PAST EVENTS
2021
THE HALF LIFE OF WAR
A community readers theater production featuring letters, diaries, and photographs from the North Haven Historical Society. Performed in collaboration with Waterman's Community Center on February 26 and 27, 2021.
Recorded and edited by Maddie Hallowell, 2021.
A community readers theater production featuring letters, diaries, and photographs from the North Haven Historical Society. Performed in collaboration with Waterman's Community Center on February 26 and 27, 2021.
Recorded and edited by Maddie Hallowell, 2021.
CIRCUMAMBULATION : A WALKING JOURNEY AROUND NORTH HAVEN ISLAND
A presentation by Lydia Brown on March 20, 2021 with photographs and descriptions of the shoreline of North Haven.
Hosted by Waterman's Community Center with editing by Maddie Hallowell.
A presentation by Lydia Brown on March 20, 2021 with photographs and descriptions of the shoreline of North Haven.
Hosted by Waterman's Community Center with editing by Maddie Hallowell.
MAINE'S ARCHAEOLOGICAL SHELL HEAPS : A CONVERSATION WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF MAINE'S MIDDEN MINDERS
A presentation about Maine Midden Minders and Indigenous ceramics with Dr. Bonnie Newsom and Dr. Alice Kelley from the University of Maine. As a community science project, Maine Midden Minders seeks to document and monitor the erosion of shell middens along the Maine coast. For more information, please see https://umaine.edu/middenminders/.
Hosted by the North Haven Historical Society, Waterman's Community Center, and North Haven Conservation Partners with editing by Maddie Hallowell. Recording available until May 2022.
A presentation about Maine Midden Minders and Indigenous ceramics with Dr. Bonnie Newsom and Dr. Alice Kelley from the University of Maine. As a community science project, Maine Midden Minders seeks to document and monitor the erosion of shell middens along the Maine coast. For more information, please see https://umaine.edu/middenminders/.
Hosted by the North Haven Historical Society, Waterman's Community Center, and North Haven Conservation Partners with editing by Maddie Hallowell. Recording available until May 2022.
2020
PLEASE NOTE - The North Haven Historical Society cancelled all events during 2020 in an effort to keep our community safe in the COVID-19 pandemic. While we will greatly miss gathering together with you all, we look forward to the day when we can do so safely.
Despite canceling our events, we still seek to share information about the authors, educators, artists, and organizations we planned to host in 2020. Like so many of us, they are navigating the challenges of this time. Like so many of us, the ways they sustain themselves have become dramatically altered by this pandemic. Please seek them out and, if you are able, support them in their work.
A note about the events we had planned for 2020 -- we chose to center events around the theme of education, in honor of our newest exhibit, Reading, Writing, & Roaming : Education on North Haven. We hoped to give space not only to the topic of schooling but also to the learning that happens within families and communities and the traditions that are passed down through generations. Also, like many other Maine museums and organizations, we planned events in recognition of Maine's bicentennial.
A note about the events we had planned for 2020 -- we chose to center events around the theme of education, in honor of our newest exhibit, Reading, Writing, & Roaming : Education on North Haven. We hoped to give space not only to the topic of schooling but also to the learning that happens within families and communities and the traditions that are passed down through generations. Also, like many other Maine museums and organizations, we planned events in recognition of Maine's bicentennial.
GENE CARTWRIGHT
Farmer and cider maker from Whaleback Farm in Lincolnville, Maine
Farmer and cider maker from Whaleback Farm in Lincolnville, Maine
From Whaleback Farm's website:
We are lucky to be the current stewards of a few acres of farmland cleared and cultivated generations ago. With sandy loam soils rich in organic matter and minerals sited on a gently sloping south facing hillside, the place was well chosen for agriculture. We wanted to carry on the local tradition of apple growing while preserving some of the old cultivated trees and wild seedlings we had found. It also made sense to break out of the cycle of soil eroding seasonal tilling, instead creating a multi-story habitat for birds and insects. So we set out with grafting knives and shovels, slowly propagating and planting fruiting trees and shrubs in orchard rows and naturalized hedges. Apples were soon joined by pears, plums, peaches and cherries while the hedgerows filled with elderberry, aronia, mulberry, haksap, wild cranberry and trellised grapes.
Learn more at www.whalebackcider.com.
