Down East AUG 09 P60-67, 95-98 Schoodic Across Frenchman's Bay from Bar Harbor lies a dramatic corner of Acadia National Park that is also one of the last of the great Down East fishing communities. BY VIRGINIA WRIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY BY ALAN LAVALLEE CADILLAC VISTAS The Schoodic Peninsula - made up of Winter Harbor (pictured) and Gouldsboro - includes a gorgeous, 2,366- acre section of Acadia National Park, and yet it receives just one-tenth the number of visitors as Mount Desert Island. For travelers who have explored Bar Harbor, Schoodic is a spectacular new place to discover. id the lobsterboats wake you at 4:30?" innkeeper Megan Moshier called brightly from the kitchen, which was emanating an enticing aroma of baked apple pancakes. No, I told her, I slept like a log. "My grandmother used to say that it was her favorite sound," Megan said. I imagined Elsa Alley, who raised four children in this gabled nineteenth- century home, snug in her bed, listen- ing for husband Carroll's boat among the dozens of engines roaring to life across the road in Prospect Harbor. The scene outside Elsa's Inn on the Harbor, which Megan and Glenn Moshier own with Megan's parents, Jeff and Cindy Alley, is much as it was when Carroll Alley fished here. True, Stinson Seafood, the last sardine cannery on the eastern seaboard, no longer sits on a wharf that flexed and twisted over storm-churned waves, but securely on land in the shadow of a gigantic fisherman bearing a can of Beach Cliff Sardines. And true, the lobsterboats are bigger and no doubt louder than they were when Elsa lay listening to them. Nevertheless, these working vessels, not pleasure boats, fill the harbor, just as lobster traps and buoys adorn lawns up and down the entire Schoodic Peninsula. Fishing is not a relic here as it has become in ports south. It permeates every facet of the culture and economy. "My father, grandfather, and great grandfather were all lobster- men," Jeff Alley told me one afternoon in Elsa's parlor. "My grand- father moved here in the late 1930s and he lobstered until he was ic Point seventy-six. My dad lobstered until he was seventy-nine. He got spectacular sick when he had traps in the water, and he died with traps in the close). By e) and Bunkers water. My brother and I went out and brought his traps in." eaceful havens Lobstering was the last thing Alley, now sixty, wanted to do e modern world. when he graduated high school. He joined the army, spending six years in Germany, and another three at bases around the United States. "I would come home on leave and my father and brother would be talking about fishing," he recalled. "It was a family thing, and I wanted to be part of it. Once I got started, I found I really did love it." He and his son, Jeff Jr., own two of the twenty commercial lobsterboats that fish year-round from Prospect Harbor. There are about one hundred and fifty licensed lobster fishermen peninsula-wide. "You find that story of moving away and coming back here a lot," Megan said. She grinned. "Iknew I wasn't coming back." After college, she worked in the hospitality industry in Washington, Honolulu, Philadelphia, and, finally, Boston. Expecting their first child and wrestling with how to minimize his time in day care, she and Glenn wistfully recalled their own carefree childhoods on the peninsula. A few months later, they were managing J.M. Gerrish Provisions, Winter Harbor's beloved ice cream parlor, with baby Andrew snug in a pack on Megan's back. Now eight, Andrew and his younger brother, Emmett, practi- cally live outdoors, riding their bikes, building tree houses, play- ing freely. "I know they're safe, and they have all the opportunities A SLOWER PACE More than a hundred years ago, wealthy rusticators built grand summer cottages and an Episcopal church (above) in Winter Harbor as a quiet alternative to the villages of Mount Desert Island. Schoodic still has that laid-back vibe. Agitator 64 WWW.DOWNEAST.COM Sea and shore are not merely scenery. For Schoodic fishermen they are a way of life. Schoodic is where, in the minds of locals, at least, Down East Maine really begins. BOLD COASTLINE Acadia's Schoodic District is high on natural drama yet offers a low-key recreational experience. Except for a few hiking trails leading to 440-foot Schoodic Head, the park encourages meandering and contemplation rather than physical challenges. QUINTESSENTIAL MAINE "Everyone knows tourism is big in this also state," Dana Rice, to says to "but the Gouldsboro 90 fishing lighthouses percent communities." harbormaster of like the tourists come see They come see Prospect Harbor Point Light (below). TWO TOWNS, ONE PLACE Schoodic encompasses two towns, Winter Harbor (population 988) and Gouldsboro (population 1,941). With its yacht club (above), Gouldsboro Winter