catherine Schmitt According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, about half of Maine is in abnormally dry conditions, with moderate to severe drought along the entire coastline, affecting approximately 1,089,000 people or about 82 percent of the state's population. This is consistent with the pattern of recent years, when drought emerged… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Our oceans are worth a deeper dive

By Tom Groening The rock musician Frank Zappa often chose bizarre, sometimes off-color, but usually witty titles for his instrumental songs. One from the late 1970s, “The Ocean is the Ultimate Solution,” remains in my memory, even though I can’t summon to mind a single lick of the tune. The… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

The case for ranked choice voting in choosing our governor

By Phil Crossman Ranked choice voting is not a sinister effort to undermine our constitution and electoral process. It is, instead, a refinement that the authors of the U.S. Constitution would have thought of themselves had they had occasion to consider contested elections on a broader scale than simply Washington… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Island intangibles marked first year on North Haven

Reflections is 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. By Maria Keeler It is an inherently slow process to incorporate yourself into a community, to listen to what others… SEE MORE

Beaver Island's community center; the island is in Lake Michigan.

Working Waterfront

Dear islands: Thanks for showing us so much

Jon W. Allan is director of the Michigan Office of the Great Lakes, an organization the Island Institute, publisher of The Working Waterfront, has partnered with in recent years. By Jon W. Allan Many people ask why we focus our work on the Great Lakes islands. “There are so few people… SEE MORE

The late afternoon sun strikes a brick building in Eastport.

Working Waterfront

Let’s understand our rural communities as islands

I believe the number of islands in the U.S. is growing, and here’s why. Across rural America people are feeling isolated—remote, beyond the care and concern of others, cut off from the rest of society. People living in rural communities feel like their futures are subject to forces beyond their… SEE MORE