Where to find signed books in coastal Maine, March 31 edition

More than a year into the pandemic I was realizing that I haven't set foot south of Portsmouth, New Hampshire since February 2020, despite having a book come out. But things are slowly loosening up as vaccinations increase and in the past week or two I've been able to sign books at a number of bookstores on the coast of Maine, where I live.

In support of local indie bookstores, I thought I'd advertise where those signed copies are right now. Proceeding from southwest to northeast....

[Update, 4/16/21: In Newington, N.H.'s Barnes & Noble as of today. (The trilogy, Lobster Coast, and Republic of Pirates.)]

In Portland: at Sherman's on Exchange Street (The American Nations trilogy and Lobster Coast) and Longfellow Books (all of them.)

In Freeport: at Sherman's. (The American Nations trilogy and Lobster Coast) 

In Brunswick: at Gulf of Maine Books. (Ditto)

In Augusta: at Barnes & Noble. (American Nations, Lobster Coast, Republic of Pirates, Union.)

[Update, 4/15/21: In Damariscotta at Sherman's (ditto).]

[Update, 4/30/21: In Camden at Owl & Turtle. (All save Ocean's End.)

In Belfast: at Left Bank Books. These copies:

In Bucksport: at BookStacks. (Union, American Nations, American Character.)

In Castine: at Compass Rose Books. These copies:

In Blue Hill: Blue Hill Books. These titles:

Bar Harbor: at Sherman's flagship store. This mountain of books:

Thanks for your support of your local bookstore, wherever you live.

Regarding Maine on the occasion of its 200th anniversary of statehood, in the Boston Globe

Maine turned 200 this year, but the Bicentennial celebrations were cancelled by the pandemic, with Gov. Mills spending the official birthday, March 15, advising Mainers to lockdown to prevent the spread of the then barely understood coronavirus.

I wrote a six-part series for the Maine Sunday Telegram on statehood's meaning that wrapped up just as Covid-19 spread into the state back in March, but I also wanted to present some key points to an external audience, one in Massachusetts in particular for reasons readers of The Lobster Coast will quickly ascertain. So in this week's Boston Sunday Globe Ideas section, I had this essay on Maine's experience as a colony of a colony, how it shaped our culture and people, and the ways in which the pandemic and other global developments may shake up the postcolonial trajectory my native state has long been on. Hope you enjoy.

This is my first byline in the Globe, but in September I spoke to Ideas staff writer David Sharfenberg about the battle for the national "soul" of the U.S., the topic of my most recent book, Union.

Update, 10/30/20: Bloomberg's Boston bureau has a radio show and podcast, Bloomberg Baystate Business, and hosts Tom Moroney and Joe Shortsleeve kindly had me on the show today to talk about the phenomena described in the Globe piece. My portion starts at 0:50:32.

Talking American Nations and the 2020 election with Denmark's Zetland Magasin

The world is watching as the U.S. staggers towards the highest stakes election since the 1870s Tuesday, and some reporters have been drawn to American Nations, American Character, Union and even The Lobster Coast for an explanation as to what is going on. Two stories came out yesterday.

Denmark's Zetland Magasin has this longform feature on American Nations and how it explains what's going on in this country. I enjoyed speaking with editor Jakob Moll and seeing my work rendered in Danish, the language of an eighth of my ancestors. Ny Holland! Det dybe sud! Great stuff.

Friday's Le Monde carried this feature on the disunited States, with a nice name drop (in excellent company) for my latest book, Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood. There are some scenes that take place in Paris, so perhaps a few readers there will discover the book.

On Monday, CBC-New Brunswick broadcast their story on Maine's second district, the topic of this post here at World Wide Woodard.

Speaking on UNION and the creation and future of U.S. nationhood, Sept. 7 via Jesup Memorial Library

On the evening of Labor Day, September 7, I'll be giving a virtual talk and answering questions about Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood and the central issues therein: the ongoing battle for the United States's soul between a white supremacist ethno-national vision for the country and a civic nationalist one centered on the ideals in the federation's founding statement, the Declaration of Independence.

The talk, originally intended to be in-person, is hosted by the Jesup Memorial Library in Bar Harbor, Maine in conjunction with the League of Women Voters - Downeast, Sherman's Bookstores, and Acadia Senior College and kicks off at 7pm. It's free and open to the public, but you do need to register here.