Harbor emits an air of exclusivity while Gouldsboro has the last U.S. sardine cannery. Jones Pond Sea and shore are not merely scenery. They are the means of 195 Forbes Pond livelihood for the fishermen who harvest lobster, scallops, and 186 urchins, and for the one hundred-and-twenty-five people who work at Stinson Seafood, the peninsula's largest employer. Some folks Corea Winter follow the seasons. They dig clams and bloodworms, make Frenchman's Harbor Prospect Harbor Bay wreathes, rake blueberries, cut wood, farm. Even the artists and Bar Harbor Grindstone craftspeople depend on the environment; it is their inspiration. Neck 3 Bunkers Tourism is important, too, but it has not subsumed the Eagle Harbor Lake peninsula. This part of Acadia attracts about 250,000 visi- tors a year, about one-tenth the number that jams the park's much larger (30,300 acres) section on Mount Desert Island, an hour's drive west. With its sweeping views of MDI and the pounding surf at Schoodic Point, Acadia's Schoodic District is high on natural drama, yet a low-key for programmed activities that kids in more urban areas have, but recreational experience. Except for a none of the stress," Megan said. "Things haven't changed much IF YOU GO few hiking trails leading to 440-foot here since I was a kid. Most people don't even lock their doors. In The drive from Bar Harbor to the Schoodic Head, the park encourages winter, we leave the cars running while we go into the IGA. We live Schoodic Peninsula meandering, contemplative exploration a way of life that no longer exists in most parts of this country." takes about one hour. rather than sweaty physical challenges. During the summer, a The laid-back pace is reflected in the est known for hosting a 2,366-acre sea-swept ferry travels between peninsula's two towns, Winter Harbor B section of Acadia National Park, the Schoodic Bar Harbor and Winter Harbor. The (population: 988) and Gouldsboro (popu- Peninsula is, in the minds of locals, at least, where Island Explorer's free lation: 1,941). Together they host a hand- Down East Maine really begins. The claim is not hard shuttle service also ful of restaurants, several B-and-Bs, and to defend. As soon as you leave wide, fast Route 1, serves Schoodic from one small motel. More than one hundred the countryside opens up and the pace slows down, June 23 to Aug. 31. years ago, two Boston businessmen seized whether you choose Route 195, which runs straight down the There is no entrance fee. For more on much this same atmosphere to sell lots peninsula's center to Prospect Harbor, or Route 186, which loops information, visit the at Grindstone Neck in Winter Harbor, the coastline like a necklace. Both two-lane roads pass coves, park's Web site at then part of Gouldsboro. Wealthy rustica- ponds, blueberry barrens, and mossy heaths. The pines, draped www.nps.gov/acad or tors seeking a quiet alternative to Bar with lichen like Spanish moss, are stunted by Atlantic winds, SO call 207-288-3338. Harbor built grand cottages overlooking the land is exposed and bright. island-studded CONTINUED ON PAGE 95 AUGUST 2009 67 Schoodic of land that she hopes will someday be a CONTINUED FROM PAGE 67 Frenchman's national park (she has also purchased Bay. Boasting its own wharves, a golf course, roughly forty acres on MDI, all parcels swimming pool, and tennis courts, the that are part of Acadia's long-term acquisi- summer colony forever altered community tion plan). In Winter Harbor, residents dynamics, not least because Winter Harbor chafed when Quimby bought and razed quickly seceded in order to reap the benefits several village houses shortly after mov- for itself. The town developed as the only ing to town a few years ago. She replaced peninsula village with a commercial core, one of the buildings, a rambling Victorian albeit a tiny and charming one overlooking that old-timers fondly recall as "Dr. Holt's Blue-Gray Eyes its namesake, a deep, sheltered cove that has place," with Mama's Boy, an upscale by Candlelight never been closed by ice. restaurant that is bigger than anything A match struck. The candle lit. A room Grindstone's cottagers have been else on Main Street except perhaps the warmed to the light. Her blue-gray eyes generous, none more SO than banking old meetinghouse, Hammond Hall. A gift came to life again. I have to admit I have heir and former owner of the Philadelphia always loved blue-gray eyes. for Quimby's chef son who ran it just two 76ers Fitz Eugene Dixon, Jr., who was seasons, Mama's Boy has been closed Soft, translucent, smokey blue-gray, a gentle color. Cut in cabochon, usually set born on the neck in the summer of 1923. since 2006. Likewise, weeds grow on in yellow gold. For whatever reason, this Listed three times in Forbes as one of the another former house lot where four years ring possesses mystic