Working Waterfront

Fernalds’ fall firewood ritual

The islands are pretty active in October as most of us get ready for winter. This year, summer lingered beyond September and we’re off to a gorgeous beginning of a chore-filled month. The weather is so beautiful that there is no hardship in being outdoors to do the fall jobs.… SEE MORE

A seasonal house on Vinalhaven. FILE PHOTO: TOM GROENING

Working Waterfront

Vinalhaven nonprofit starts housing project

With the help of a $840,000 Maine Housing grant, the Vinalhaven Housing Initiative begins construction this fall on its first project to create affordable homes for islanders, year-round workers, and elders priced out of the housing market. “It’s a crisis,” said Dylan Jackson, the group’s project director. “Soaring housing costs… SEE MORE

DOT Commissioner Bruce Van Note speaks at the ceremony. PHOTO: ALEX ZIPPARO

Working Waterfront

New Matinicus boat commissioned

The new ferry is named after a heroic Maine veteran and member of the Penobscot Nation who served as a combat medic during the D-Day invasion of France in 1944. Private Shay saved many lives on Omaha Beach and was awarded the Silver Star and French Legion of Honor... SEE MORE

Sara Rademaker, left, and Anne Langston Noll, winners of the Phyllis Wyeth Visionary Award.

Working Waterfront

Herring Gut center honors Rademaker, Langston Noll

In August, Herring Gut Coastal Science Center honored two women active on the coast with an award named in honor of Phyllis Wyeth, founder of the educational center based in Port Clyde. The Phyllis Wyeth Visionary Award was given to Anne Langston Noll and Sara Rademaker. Langston Noll, as associate… SEE MORE

David Dewey working on site in Rockland. PHOTO: COURTESY OF ARTIST

Working Waterfront

David Dewey’s Rockland

As a painter of light, Dewey explains, watercolor is a natural medium. “It is all about light through the transparent layering of color pigments on white paper,” he writes. SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

‘Island girl’ returns to teach on Isle au Haut

Kipp Quinby’s new job is a sort of homecoming. In September, she took over as the teacher of Isle au Haut’s one-room school house, the same room where she attended school as a child. SEE MORE

Students at work in courses on electric outboard maintenance and repair. PHOTO: YVONNE THOMAS

Working Waterfront

Going electric—Training technicians to work on electric outboards

The topic was electric outboards and the course was created with boat yard technicians in mind, but designed for a wide range of levels of familiarity with the content. It was offered in Rockland at Mid-Coast School of Technology in July and in Farmington at Foster Career and Technical Education Center in August. SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

After the storms: Downeast coast rebuilds

The owners of Chipman’s Wharf, a seafood market, lobster buying station, and restaurant in Milbridge, had a brutal awakening after the powerful January storms wiped away their 106-foot wharf. SEE MORE

From left, new Island Institute Fellows: Mark Gorski, Lucia Daranyi, Thomas McClellan, Erin Dent, and Taylor Rossini. PHOTO: JACK SULLIVAN

Working Waterfront

Island Institute welcomes five new Fellows

Island Institute’s flagship fellowship program, which is celebrating its 25th year, welcomes five new Island Institute Fellows, two new community partners, and five continuing Fellows. The program brings recent college graduates to island and coastal towns to work for two years on a community’s public priorities. The new Fellows are:… SEE MORE

Sir William Cornelius Van Horne’s “.007,” ca. 1897, oil on canvas.

Working Waterfront

A painter on Ministers Island

David Sullivan’s Minister’s Island: Sir William Van Horne’s Summer Home in St. Andrews (2007) tells the remarkable story of this 500-acre island just off that New Brunswick resort community. SEE MORE