Articles
Andrew Wyeth 1917–2009
(Andrew Wyeth died quietly at his home in Chadds Ford, Penn. January 16, 2009) Andrew Wyeth, along with his wife Betsy, were the very first founding members of the Island Institute. Their vision, which they never stopped supporting, respected the islands as traditional outposts of a self-sufficient way of life, even as Maine’s islands began
The Long View: Sustainable island living
Soren Hermansen, Samso Island Denmark’s renewable energy ambassador to the world, was in Maine last month as a guest of the Island Institute. He visited islanders on Chebeague and Long, spoke to a crowd of 200 in Portland, met with 50-60 Vinalhaven and North Haven residents and students before appearing as the keynote speaker at
The Long View: The Maine lobster business model is broken
The second half of the 20th century ended a little late in calendar terms the first week of October 2008. That was the week that everyone from Iceland’s international depositors to Maine lobstermen and from Wall Street financiers to Russian oligarchs began to recognize that our intricately inter-dependent and globally profligate indebtedness will extract a
Island energy costs are a microcosm of Maine
In the event that it might have escaped your notice, the Public Utility Commission recently approved an emergency rate increase for the Monhegan Power Company to 70 cents per kilowatt-hour-up from 55 cents per kilowatt-hour. Since islanders use an estimated average of 15-17 kilowatt hours per day, this translates to an electric bill of between
The Long View: Lobsters–the rest of the story
A deep sense of unease pervades the waterfronts of Maine’s 145 lobster villages scattered between York Harbor and Eastport. During the past four years lobstermen have been squeezed by continuously declining harvests and declining prices – not how the laws of supply and demand are supposed to work-while also trying to adapt their businesses to
The Long View: From Many Fish at Low Prices to Fewer Fish for More Money
Fishing may not be the oldest profession on earth – other human preoccupations perhaps better qualify – but societies around the globe have gone down to the sea and shore to cast their nets for fish since prior to the dawn of civilization when farming began. For centuries, cod and haddock were fished from Maine’s
Islanders Are Hearty Folk (Not)
With this issue of The Working Waterfront, we bid farewell to our founding editor, David Platt, who is not exactly sailing off into the sunset, but has retired from his fulltime duties as editor of the newspaper, Island Journal and publications director for the Island Institute. During the past 15 years that he manned the
Islanders Are Hearty Folk (Not)
The Long View: Islands are the Canaries in the Oil Patch
While the rest of the United States is feeling the pain of rapidly increased fuel prices, rural Maine is in far more desperate shape and island Maine is in the most vulnerable predicament of all American communities outside perhaps of Alaska. On Maine islands, fuel prices have already exceeded $5 a gallon for heating and
The Long View: Survivors
People often ask if Maine’s island communities can really be expected to survive in the long run. Especially now — with food, fuel, ferries and energy prices soaring and the harvest of lobsters declining for the first time in over 15 years — the question has additional urgency. Matt Simmons, a prominent oil industry analyst