appeal. Women four hundred richest Americans, Dixon ago Quimby offered to build a village love it, I've never fully understood why, gave to causes small and large. He built the green. "She seems to have lost interest," they just do. peninsula's only supermarket, helped fund Barto says. "Maybe she felt people were Blue-Gray Aquamarine Ring 8x6mm #X 1620 $685.00 Winter Harbor's gymnasium, and every making too many off-the-wall demands, summer laid down a hundred dollars for a Absolute Satisfaction Guaranteed but she asked for the input and she got it." 1-800-433-2988 single pecan pie at the Acadia Community Gouldsboro's reputation as a summer- Open Mon-Sat 9:30am-5:00pm Women's Club's bazaar. In 2002, when ing place, meanwhile, is relatively new. the U.S. Navy closed its Schoodic Point, Seasonal homeowners have been trickling Cross Jewelers Winter Harbor, and Corea facilities, onto the peninsula over the last fifteen to Jewelers to New England Since 1908 570 Congress St., Portland, ME 04101 ©03 twenty years, but in sprawling Gouldsboro, the visual impact is dispersed among the The peninsula is villages of Birch Harbor, Corea, Prospect still adjusting to life NEW BOOK! Harbor, and South and West Gouldsboro. without the navy, which "Bar Harbor has always had the really A Field Guide to affluent people, and it was very rare that employed 270 officers you'd find a million-dollar home on this the Wabanaki and enlisted personnel side of Frenchman's Bay other than at Grindstone Neck," says Paul Tracy, a NOTES and 145 civilians. fourth-generation owner of the Winter ON LOST Harbor Agency, an insurance and real A Field the Dixon gave what many regard as his estate firm. "Now we're seeing more and finest gift by renovating and marketing the more of those big homes ourselves." housing that was being turned over to the Given the way their paths diverged, it's town. "All he wanted was reimbursement not surprising that the towns developed for his expenses," Winter Harbor Town a rivalry, often exuberantly expressed Manager Roger Barto says, "but in the end at school basketball games, a popular he not only returned $4.75 million for the pastime here, according to Tracy, whose housing, he also donated his lawyer's fees, great grandfather was a Winter Harbor about $250,000, because he thought they secessionist. Two recent school crises, Notes on a Lost Flute is chock full of fun were too high." Dixon died in 2006, but however, have strengthened ties. When information and fascinating facts about the his gift keeps giving - the town uses the their grammar school was shuttered by "time-places" of ancient Maine. Discover interest to pay for public improvements, mold, 157 Gouldsboro students were new and surprising things about paths we such as the sidewalks, benches, and street- eagerly welcomed at the Winter Harbor travel and objects we encounter every day. lights that were installed this spring. school, whose enrollment had plunged By contrast, another multimillionaire from 175 to 28 students after the navy Save 15% summer resident, Roxanne Quimby, has left town. This fall, students from both online with code D0908R3. Offer expires 8/31/09. some folks scratching their heads. The towns will enter a brand new consolidated grammar school in Prospect Harbor. From the publishers of Down East Burt's Bees founder is a controversial figure www.downeast.com 800-685-7962 in northern Maine for acquiring vast tracts "There's more cooperation between the AUGUST 2009 95 towns now," Tracy observes, "but I've always thought of us as one community. We go to the same benefit suppers and the same Little League games. We all shop at the IGA and have coffee at Chase's." T he peninsula is still adjusting to life without the navy, which employed 270 officers and enlisted personnel and 145 civilians. "Our biggest loss is in social capital - the diversity of people and the volunteers who coached school teams, worked at the libraries, and ran the lobster festival," Roger Barstow says. Welcome to the "The navy families helped with just about anything we asked them to do. When a neighborhood large group of people in their twenties and thirties leave, you're left with a much Penobscot Shores older community." retirement for the young at heart! The economic impact has been mixed. The sale of navy housing brought in new residents, mostly summer people, and that's Maine's Premier Oceanfront penobscotshores.com been good for some businesses. "They use Retirement Community the restaurants, the IGA, me," says agent Paul Tracy. "They have to buy insurance, 207.338.2332 888. 519. 0513 order home heating oil, buy gas. A lot more 10 Shoreland Drive, Belfast, Maine 04915 money is being spread around." "We'd all like to see more Down East Subscription FAQs year-round people, but we need the businesses to Q. I recently ordered a subscription. the issue you missed. Or, if you prefer, we will replace When will I see my first copy? the missing issue if we have extra copies. employ them." A. Expect your first issue to arrive in four to eight weeks. Q. I received two copies of last month's issue. Q. Where can I find my account number What should I do? and expiration date? A. In the event that you receive more than one copy of an issue, please call 800-727-7422 (US) or 207-594- Pete Drinkwater, however, finds DEM0005646377 48 JAN 08 9544 (outside the US) and we will fix the problem. things neither better nor worse at his Account # Expire Date MR & MRS ROBERT SMITH Q. Are back issues and slipcases available? 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Once we have received your subscription order, your first issue will arrive within four to eight weeks. Down East or. thanks to Schoodic Arts for All, which After that, your issues should arrive around the 15th of Subscription Department Down East Magazine the month prior to the cover date. If you've missed an P.O. Box 37047 P.O. Box 679 responded to the base closure with a issue or it is two weeks past our delivery date-due Boone, IA 50037 Camden, ME 04843 campaign to save Hammond Hall, a to postal delivery problems or an error-give us a call magnificent 1904 meetinghouse on and we'll extend your subscription to compensate for Thank You! Winter Harbor's Main Street that was slated 96 WWW.DOWNEAST.COM to be burned for fire practice (Fitz Dixon with forty full- and part-time got the ball rolling with a fifty thousand- employees. The dollar donation). The organization has Vacationland since filled the space year-round with concerts, plays, art exhibits, and classes, T he lobsterboats woke me my last Concierge morning in Prospect Harbor. I stole and its monthly coffeehouses are valued to the window to watch the boats Personalized vacation services as much for their music as for their socia- depart and wondered if the peninsula's Event planning & rentals Tickets & reservations bility. Programs peak in early August with unadorned beauty and the relative subtlety Information services the Schoodic Arts Festival that this of the tourist economy lulls residents into Sitters & companions summer boasts nearly thirty performances thinking their home is immune to change. Corporate & personal services and eighty workshops. The center also Later in the day, Dana Rice, Gouldsboro's Call today! 1-800-851-1798 supports the Schoodic International harbormaster and a lobster dealer, talked www.vacationlandconcierge.com Sculpture Symposium, a fledgeling event as if he'd heard my thoughts. "People that brings sculptors from around the think we're far enough east that tourism world to Acadia National Park from late won't overwhelm us," he asserted, "but July to early September. Working out- Bar Harbor is just five or six miles across doors, the artists create large granite the bay, and it's a tourist trap. It hasn't public artworks for Maine communities. happened here yet almost by accident. "We've addressed the local economy in a My fear is that when the economy turns YOUR BEST FRIEND IS WAITING very measurable way," the center's executive around, it will hit us like a tidal wave. director, Mary Laury, says. "We're a very ADOPT TODAY Let's let the tourists bring the dollars and Almost Home Rescue is an all- community-based art center that is a center- enjoy what we take for granted, but let's volunteer Maine organization piece for downtown renovation. Sixteen also make sure our children and grand- committed to rescuing dogs from creative businesses have moved to the children can have jobs." Southern kill shelters and placing Schoodic Peninsula since we began our Rice met me at a deteriorated 120-year- them in loving New England homes. programs at Hammond Hall." old lobster pound that he purchased for www.AlmostHomeRescue.net The navy's Schoodic Point headquarters, $345,000 at a foreclosure auction this Down East proudly supports Almost Home Rescue meanwhile, have been returned to the spring. "My family has a long association land's original owner, Acadia National with this pound," said Rice, whose great Park, which is converting the base into grandfather and father-in-law were the stunning seaside campus of the pound keepers there, "but I didn't do this Schoodic Education and Research Center for sentimental reasons. I'm completely (SERC), whose mission is to advance dedicated to locking this in as a working science and learning. "At the time the base waterfront long after I'm done with it." was being decommissioned, about twenty A former fisherman himself, Rice of these new science and learning centers buys as much as 18,000 pounds of were being created throughout the national lobster a day during peak season. He park system," explains Dennis O'Brien, plans to rebuild the