Gene and his partner Meghan have made several visits to North Haven and in 2019 they gave a cider tasting at the Historical Society in collaboration with a walk and presentation with apple historian John Bunker. During their visit, they gathered a truckload of apples to make into an island cider and after bottling it this spring, Gene reports it's one of the best they've ever tasted!
We are lucky to be the current stewards of a few acres of farmland cleared and cultivated generations ago. With sandy loam soils rich in organic matter and minerals sited on a gently sloping south facing hillside, the place was well chosen for agriculture. We wanted to carry on the local tradition of apple growing while preserving some of the old cultivated trees and wild seedlings we had found. It also made sense to break out of the cycle of soil eroding seasonal tilling, instead creating a multi-story habitat for birds and insects. So we set out with grafting knives and shovels, slowly propagating and planting fruiting trees and shrubs in orchard rows and naturalized hedges. Apples were soon joined by pears, plums, peaches and cherries while the hedgerows filled with elderberry, aronia, mulberry, haksap, wild cranberry and trellised grapes.
Learn more at www.whalebackcider.com.
Gene and his partner Meghan have made several visits to North Haven and in 2019 they gave a cider tasting at the Historical Society in collaboration with a walk and presentation with apple historian John Bunker. During their visit, they gathered a truckload of apples to make into an island cider and after bottling it this spring, Gene reports it's one of the best they've ever tasted!
STEPHANIE CROSSMAN
Fiber artist in Vinalhaven, Maine
Fiber artist in Vinalhaven, Maine
Essence of Jelly Fish Ocean, a 3D netted sculpture by Stephanie Crossman
From Stephanie Crossman's website:
Traditional knotted netting, commonly known as fish netting, is an obscure fiber technique and my passion. In the past, I felt limited by the mainstream utilitarian marine usage of nets, such as seine nets or lobster trap heads. Using new and different fibers has precipitated changes in my work over more than 30 years. When I happened upon a tiny handmade needle in my husband's great-grandmother's antique tools, the metamorphosis began. Each knot is formed over a toothpick. Through trial and error, I designed a way to shape and stiffen each piece. This ability to make minute lace-like netting offered unlimited possibilities. I started by transforming sea life into three dimensional works of art. Since that time, I have designed original patterns from nature, including flowers, insects, and birds. I continued to explore this ancient technique and stretched the contemporary boundaries of netting. Each piece of art is individual and unique, signed and numbered. All are mounted in shadowboxes or domes.
My husband's great-grandmother taught me the basics of netting over 30 years ago when she was 92 years old. We both made nets for a marine supply company. I then started designing wearabIes such as bags, scarves, etc. After discovering the tiny metal needle in Gram's stash of netting supplies, I started experimenting with netting on a very small scale resulting in these sculptures.
Unlike crochet or knitting, netting is more closely related to lace-making. Because of its uniqueness, I especially cherish the fact that netting was passed down to me along with the handmade tools. I strive to keep utilitarian fish netting contemporary as it becomes more obscure. Creating new forms keeps it ever present on the world stage.
See more of Stephanie's work at www.stephaniecrossman.com and www.mainenetbags.com.
Locally, you can find her work at Hopkins Wharf Gallery on North Haven and New Era Gallery on Vinalhaven.
Traditional knotted netting, commonly known as fish netting, is an obscure fiber technique and my passion. In the past, I felt limited by the mainstream utilitarian marine usage of nets, such as seine nets or lobster trap heads. Using new and different fibers has precipitated changes in my work over more than 30 years. When I happened upon a tiny handmade needle in my husband's great-grandmother's antique tools, the metamorphosis began. Each knot is formed over a toothpick. Through trial and error, I designed a way to shape and stiffen each piece. This ability to make minute lace-like netting offered unlimited possibilities. I started by transforming sea life into three dimensional works of art. Since that time, I have designed original patterns from nature, including flowers, insects, and birds. I continued to explore this ancient technique and stretched the contemporary boundaries of netting. Each piece of art is individual and unique, signed and numbered. All are mounted in shadowboxes or domes.
My husband's great-grandmother taught me the basics of netting over 30 years ago when she was 92 years old. We both made nets for a marine supply company. I then started designing wearabIes such as bags, scarves, etc. After discovering the tiny metal needle in Gram's stash of netting supplies, I started experimenting with netting on a very small scale resulting in these sculptures.