Signed copies of Union and some of my other books are available for online order, shipping, or pickup from Sherman's in Bar Harbor.

The following night, September 8, I'll be speaking about Maine's backstory (and The Lobster Coast) via the Schoodic Institute in Winter Harbor, Maine. 

I speak again about Union, virtually and free to the public, via the Boston Athenaeum on September 23.

Speaking on Maine's past and Lobster Coast via the Schoodic Institute, Sept.8

On September 8 at 7pm Eastern, I'll be talking about the backstory of Maine on the occasion of its Bicentennial: a harrowing and little understood saga of war and betrayal, of clashing empires and ethnic cleansing, of civil war and colonial occupation by Massachusetts of what had been a separate province. These events shaped Mainers as a people and explain some of the culture’s most impressive virtues and most frustrating faults, as well as the still fraught relationship between this land’s real natives and the rest of us whose families came “from away” at some point in the past four hundred years.

These are issues discussed in my history of coastal Maine, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier, as well as my Maine Sunday Telegram series this spring, "Colony."

The talk, via Zoom, is hosted by the Schoodic Institute at Acadia National Park in Winter Harbor, Maine. It's free and open to the public, but you do need to register.

Speaking on Maine's formative history (virtually), August 20 via Biddeford Pool Summer Speaker Series

This Thursday, August 20, I'll be speaking on, well, why Maine and Mainers are they way they are and how events centuries ago shaped our fundamental, postcolonial character.It's the subject of my second book, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier, as well as this spring's special series "Colony" in the Maine Sunday Telegram. 

The event is the final installment of the 2020 Summer Speaker Series hosted each year by the Biddeford Pool Union Church here in Maine. Unfortunately the pandemic has made this and so many other events impossible to hold in person, but it's going digital, which means anyone, anywhere can join. Kicks off at 7pm, but you do need to register. 

Details can be found on this poster at the Union Church's website. Here's the key bit: 

"To register for the Series, contact Elaine Robinson, 283-1398, or erobinson4@maine.rr.com. You will receive an email with Zoom call information. Donations gratefully accepted. 100% of proceeds benefit charities such as Seeds of Hope, Stone Soup Food Pantry, Ever After Mustang Rescue, and Saco Meals. Send check made out to “Union Church” with “Speaker Series” in subject line to UC Treasurer, PO Box 344, Biddeford Pool ME 04006." 

Other upcoming virtual events include: 

 

September 1, German Marshall Fund of the United States (on my new book, Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood) 

September 7, Jesup Library of Bar Harbor, Maine (ditto.) 

September 8, Schoodic Institute, Winter Harbor, Maine (on Maine's past, present, and future) 

September 23, Boston Athenaeum (on Union)

Remembering the Malaga Island tragedy

Earlier this month my Press Herald colleagues asked me to record a video bit for the "this day in Maine" Bicentennial of Statehood feature on a story I reported on closely before I joined the paper in 2012: the Malaga Island tragedy.

It's an awful story -- a shameful official act by Maine's government exceeded only by its past treatment of the Passamaquoddy and other tribes -- featuring racism, social darwinism, and plain old corruption. I first learned of the 1911-12 saga while researching my history of Maine, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier, and followed with a story in Down East about Maine's bungled attempt to apologize (no longer online). I also wrote about it for the Press Herald shortly after joining the staff.

Hope you appreciate the brief video. For more on Malaga, start with my former Salt Institute colleague Rob Rosenthal's excellent and important audio documentary, Malaga Island: A Story Best Left Untold.

Traveling via book? Lonely Planet recommends Lobster Coast for Maine

The pandemic has us all grounded, with transportation cut back, unnecessary travel dangerous, and most international borders sealed off. But the folks at Lonely Planet, the travel guide company whose guides got me around the Communist bloc in 1989, have compiled a list of books to let you travel the United States without leaving your home.

I'm honored that for Maine they chose my 2004 cultural and environmental history, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators, and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier. Readers of the recent Press Herald series "Colony" will recognize many of the themes within, but there's much more about what makes our people tick. It's a story Lonely Planet says is "essentially the colonial, East Coast version of The Deadliest Catch."

Especially honored to be included alongside their choices for other states like Maryland -- A Beautiful Struggle by Ta-Nehisi Coates -- Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace (for Massachusetts); and John McPhee's Pine Barrens (for New Jersey.)

