Sunbeam | Mission to Maine

When deputy editor Ian Aldrich spent four days aboard the Sunbeam V in December 2013, he was witnessing a story of service and compassion that had been unfolding on Maine’s isolated islands since the early 20th century. Now, in spring 2020 — as the world realizes more than ever how much we depend on our medical professionals — Ian’s article about the Maine Seacoast Mission and its Christmas visit to island communities has a new resonance. In a sense, the coronavirus pandemic has made all of us into islanders, grateful for others’ caring and support as we wait for the storm to pass. —Mel Allen, editor

PS: During the pandemic, the Maine Seacoast Mission has temporarily suspended its island visits to help protect the health of residents; however, it remains in close contact with the communities it serves.

It’s just pushing 10:00 in the morning when Frenchboro comes into view. It’s a mid-December day, and for nearly two hours we’ve been churning through a frigid Atlantic, cutting through a winterscape that is unabashedly Maine.

Sea smoke pours off the water and encircles the islands — Great Cranberry, Sutton, and Swans — giving a dreamy look to the land and water. Snow-draped pines tower above the rocky shores, while small, frosty waves roll forward. From the warm confines of a ship’s helm, it’s a stunning day to be on the water.

The ship, my home for the next four days, is the Sunbeam V, a 75-foot cruiser owned and operated by the Maine Sea Coast Mission. For more than a century the Mission has made Maine’s small, year-round island communities its focus. It ministers to island residents and offers inexpensive, sometimes free, medical care in places where even getting a bag of groceries, let alone having a sore throat checked out, can mean steering a boat through rough seas or trying to catch a flight to the mainland. On this trip we’ll visit three islands — Frenchboro, Isle au Haut, and Matinicus — where the Sunbeam will host church services, community meals, and medical checkups. But there will also be other forms of outreach. We’ll help a young family move off-island, play a late-night game of volleyball, and deliver lunch to a weary bunch of chocolate makers. You see, part of the crew’s mission is also about just showing up, helping out, maintaining a connection to these remote places. It’s why the Sunbeam travels even during the depths of winter. It’s why, on this subzero day, we’re pulling into Frenchboro.

As we do, Rob Benson, the Mission’s Pastor to the Outer Islands, slips on a heavy winter jacket. “It’s good to be back,” he says, fishing a thick hat out of his coat pocket. Though it’s been only two weeks since he last set foot on the island, that can feel like a long time for a crew that is often on the water 12 to 15 days a month. Benson’s sentiment is shared by everyone onboard the Sunbeam: ship’s nurse Sharon Daley, Captain Mike Johnson, engineer Storey King, and the Sunbeam steward, who simply goes by the name of Jillian.

The road from harbor to neighborhood is a steep climb that eventually opens up to a flat, open expanse of homes and buildings: church, school, library, town hall. Benson bounds off the ship to check on the island church, where he’ll host a Christmas service the following week, and soon residents trickle onboard and mill about the dining room. The varied mission of the Sunbeam is reflected in the different roles this room takes on. Tonight it hosts a Christmas service; tomorrow morning a community breakfast. It’s a coffee shop, a game room, a craft center. In the back, Jillian has set up a partially finished hooked rug and encourages visitors to try their hand at it. Stuffed in the corner are bags of chicken feed for a Frenchboro resident who gives the crew eggs. Near the kitchen, a tray of fresh cinnamon buns is quickly disappearing.

By late morning, the dining room hosts more than half of the island’s 19 year-round residents. One of the early visitors is a retired lobsterman named Danny, who’s presiding over a rout of the ship’s engineer in a game of cribbage. “I won,” he says, scooping up the pile of cards that sit between them. “15-2.”

“Yeah, yeah,” King says, shaking his head. “That’s all you need.” He leans back in his seat and clasps his hands behind his head. “At least I didn’t get skunked this time,” he adds. Danny, who has a thin gray mustache and wears large, square glasses, looks up and chuckles. He picks up King’s cards, shuffles them in with his own, and then deals another round.

Just then, Christie Jernigan, the island’s schoolteacher, drops in with her two boys, a third of the school’s population. Daley springs up from a table to greet her. “How have the last couple of weeks been?” she asks.

Jernigan laughs. “I forgot how tortuous the last week before Christmas vacation is,” she says. “Making gifts, a little bit of academics. Last week we dug up a Christmas tree.”

For the next hour coffee cups are refilled, and Jillian serves homemade reubens. Daley shares pictures of her new granddaughter with one of the island’s young mothers, Brianna Gamester. “Ooooh, Tegan, right?” she says. Daley nods her head yes, and smiles. Around them, lobstermen talk prices and tonight’s looming snowstorm.

By 2:00, it’s time to go. The Sunbeam needs to make Isle au Haut by evening, a three-hour journey, before the storm. There are hugs and handshakes and the promise that everyone will soon see one another again. As the ship heads into open water, Benson is pleased with the visit.

“Sometimes we think of ourselves as this floating truck stop,” he says. “People will come down for a meal but then want Sharon to check their blood pressure. Or someone may come up to me: ‘You should know that so-and-so’s father is sick.’ It’s an opportunity for unscripted interaction. And it helps build community. Put a meal out and people start rubbing elbows; they discover new ways of relating to each other.”

