There is nothing like startlingly fresh information and thoughtful analysis, such as recently presented in a new Brookings Institution report, “Charting Maine’s Future,” to help us answer whether Maine’s economic and government policies are on the right or wrong track. And then to think about what these new findings mean for the coast and islands
Nature Conservancy Receives Large Tract of Land in Phippsburg
In October, an anonymous donor gave 1,910 acres of land in Phippsburg to The Nature Conservancy. The new tract, to be called “The Basin Preserve,” is one of the largest unfragmented forest blocks in the midcoast region, a wondrous mixture of steep hemlock gorges and pitch pine forest and four miles of shoreline frontage along
Off the Grid
To the editor: In the headline for The Long View “Summah People — Some Ahrn’t” [WWF Sept. 06] did one of those summah people sneak that “r” into “Ahn’t?” The article was pleasingly positive about summer people, without offending us natives. The possibility of no ferry service to Digby, presented in “Efforts are underway to
Island Isolation
To the editor, The solution to Campobello Island’s isolation from the rest of Canada [WWF Oct. 06] would be the sale or ceding of the island to the U.S. The only negative implication would be the loss of socialized medicine to the Island population since the population would have to be assimilated into the State
Pen Pal
To the editor: My compliments to Melissa Hayes on her tribute to Elizabeth Ogilvie [WWF Oct. 06]. She was my pen pal author when I attended Winthrop Junior High in 7th grade in 1967! Charlie Ault Damariscotta
The Power of Stories
To the editor: One of your devoted followers has left our midst. In her wake she leaves people like me who are landlubbers but nevertheless who’ve been affected deeply because of her draw to the ocean. In her mid-teens, as the Great Depression fell hard on the land, Marguerite and her friends would take their
Vegetable fleet puts to sea
“There is nothing, simply nothing, like messing about in–pumpkins?” (with apologies to Rat in Wind in the Willows) But pumpkin boats? It’s true. Right here in mid-coast Maine, adventurous farmer-sailors grow Giant Atlantic pumpkins, only to slice them in half, hollow them out and put to sea in their veggie coracles. A recent pumpkin regatta
Sentinel Species The State of the World’s Oceans, Courtesy of their Whales
A whale in the ocean might seem very different from the proverbial canary in the coal mine. But a team of leading scientists, including two from Maine, is setting out to prove that whales might be our best warning of the global extent of pollution. The Lincoln, MA-based Ocean Alliance is leading a research project
FREYA departs Vinalhaven for “the adventure of a lifetime”
It was foggy, rainy and windy on Sept. 24th when Vinalhaven vocational education teacher Mark Jackson and one of his students, Philip Hopkins, set off on the 30-foot steel sloop Freya for the first six-week leg of a four-leg trip down and up the east coast. Crewmembers will change in the Chesapeake Bay area and
North Haven embarks on affordable housing
With a two-acre lot donated by a local resident, $25,000 in locally raised funds and a matching grant from the Islands Challenge Fund, the members of North Haven Sustainable Housing (NHSH) are ready to start construction on an energy efficient, affordable home. Beginning in 2004, NHSH, an all-volunteer community group, saw the need for year-round