B A C K   T H E N

Monhegan

This view of the storied island was shot from a vessel on a day with a brisk offshore nor’west breeze. One doubts that the photographer quite expected this wonderfully evocative result, which imparts the seductive and forbidding natures of islands in general and of Monhegan in particular. Monhegan played an important role in the history of the first Europeans arriving on this coast, and thus, by extension, in the fate of the native inhabitants of the region.

While Monhegan islanders were separated from the mainland by water and weather, it would not be accurate to describe the community as isolated, since the island and its powerful lighthouse were important seamarks in heavily traveled waters, and passing vessels were frequently in sight. Also, it lay closer to rich fishing grounds than did mainland communities back when there were fish left to catch in coastal waters. The aesthetically perfectly placed three-masted schooner is headed north toward Two Bush Channel, the western entrance to Penobscot Bay. Because she is having to tack, she is not setting her fore and main topsails.

Text by William H. Bunting from Maine On Glass. Published by Tilbury House Publishers, 12 Starr St., Thomaston, Maine. 800-582-1899.

Maine On Glass and prints of the photographs are available through the Penobscot Marine Museum: PenobscotMarineMuseum.org.