– – – –

That kind of steady, subtle community building has been a part of the Mission’s work from the beginning. Its story began in 1905, when two brothers, Angus and Alexander MacDonald, both pastors, were inspired to create a roving, nondenominational parish that could serve Maine’s outer islands. At that time, there were more than 300 year-round island communities, where residents fished and lumbered, built boats, and survived together.

That kind of isolation bred a fierce independence, but also, the MacDonald brothers worried, a spiritual disconnect. In July of that year, the Mission launched a 26-foot sloop, the Hope, and began plying Maine’s waters, from Quoddy Head to Kittery Point.

If soul-saving initially sparked the MacDonald brothers to act, a broader sense of charity soon formed the Mission’s underpinnings. By the 1920s, it brought nurses and doctors to the islands, helped secure residential telephone service, established post-office branches, employed a traveling teacher to work with the children of lighthouse keepers, and awarded college scholarships to new high-school graduates.

Today, the Mission, which makes its home in Bar Harbor, works across Maine. But its island program remains at the center of what it does. In some ways the work is easier than when the MacDonalds began. A ship like the Sunbeam, which comfortably sleeps about a dozen, has made the travel more bearable, while only 15 year-round island communities remain.

But in other ways, the Mission’s work is more complex; the issues it addresses, more diverse. The fact that islanders, who can be leery of outside help, can turn to the Mission as a resource for alcohol-addiction or marriage counseling says something not just about the organization’s long history with these islands but its approach: even, gentle, soft-spoken.

Over the past decade, Benson and Daley have been the main faces of that work. Benson, who laughs easily and often, became the Mission’s pastor in 2002, after several years working as a hospice chaplain in Washington, D.C. He arrived just a few months after Daley, a 40-year nurse who moves and talks with an efficiency that speaks to her Midwest roots. They depend on each other. The work can be hard. Sometimes they’re the only ones people can confide in about the problems they’re facing. Even if they could share what they’ve seen or heard with friends and family, they wouldn’t know how.

“Rob and I talk a lot about what we’ve experienced,” Daley says. “That helps. But to be honest, I’m not in a good mood when I get home. If I can, I’ll walk around L.L. Bean for an hour after getting off the ship. That little bit of time to decompress helps. By the next day I’m fine. If I feel that I’ve done something to help somebody, that gives me energy. Makes me feel like I’m making a difference.”

– – – –

Isle au Haut glows under a full moon as we near the island. It’s early evening, and as we pull into the harbor, Bernie Barter blinks her porch light to welcome us, prompting the ship’s captain, Mike Johnson, to sound the horn. Bernie greets us in person a half-hour later, when we step inside the town store for a community supper of sausage and kale soup with homemade baguettes. Part matriarch, part local celebrity, Bernie, who’s in her seventies and affectionately known as “Teenage Grandma,” wears a Santa cap and a long necklace of colorful fake jewelry. The Sunbeam crew still talks about the day a few years ago when she showed up at the community event in white go-go boots and a white minidress, playing the accordion. “She’s the blingiest person I know,” Jillian says.

Nearby stands Bernie’s husband, Billy, a semi-retired lobsterman whose family helped settle this island in 1792. Tall, with a strong build and a preference for dry one-liners, Billy leans against the store counter and talks with a few other men. The weather has caught them by surprise, and there’s concern about the traps several of them still haven’t retrieved. The discussion then turns to how best to get lobster smell off your hands.

“I heard peanut butter works best,” one of them says. A few curious looks are thrown his way.

“That’s not supper talk,” Bernie says.

“We haven’t started eating yet,” Billy says, laughing.

In small island communities, fissures can pop up in places that might seem unexpected to mainlanders. This weekly gathering began as a result of one such division. Over the previous few years there had been debate among island residents over the store’s reduced winter hours. Owned and managed by the community, the building had become a place to drop in for coffee or a game of checkers. For year-rounders, that felt especially vital during the long winters. But part-timers had balked, and the store’s board of directors had refused to change. Then the board experienced some turnover, and with it, hours were expanded. But scraped feelings lingered, and Benson believed that a community supper could help soothe them. On this night, some 20 residents file into the building, swapping stories and enjoying the soup.

When dinner is finished, we walk beneath moonlight back to the Sunbeam for dessert and Christmas carols. The boat is transformed into a big sitting room, with people crowding around tables or sitting tightly on benches, including four generations of Barters. Captain Johnson arrives. We’re scheduled to leave for Matinicus tomorrow, but Johnson’s been keeping tabs on the weather, and it doesn’t look promising. “I’m not sure we’ll be able to leave,” he tells Daley.

Daley presses a hand against her forehead. “Oh, that does make my life more complicated,” she says. “I really don’t want to cancel my two appointments there.”

Around her, the room begins to warm up for the singing. Storey King tunes his guitar, and Benson hands out songbooks. “How about ‘Jingle Bell Rock’?” he asks. “I like that one,” Bernie says.

Benson thumbs through the book. “Sorry,” he says. “We don’t seem to have it. How about ