Gordon Page chats with the manager of Rock City Café.

Working Waterfront

On the record with… Rockland downtown’s Gordon Page

Gordon Page came to Rockland in 1982 for a job at National Sea Products, a company on the city’s waterfront that processed frozen blocks of fish. Today, he’s the executive director of Rockland Main Street, a nonprofit group that works to boost the city’s downtown business district. The bookends to… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Lifetime of cultural immersion prepared MacWilliam for island school

Rita MacWilliam came to the tiny one-room, K-8 schoolhouse on Isle au Haut from a life of immersion in new cultural experiences that included working in other tiny schools in out-of-the-way settings. This island’s new teacher, who mainly grew up in Ohio, started her career as a 19-year-old undergraduate in… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Vinalhaven to celebrate work of noted children’s author

Margaret Wise Brown, author of such children's classics as Goodnight Moon, The Runaway Bunny and The Little Island, had a deep love for Vinalhaven. In fact, the home she bought on Long Cove is the only house she ever owned. Perhaps that's why she called it the Only House. Brown… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Imagination, creativity kindled in fairy houses

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. Alana Flanagan works on Vinalhaven with the school and Partners in Island Education; she leaves her fellowship… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Kayaking: Easy access to ocean, but risks often underestimated

In the 20 years she’s been operating her kayak business, Karen Francoeur estimates she has introduced well over 1,000 people to the joys of paddling on Maine waters. “I started my business when kayaking was becoming a big thing,” she said, back in 1997. The sport took off, she remembers,… SEE MORE

Kaitlyn Mullen at the College of the Atlantic dock.

Working Waterfront

Mullen links ferry with research in Frenchman Bay

A new type of ferry linking Winter Harbor and Bar Harbor that’s also a research platform was established by a woman of many roles. Kaitlyn Mullen is a prominent marine mammal observer, world traveler, doctor of ocean engineering, tour operation manager and captain and professional singer/songwriter. Mullen is also something… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Island book club lands George Mitchell as speaker

There are many things that set Vinalhaven apart from the rest of the world but what really distinguishes us is our Gentlemen’s Book Group. Begun about ten years ago by an enterprising lobsterman trying to rise above his station, the group at first numbered about 15 island men. Of these,… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Downeast to Casco Bay, coastal conversations float all boats

It must have been six years ago now that this paper made a concerted effort to add Washington County content. I recall raising grant funds to make it possible. The thought back then was that Washington County coastal communities shared a great deal in common with the island and remote coastal communities elsewhere in Maine. A… SEE MORE

Landowner Mark Alley and Island Institute Fellow Jessi Duma at the garden Alley is allowing Duma and her colleagues to bring back after a long period of lying fallow.

Working Waterfront

Cranberry Islanders reseed a growing tradition

Here and there around Great Cranberry Island, a flock of geese runs as one around its pen, a trio of sheep explores a grassy apple orchard, a brace of goats peer through a fence, and a whole lot of gardens in various sizes and configurations bloom with delicious vegetables and… SEE MORE

Some of the early members of Maine Coast Artists

Working Waterfront

Maine rocks the arts, the arts rock Maine

In 2012, according to the U.S. Federal Bureau of Economic Analysis, arts and culture production accounted for $698 billion, or 4.32 percent of the nation’s economy. Surprise: that’s more than construction, transportation or tourism. In Maine, by 2014, there were 3,262 arts-related businesses sustaining 10,667 jobs. In other words, the arts account for… SEE MORE