Down East, Maine is a unique place. I have been writing about this “uniqueness” for some time now, so it’s refreshing to find a new book that offers a trove of some quirky stories that add to the unusual luster this place provides. In Jim Harnedy’s new book, Forgotten Tales of Down East Maine, place […]
On a morning crisp in its chill, the autumnal clock stirs as colors flow through the veins of leaves in tall stands of trees, saturating them with a last breath of summer. I step outside for a walk behind the house. I can see my breath bend in the cold air and hear the trees’ […]
“We are known for helping each other—across town lines, or whatever it takes. If someone needs help, the help comes quick and in many ways,” says Joe McBrine. A Maine game warden, McBrine sees in his job and in the place he lives that people are the common denominator when it comes to community. “Very […]
Life seems to come in two chapters: a time when we are young, looking forward to the future; and that time when we are older— glancing back, remembering, trying to stave off tomorrow’s arrival. In Deborah Gould’s novel,The Eastern: Later On, we find a story that is woven from the fabric of both young and […]
A mission to Saipan to pickup wounded from the battle of Iwo Jima, piloting home a plane filled to the brim with American prisoners of war at the end of WWII and a passion to preserve and record the past— these are just a few snapshots in the life of Frank Foster Jr. When asked […]
Many years ago, fresh out of college and a couple of years into my first job, I read the book First Person Rural, Essays of a Sometime Farmer, written in 1978 by Noel Perrin. After finishing the book I was convinced that one day I would go to Vermont, buy a 10-acre farm, raise chickens, […]
A friend of mine visiting Downeast for the first time mentioned shortly after arriving that he noticed a drastic change in the air and in the light. Paraphrasing, he commented, “The air is tinged with the scent of salt, and the light is brighter. Everything here seems so different, even the shadows appear out of […]
“I can’t live one day without hearing music, playing it, studying it, or thinking about it,” Leonard Bernstein once said. And if Susan Aceto is successful, neither will the Machias Bay area live without music. This year marks the first time Aceto is at the helm of Machias Bay Chamber Concerts (MBCC) as president of […]
Pack the parka and the snowshoes and throw in a six-pack for good measure as we travel to Canada, a place many call the “Great White North” because of its vast expanse of snow and wilderness. The term was also used as the title for a Canadian comedy sketch about living in Canada in the […]
For sailors out there, Maxwell Taylor Kennedy’s newest book, Sea Change: A Man, A Boat, A Journey Home, provides a gripping adventure even a landlubber would appreciate. With the swagger of a sea story, a monumental task pursued, hardships faced with subtle glints of humor thrown in for measure, the book tackles the reality boats bring […]
