The Island Trail T h e N e w s l e tt e r o f t h e M a i n e I s l a n d T r a i l A s s o c i at i o n w i nt e r 2 0 1 4
Creating a Bigger Ripple B y L e e B u m st e d
We had already completed this profile of Dorcas Miller, a long-time MITA friend and volunteer, when we learned that she was to be honored by the Maine Wilderness Guides Organization. She recently received their Conservation Award for her distinguished career of writing and teaching about the natural world. Congratulations, Dorcas!
Dorcas Miller says she writes books because they don’t exist and she wants to use them herself. She takes the old adage, “write what you know,” one step further—she writes about what she would like to know. Her book topics include guides to natural history, backcountry cooking, and outdoor recreation. Of Dorcas’s books, the one best known to Maine paddlers is her wonderfully detailed Kayaking the Maine Coast: A Paddler’s Guide to Day Trips from Kittery to Cobscook. In it, she offers information on launch sites, islands and mainland spots to visit, safety considerations, and wildlife in a format that encourages readers to build their own trip plans. continued page 19
In This Issue Brothers on a Boat .............................. 2 Questions for Mark Fasold ...............4 Dirty Jobs .................................................8
Jack Phillips (center) with his father and brother Sam on George Head in the 1980s.
Wild Island Summers: A Phillips Family Tradition B y Ja c k P h i l l i p s , d e v e lo pm e n t d i r e c to r
My grandfather loved the Maine coast. He grew up in Boston and lived most of his adult life in Woods Hole, MA, on Cape Cod. But in his later years he bought a Concordia Yawl and cruised the waters of coastal Maine every summer. Merchant’s Row, the archipelago of small islands between Stonington and Isle au Haut, was his favorite destination. As he grew older, and his six children began to have kids of their own, he sought undeveloped property for his brood, and their families, to gather for camping trips. He envisioned a seasonal commune of siblings, spouses, and small children enjoying the splendors of Maine in its natural form, which he would proudly observe from his sailboat, anchored comfortably several hundred yards offshore. In the late 1970s, he found the place he was looking for: George Head Island, a pristine property a mile off of Stonington with a 1,000-foot sandbar prominently exposed at low tide and grassy fields perfect for camping, right in the heart of his beloved Merchant’s Row. The owner, Emily Muir, had apparently wanted to sell the island since her husband, William, who sculpted the beautiful bronze quarryman statue that sits on Stonington Harbor, died several years earlier. continued page 7
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