So stay safe out there.... and happy armchair travels.

Colony, the Press Herald Maine Bicentennial series, concludes

With the world facing the biggest social, economic, and epidemiological crisis in at least two generations, I neglected to post the final two installments of "Colony," my six part Maine Sunday Telegram series on the backstory of Maine statehood and the lasting legacy of those (colonial) experiences.

The last two installments ran one and two weeks ago respectively and you can find the whole series on the Colony landing page over at the Press Herald.

Thanks to the incredible number of readers who wrote -- and continue to write -- with kind words about the series and what it meant to them. The most common question: will it be released as a mini-book? The answer is "I don't think so" -- the pandemic is drawing all the paper's resources -- but you can find most of these themes (and much, much more) in my 2004 book on the cultural and environmental history of Maine, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier. 

Also, if you missed our 29-part series on Maine-Passamaquoddy relations, "Unsettled," it is indeed available as an e-book as well as free online to subscribers. I hope it brings some distraction to all of you bunkered down in the middle of this crisis.

Colony, Chapter 3: Massachusetts' conquest of Maine

Maine is celebrating the bicentennial of its statehood this year, but the story of our beginnings lies in the millennia and centuries that preceded March 15th, 1820, the day we regained our independence from Massachusetts. 

Colony, an ongoing six-part series in the Maine Sunday Telegram, tells that story, and the third installment appeared last Sunday, telling the story of how Massachusetts Bay annexed the formerly-independent colony of Maine in the 1650s. At one point they even send soldiers in.

The conquest made Maine a colony of a colony, and Boston ruled what eventually became known as the District of Maine -- which didn't even border on the rest of the Commonwealth -- in the interests of mainland Massachusetts, not the people living on the eastern frontier. As we'll see in the next three chapters of Colony, this experience, which lasted until 1820, fundamentally shaped Maine's culture, economy and self-conception.

If you enjoy this series and want more, consider reading my cultural history of Maine, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier (Viking, 2004) and, on Maine-Wabanaki relations in more recent times, the Portland Press Herald series "Unsettled," also available as an ebook at the usual outlets.

Colony, a six-part series on Maine's long path to statehood

Maine is celebrating the bicentennial of its statehood this year, but the story of our beginnings lies in the millennia and centuries that preceded March 15th, 1820, the day we regained our independence from Massachusetts. 

Colony, a six-part series that launched in the Maine Sunday Telegram today tells that story. It's a harrowing and little understood saga of war and betrayal, of clashing empires and ethnic cleansing, of an intra-English civil war and a 170 year colonial occupation by Massachusetts of what had been a separate province. These events shaped us as a people and explain some of our culture’s most impressive virtues and most frustrating faults, as well as the still fraught relationship between this land’s real natives and the rest of us whose families came “from away” at some point in the past four hundred years.

This first chapter is on the prehistoric and immediate contact period hereabouts. The series continues each Sunday for the next month and a half.

If you enjoy this series and want more, consider reading my cultural history of Maine, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier (Viking, 2004) and, on Maine-Wabanaki relations in more recent times, the Portland Press Herald series "Unsettled," also available as an ebook at the usual outlets.

[Update, 3/5/2020: You can read Chapter 2 here and Chapter 3 here.]

Speaking (a lot) about most everything at Star Island's Natural History Week, June 20-27

I'm pleased to announce that I'll be the annual speaker on Star Island, Isles of Shoals, for this year's Natural History Week, held June 20 to 27. [Update, 5/4/2020: Star Island's entire summer season has been cancelled due to the ongoing pandemic.]

Natural History Week - "Living in a Changing World" -- is held each year on the bucolic island, located off the coast of southern New Hampshire, but in a small archipelago that straddles the border with Maine. Attendees spend the whole week on the island, enjoying its beauty and nature by day, and attending daily talks by your truly and others. 

During the week I'll be speaking on:

* the crisis in the world's oceans (topic of my first book, Ocean's End: Travels Through Endangered Seas) and the warming of the Gulf of Maine (subject of a Portland Press Herald series I wrote that was a finalist for a 2016 Pulitzer Prize.)

* the cultural and environmental history of coastal Maine (subject of my second book, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier) and a forthcoming Press Herald series tied to Maine's Bicentennial this year.