Unlike crochet or knitting, netting is more closely related to lace-making. Because of its uniqueness, I especially cherish the fact that netting was passed down to me along with the handmade tools. I strive to keep utilitarian fish netting contemporary as it becomes more obscure. Creating new forms keeps it ever present on the world stage.
See more of Stephanie's work at www.stephaniecrossman.com and www.mainenetbags.com.
Locally, you can find her work at Hopkins Wharf Gallery on North Haven and New Era Gallery on Vinalhaven.
CATHARINE BIDDLE, PH.D
Associate Professor of Educational Leadership at the University of Maine in Orono
Associate Professor of Educational Leadership at the University of Maine in Orono
From Catharine Biddle's website:
I am an Associate Professor of Educational Leadership at the University of Maine. My research examines the way in which rural schools and communities respond to 21st century social and economic change. As part of this work, I co-lead the Rural Vitality Lab, a cross-institutional research partnership between the University of Maine and Colby College. My teaching and service reflect my interest in creating and sustaining healthy developmental ecologies for rural youth as I work with aspiring principals, teacher leaders and doctoral students to understand how educational leaders can better work with and be community leaders. I also currently serve as Co-Editor of the National Rural Education Association’s scholarly journal, The Rural Educator.
I am currently co-editing the Bloomsbury Handbook on Rural Education in the United States (release date: 2021) with Dr. Amy Azano and Dr. Karen Eppley, and am co-authoring a book for Harvard Education Press with Dr. Lyn Brown, Dr. Mark Tappan, and Brittany Ray entitled, Voice, Vitality and Healing: Centering Students in Trauma-Informed Schooling (release date: 2022).
I received my Ph.D. in Educational Leadership from Penn State’s Department of Education Policy Studies where I worked as a research affiliate of the Center on Rural Education and Communities. Before I became a researcher, I was the Executive Director of the Nanubhai Education Foundation, a 501c3 organization working in Gujarat, India on “Inspiring Students, Empowering Teachers, and Transforming Rural Classrooms”, as well as a high-school educator in rural India and a middle-school educator in South Boston with the national non-profit Citizen Schools.
Learn more at www.catbiddle.com.
View the video link below to "The Heart, the Drain, the Catapult and the Catalyst: Rural Schools and Leadership for Right Now," a presentation by Catharine Biddle for the Island Institute ILEAD Speaker Series in 2019.
I am an Associate Professor of Educational Leadership at the University of Maine. My research examines the way in which rural schools and communities respond to 21st century social and economic change. As part of this work, I co-lead the Rural Vitality Lab, a cross-institutional research partnership between the University of Maine and Colby College. My teaching and service reflect my interest in creating and sustaining healthy developmental ecologies for rural youth as I work with aspiring principals, teacher leaders and doctoral students to understand how educational leaders can better work with and be community leaders. I also currently serve as Co-Editor of the National Rural Education Association’s scholarly journal, The Rural Educator.
I am currently co-editing the Bloomsbury Handbook on Rural Education in the United States (release date: 2021) with Dr. Amy Azano and Dr. Karen Eppley, and am co-authoring a book for Harvard Education Press with Dr. Lyn Brown, Dr. Mark Tappan, and Brittany Ray entitled, Voice, Vitality and Healing: Centering Students in Trauma-Informed Schooling (release date: 2022).
I received my Ph.D. in Educational Leadership from Penn State’s Department of Education Policy Studies where I worked as a research affiliate of the Center on Rural Education and Communities. Before I became a researcher, I was the Executive Director of the Nanubhai Education Foundation, a 501c3 organization working in Gujarat, India on “Inspiring Students, Empowering Teachers, and Transforming Rural Classrooms”, as well as a high-school educator in rural India and a middle-school educator in South Boston with the national non-profit Citizen Schools.
Learn more at www.catbiddle.com.
View the video link below to "The Heart, the Drain, the Catapult and the Catalyst: Rural Schools and Leadership for Right Now," a presentation by Catharine Biddle for the Island Institute ILEAD Speaker Series in 2019.
BRIAN AND SAMANTHA LAWTON
Dancers and dance instructors in New York City
Dancers and dance instructors in New York City
Samantha and Brian Lawton are life and dance partners trained in a multitude of dance styles, growing up studying ballet, jazz, modern, tap, and theatre, and into their professional career studying the social, partnered dance forms. The two are alumni of New York University, where they met and began their dance partnership. Since then they have become specialists in Lindy Hop/Swing and the jazz dances with a wide knowledge of the ballroom dances. They strive for opportunities to combine their vast knowledge and training in many different dance forms to create and perform new and engaging work.