pound, which has executive director of the nonprofit Acadia five hundred feet of water frontage Partners for Science and Learning, which in Bunkers Harbor. "The lobstering was created to carry out the conversion. industry and the herring industry are "Acadia National Park made a gutsy call about the two only viable fisheries in the because this one is many orders of magni- state of Maine today, and very few people tude bigger than the others. We're taking away from the waterfront realize how advantage of the facilities- there are thirty- important they are to the state economy," six major buildings-and we want to be an he said. "Everyone knows tourism is a economic engine for the community." big thing in the state, but 90 percent of JAMES WALTER SCHILDROTH Though it is still very much a work in the tourists come to see the fishing ARCHITECT progress, SERC has already raised the communities." Organic Architecture since 1970 profile of Acadia's eastern side by hosting There are signs that the peninsula is Member: Frank Lloyd Wright Taliesin Fellowship a diverse collection of science scholars, indeed on the cusp of transformation. from the thirty-five entomologists who There are, for example, the million-dollar P.O. BOX 275 Wiscasset, ME 04578 spent several days collecting and identi- 207-882-6305 homes that Paul Tracy talked about, a fying butterflies to the seven hundred construction trend that cooled when the Maine middle schoolers who conducted national economy went sour. The poten- More photos at our Web site: biological research in the park. The goal, tial for far more rapid and sweeping www.schildrotharchitect.com O'Brien says, is a twelve-month operation change, however, is packaged in AUGUST 2009 97 NOW AVAILABLE! a controversial proposal for a mammoth NEW resort that could have as many as one 15TH EDITION thousand seasonal homes, two hotels, a CATALOG 112 Pages, golf course, and environmental educa- Full Color tion centers on three thousand wooded $15. AND OR DOWNLOAD acres adjacent to Acadia National Park. FOR FREE After a flurry of news reports last year, 800-992-0121 little has been heard from the developer, Designing and Manufacturing www.postandbeam.com Any Place on the Planet Winter Harbor Properties, a group of Custom Post & Beam Homes, Additions and Specialty habitat twenty investors who have SO far Buildings Since 1972 www.epriorjewelry.com remained anonymous. In December, two POST & BEAM® SHIPPING NATIONWIDE LATITUDE & LONGITUDE Maine firms hired to help develop the Dpt. DE36, 21 Elm St., So. Deerfield, MA 01373 project quit, citing philosophical disagree- ments and difficulties getting paid. Park officials and conservation groups NEW BOOK! Mountains are opposed to the project, which they say of would break up wildlife habitat and Mountains of Maine Maine Get the informative, quirky, and sometimes downright hilarious answers Intriguing Stories Behind Their to how Maine mountains got their names. Mountains of Maine puts The potential for rapid together histories that include intriguing facts and local legends. change in Schoodic Get 15% off Mountains of Maine online at DownEast.com with code D0908R2. Offer expires 8/31/09. is packaged in a Meet the author! Meet Steve Pinkham Sunday, August 16 at the Moosehead controversial proposal Historical Society's Authors Day. FMI: 207-695-2909. for a mammoth resort. From the publishers of Down East Steve Pinkham www.downeast.com 800-685-7962 compromise the isolated beauty of Schoodic Head. Many residents, though, are with- holding judgment as they cautiously await details. "I know why I and a lot of other people moved here: The area is unique and we don't want to mess it up," says Peter Drinkwater, who serves on the Winter Harbor Planning Board and the Schoodic Scenic Byway Corridor Management MAINE WILDERNESS Committee. "But if they follow the subdivi- LODGES sion ordinance and byway rules, they could Discover your do something very nice." Roger Barto agrees: "I think a carefully planned development could work here," natural state. he says. "In order for the town to continue to grow, it's got to have some place to grow An Appalachian Mountain Club into. If you tie it all up in conservancy, as some people want, you lose the tax experience in the heart of the dollars." 100-Mile Wilderness. Rice, too, says he's not necessarily opposed to the project - or any other TWO UNIQUE LODGES. ENDLESS development that comes the Schoodic EXPLORATION ON TRAILS AND WATER Peninsula's way. "In the next ten or twenty www.outdoors.org/mainelodges years, there are going to be some huge changes on this peninsula," he predicts. "It's our responsibility to realize what could happen in just one generation. We can seek a happy medium. We need to protect the lobster-fishing community. Without it, there'd be nothing here. It would just be a resort."