* the true story, reassembled from archival sources, of the great Caribbean pirate gang led by Blackbeard, Sam Bellamy, and others -- pirates who plied the waters of the Gulf of Maine as well as the Spanish Main. (A story told in The Republic of Pirates.)

* the reasons why the United Staes is polarized and paralyzed, which have their origins in the differences between the distinct colonial projects on the eastern and southwestern rims of what is now the United States, subject of American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America.

* and perhaps American Character: The Epic Struggle Between Individual Liberty and the Common Good and the new book, Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood, to be released June 16th, as well.

Registration information at their website, and further information at Star Island Corp's mother ship. I look forward to meeting those of you who decide to attend.

Speaking on history of immigration in Maine, Portland, Jan. 18

Portland Ovations is convening a panel discussion on the history of immigration in Maine on January 18th at the Maine Historical Society in Portland, and I'm pleased to be taking part. It kicks off at 1pm and is free and open to the public.

Here's the description from Portland Ovations:

When we talk about immigration to Maine, we start with white settler-colonialism. What has been the impact of immigration on Maine’s land and people from the first French explorers in 1604 to the present? What are the drivers of recent immigration movements, and how does each new wave shift Maine’s economy and culture? What specific challenges do Maine’s environment and population pose for new arrivals; and how do we support Maine’s first peoples?

**PANELISTS**

- Tilly Laskey, Curator of 'Holding Up The Sky' and Native art and culture specialist at, Maine Historical Society
- Alain Nahimana, Executive Director, The Greater Portland Immigrant Welcome Center
- Maulian Dana, Tribal Ambassador, Penobscot Nation
- Colin Woodard, Journalist, Author of American Nations and The Lobster Coast
- Moderator, Linda Nelson, Deputy Director, Portland Ovations and Bowdoin College graduate in American Studies.

Speaking on Maine's colonial and post-colonial past in Rockland, Nov. 16

Maine's bicentennial is fast upon us, and I have a thing or two to say about how our state's experiences as a colony of a colony set the stage for statehood in 1820 and a variety of cultural strengths and pathologies every since.

If you live near the western shores of Penobscot Bay, I'll be giving a talk on all this in Rockland on November 16. The talk is hosted by the Rockland Historical Society, held at the Sail Power and Steam Museum, supported by the Maine Bicentennial Commission, and kicks off at 4pm. It's free and open to the public.

You can find more details via this Village Soup article.

I'll be speaking and writing about Maine's historical legacy in the coming months and will post updates here.

Is Maine's decades-long lobster boom about to end?

I recently reported on a new scientific study that suggests Maine's lobster boom is about to come to an abrupt end, with landings returning to historic levels over the next five years.

First: the lobster boom. From the 1940s to the 1980s,  Maine lobstermen reliably caught about 20 million pounds of lobster each year. But starting in 1990 – and for reasons that are still debated – the catch began to increase steeply, surpassing 30 million pounds in 1991, 50 million in 1999 and 80 million 10 years later. The catch has exceeded 100 million pounds every year since 2011, hitting a jaw-dropping 132.6 million in 2016 before ticking downward to 119.6 million in 2018.

But, as I reported in the Portland Press Herald, a new and improved version of the priority lobster population prediction model -- one that takes into account increases in water temperature and resultant lobster diseases -- suggests the boom is about to sharply end, with the most brutal downturns in landings occurring in the places where the boom has been the loudest. But there's a caveat: all of this could be wrong if the warming of the Gulf of Maine is driving baby lobsters to settle in deep water where they were once unable to survive.

Enjoy the article for details.

Speaking on Maine's identity, history, future in Blue Hill, Sept. 16

I'll be speaking on coastal Maine's cultural and economic background in Blue Hill, Maine next Sunday, September 16 at the Esther Wood Room of George Stevens Academy.

The talk -- entitled "Four Centuries of Coastal Maine Lives and Livelihoods" is sponsored by Colloquy Downeast in collaboration with six local partners, including the Maine Center for Coastal Fisheries the Ellsworth American, Brooklin Keeping Society, the Wilson Museum, and the Sedgwick-Brooklin Historical Society. These are themes I explore in the second of my books, The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators, and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier.

It kicks off at 3pm. Tickets are $5 at the door and include a light reception following the talk. There's a write-up in the American this week.

My next public talk thereafter is on the other side of the world: on American Nations at the 2018 Asahi World Forum in Tokyo September 25. Free book and a sake for anyone who makes both of these events in person.