A few of their credits include The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (Amazon), The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon (NBC), and the Red Hot Chili Peppers music video “Go Robot”. The two are the resident directors of the Broadway show Swing! for Norwegian Cruise Line.
During this pandemic, they are teaching online dance classes, Samantha is a service member for AmeriCorps delivering meals to food insecure families in NYC, and Brian is developing a virtual puzzle experience soon to be released.
Learn more at www.samanthaandbrian.com and view their demo reel below!
A few of their credits include The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (Amazon), The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon (NBC), and the Red Hot Chili Peppers music video “Go Robot”. The two are the resident directors of the Broadway show Swing! for Norwegian Cruise Line.
During this pandemic, they are teaching online dance classes, Samantha is a service member for AmeriCorps delivering meals to food insecure families in NYC, and Brian is developing a virtual puzzle experience soon to be released.
Learn more at www.samanthaandbrian.com and view their demo reel below!
DEB SOULE
Herbalist and teacher from Avena Botanicals in Rockport, Maine
Herbalist and teacher from Avena Botanicals in Rockport, Maine
From the Avena Botanical's website:
Deb is an herbalist, gardener, teacher and author of The Woman's Handbook of Healing Herbs and How to Move Like a Gardener. Raised in a small town in western Maine, Deb began organic gardening and studying the medicinal uses of herbs at age 16 alongside the internationally known medical herbalist Mary Bove. Deb's faith in the healing qualities of plants includes a desire to make organic herbs easily accessible to women and families living in rural areas.
As Deb's knowledge and faith in the efficacy of medicinal herbs grew, so did her desire to be of service to her community. In a small 8 by 10 foot room in her house, Deb began preparing various herbal remedies. In the fall of 1985, with her first mail order catalog and a small selection of herbal extracts and teas, Deb launched Avena Botanicals at the Common Ground Fair in Windsor, Maine. Five years earlier, while enrolled as a student at College of the Atlantic, Deb lived in Nepal close to three Tibetan monasteries. She was deeply influenced by the Tibetan peoples commitment to ease physical symptoms and mental and emotional upsets through plants, prayer and other spiritual practices.
Deb's passion for plants, gardens and healing and her commitment to sharing herbal knowledge with others is central to her work. She frequently is a guest-lecturer at various conferences as well as an instructor for botany and horticulture students, garden clubs, and medical students. In 2005, People, Places and Plants magazine named Deb as one of the 50 most influential gardeners in the Northeast. More recently, she has been featured in Maine magazine, Down East magazine, Taproot, the Portland Press Herald, and a variety of other publications.
Deb's life closely follows the yearly agricultural rhythm. From April through October, Deb spends most days with her hands in the earth tending three acres of medicinal plants using organic and biodynamic practices. During the spring and summer months, Deb teaches a variety of herb classes and offers bi-monthly herb walks in Avena Botanicals' herb gardens. Throughout the year, Deb writes herb articles, develops herbal remedies, and consults with clients and health care providers. Biodynamic agriculture and her work with Maine Wabanaki Reach (www.mainewabanakireach.org) guides her ongoing learning and commitment to ecological, racial, and social justice issues and accessibility to medicinal herbs and food.
Visit www.debsoule.com and www.avenabotanicals.com to learn more about Deb's projects and teachings.
View a garden walk with Deb below and find additional garden walks at www.avenabotanicals.com.
Deb is an herbalist, gardener, teacher and author of The Woman's Handbook of Healing Herbs and How to Move Like a Gardener. Raised in a small town in western Maine, Deb began organic gardening and studying the medicinal uses of herbs at age 16 alongside the internationally known medical herbalist Mary Bove. Deb's faith in the healing qualities of plants includes a desire to make organic herbs easily accessible to women and families living in rural areas.
