From left are seventh graders Lola Gahan and Hannah Frothingham and fifth grader Lucy Lombard of the Cuttyhunk School. The students built satellite models after the virtual NASA field trip. PHOTO: MICHELLE CARVALHO

Working Waterfront

A field trip to space

In February, students from Maine’s outer islands met virtually for a field trip to NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. Students and teachers from the one-room schools on Cliff, Monhegan, Isle au Haut, Frenchboro, Great Cranberry, Little Cranberry, and Cuttyhunk (in Massachusetts) islands met on Zoom with NASA educators to learn… SEE MORE

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Caring for our elders: A call to action

Maine’s getting old, faster than any other state. Now is the time for “policymakers and lawmakers to think boldly about how best to address Mainers’ needs for long-term care services.” That call to action was issued more than a decade ago. The 2010 recommendations by experts convened by the Maine… SEE MORE

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Reviving Rachel Field whose muse was Cranberry Isles

The Field House: A Writer’s Life Lost and Found on an Island in Maine She Writes Press Early in The Field House: A Writer’s Life Lost and Found on an Island in Maine author Robin Clifford Wood asks, “Why has no one told her story?” The “her” is Rachel Field,… SEE MORE

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Cruel April twice experienced

April has always been a month that plays hard with my emotions. The weather has intense mood swings and suddenly there are a million things to do, not enough hours in the day to accomplish them all, and dinner is always later than I planned. The busy-ness of it wears… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Market economics, island style

It’s only been a year since the scope of this scourge began to make itself apparent. During those 12 months, several island businesses have closed and probably won’t re-open. Others have only clung to existence and hope to resurface this year. A few have remained healthy and prosperous because the… SEE MORE

Students rehearsing the play D&D. PHOTO: ALICE GREENWAY

Working Waterfront

It’s play time on North Haven

Spring is taking a particularly “playful” form on North Haven. Twenty playwrights, tapping at their laptops over the winter, have submitted manuscripts. Seven directors are taking time away from boatyards, school, and gardens. And 38 actors of all ages are striding the boards, which this year includes the fields at… SEE MORE

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‘Lost and found’ a metaphor for this year

I pulled out my laptop to write just now and asked my six-year-old what this month’s column should be about. I had some vague ideas around maybe the virtual one-acts festival my students participated in back in March, or an ode to my greenhouse, which currently has the first tiny… SEE MORE

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Plenty of grit in the women who lobster

Pretty Rugged: True Stories From Women of the Sea By Ali Farrell (Sea Street Publishing, Camden; 2020) Review by Tina Cohen This is a book about women who lobster, and it is about the grit of these fishermen (the term has become gender-neutral). Nothing is prettied up here. Author Ali… SEE MORE

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Properties of ‘significant value’ conserved on Chebeague

March was a banner month for the Chebeague & Cumberland Land Trust (CCLT) as the organization protected two properties with significant value to the Chebeague Island community. On March 3, the trust purchased a 24.3-acre forest in the center of the island known as Littlefield Woods, and on March 15… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

The whole story on scallops

Mussels used to grow nearby on rocks at the water’s edge, and now there aren’t many at all. And it was getting harder about 25 years ago, but we used to dig clams out of a tidal flat just down the road, enough for a meal of steamers. No more.… SEE MORE