Speaking on the Scots-Irish legacy in Maine and the nation, Aug. 14, Brunswick, Maine

This is the 300th anniversary of the coming of the Scots-Irish to New England and to mark the occasion, there's a multi-day conference taking place this week at Bowdoin College sponsored by the Maine Ulster Scots Project.

The 2018 Diaspora Conference and Reunion opens tomorrow morning, August 14 at Bowdoin's Kresge Hall and continues through Thursday, with presentations from scholars on both sides of the Atlantic.

I'm pleased to be giving the opening keynote Tuesday night on the impact of the Scots-Irish migration on both Maine and North America, issues I wrote about in some detail in The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators, and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier and American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America respectively. I'm preceded by Norman Houston, director of the Northern Ireland Bureau, the diplomatic mission of that part of the UK to the US and Canada.

Conference information can be found here.

At 1 pm tomorrow I'm also speaking about the political ramifications of American Nations in Maine Public radio's live interview and call-in program, "Maine Calling." Tune in if you can.

Talking Maine's 1820 split from Mass. with KQED's California Report

This November, Californians will be asked if they want to split their state into three, a measure spearheaded by venture capitalist Tim Draper. I wrote about some of the problems Draper's borders present, in historical-cultural terms, over at Medium last month.

But this week, I got to talk about an entirely different aspect of historical background on KQED's statewide "California Report": the lessons and precedents set by Maine's split from Massachusetts in 1820.

Readers of The Lobster Coast are aware of the two entities were separate colonies back in the 1640s, when the English Civil War pit Royalist, Anglican, semi-feudal, West Country-dominated Maine against Puritan, Parliament-backing, East Anglia-settled Massachusetts. The execution of the King cleared the way for Boston to annex the Maine settlements, which they ruled as a colony -- the District of Maine -- for nearly 70 years. The War of 1812 -- when Massachusetts refused to defend eastern Maine or help the federal government rollback the British occupation of it -- was just the final blow to Commonwealth unity.

But I digress. Here's a link to the audio of our interview, and here's the web story. (KQED is the San Francisco NPR affiliate, and one of the nation's public radio "superstations."

Maine member sues Trump's voter fraud commission for access to proceedings

Today Maine's member of President Trump's voter fraud commission sued the body in federal court after its staff for weeks ignored his request for documents and information about its deliberations.

Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap, one of four Democrats on the 11-member body, filed the suit at the federal district court for the District of Columbia, alleging violations of the Federal Advisory Commissions Act, which requires commissioners receive communications equally.

Dunlap, initially open minded about the commission, has slowly become one its most vehement internal critic, denouncing its Vice Chair's erroneous accusations about fraud in New Hampshire and the lack of information flow.

For today's story I also interviewed outside experts and another Democratic member of the commission, New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner, who says he is seeking to see the best in the body.

[Update, 11/18/17: Dunlap has now asked the court for an injunction against the commission.]

For additional coverage of this ongoing story, start here, but don't miss this story and this one.

Talking American Character, Lobster Coast on CSPAN

The indefatigable team at CSPAN's City Tour came to Portland, Maine this summer and the segments they produced are airing this weekend, spotlighting our little city.


I was pleased to record two separate interviews with them, one on Lobster Coast and the historical and cultural background to Maine's lobster fishery, the other on American Character: A History of the Epic Struggle Between Individual Liberty and the Common Good (from Portland Head Light.)
Here's the broadcast schedule for those. I'll post links to each segment as they come available.

Lobster Coast on "Book-TV in Portland, Maine", CSPAN-2, Saturday, October 21 during the 1203 pm Eastern broadcast.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?435268-1/lobster-coast

American Character on "Book-TV," CSPAN-3, Sunday, October 22 at 0632 am Eastern

https://www.c-span.org/video/?435270-1/american-character

Lobster Coast on "American History," CSPAN-3, Sunday, October 22 during the 2pm Eastern broadcast on Portland, Maine. (For night owls, it repeats Monday, October 23 at 0400 Eastern.)
https://www.c-span.org/video/?435268-1/lobster-coast

[Update, 11/10/17: Both segments air tonight on CSPAN-1 in a special Portland, Maine program starting at 7:06pm.]

If you're interested in American Nations, my full talk at Iowa State was carried on CSPAN-1 a couple of years back and is available here.