As Deb's knowledge and faith in the efficacy of medicinal herbs grew, so did her desire to be of service to her community. In a small 8 by 10 foot room in her house, Deb began preparing various herbal remedies. In the fall of 1985, with her first mail order catalog and a small selection of herbal extracts and teas, Deb launched Avena Botanicals at the Common Ground Fair in Windsor, Maine. Five years earlier, while enrolled as a student at College of the Atlantic, Deb lived in Nepal close to three Tibetan monasteries. She was deeply influenced by the Tibetan peoples commitment to ease physical symptoms and mental and emotional upsets through plants, prayer and other spiritual practices.
Deb's passion for plants, gardens and healing and her commitment to sharing herbal knowledge with others is central to her work. She frequently is a guest-lecturer at various conferences as well as an instructor for botany and horticulture students, garden clubs, and medical students. In 2005, People, Places and Plants magazine named Deb as one of the 50 most influential gardeners in the Northeast. More recently, she has been featured in Maine magazine, Down East magazine, Taproot, the Portland Press Herald, and a variety of other publications.
Deb's life closely follows the yearly agricultural rhythm. From April through October, Deb spends most days with her hands in the earth tending three acres of medicinal plants using organic and biodynamic practices. During the spring and summer months, Deb teaches a variety of herb classes and offers bi-monthly herb walks in Avena Botanicals' herb gardens. Throughout the year, Deb writes herb articles, develops herbal remedies, and consults with clients and health care providers. Biodynamic agriculture and her work with Maine Wabanaki Reach (www.mainewabanakireach.org) guides her ongoing learning and commitment to ecological, racial, and social justice issues and accessibility to medicinal herbs and food.
Visit www.debsoule.com and www.avenabotanicals.com to learn more about Deb's projects and teachings.
View a garden walk with Deb below and find additional garden walks at www.avenabotanicals.com.
COLIN WOODARD
Writer, historian, and award winning journalist in Portland, Maine
Writer, historian, and award winning journalist in Portland, Maine
Colin Woodard is a New York Times bestselling author and award-winning journalist. He is currently a contributing editor at Politico and State & National Affairs Writer at the Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram, where he won a 2012 George Polk Award, was a finalist for the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting, and was named 2014 Journalist of the Year by the Maine Press Association.
A Maine native and a longtime foreign correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor, The Chronicle of Higher Education and The San Francisco Chronicle, he has reported from more than fifty foreign countries and seven continents, and lived for more than four years in Eastern Europe.
He is the author of six books: Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood (Viking, 2020) American Character: A History of the Epic Struggle Between Individual Liberty and the Common Good (Viking, 2016) American Nations: A History of The Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America (Viking, 2011), The Republic of Pirates: Being The True and Surprising Story of the Caribbean Pirates and the Man Who Brought Them Down (Harcourt, 2007), the New England bestseller The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators, and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier (Viking, 2004), a cultural and environmental history of coastal Maine, and Ocean's End: Travels Through Endangered Seas (Basic Books, 2000), a narrative non-fiction account of the deterioration of the world's oceans. A graduate of Tufts University and the University of Chicago, he lives in Midcoast Maine.
Learn more about Colin and his work at www.colinwoodard.com.
Learn more about Colin's new book, Union in this video from Politics and Prose Live, featuring a conversation between Colin Woodard and Tom Gjelten, the Religion and Belief Correspondent for National Public Radio news (and once upon a time a teacher at North Haven Community School).
A Maine native and a longtime foreign correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor, The Chronicle of Higher Education and The San Francisco Chronicle, he has reported from more than fifty foreign countries and seven continents, and lived for more than four years in Eastern Europe.
He is the author of six books: Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood (Viking, 2020) American Character: A History of the Epic Struggle Between Individual Liberty and the Common Good (Viking, 2016) American Nations: A History of The Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America (Viking, 2011), The Republic of Pirates: Being The True and Surprising Story of the Caribbean Pirates and the Man Who Brought Them Down (Harcourt, 2007), the New England bestseller The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators, and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier (Viking, 2004), a cultural and environmental history of coastal Maine, and Ocean's End: Travels Through Endangered Seas (Basic Books, 2000), a narrative non-fiction account of the deterioration of the world's oceans. A graduate of Tufts University and the University of Chicago, he lives in Midcoast Maine.
Learn more about Colin and his work at www.colinwoodard.com.
Learn more about Colin's new book, Union in this video from Politics and Prose Live, featuring a conversation between Colin Woodard and Tom Gjelten, the Religion and Belief Correspondent for National Public Radio news (and once upon a time a teacher at North Haven Community School).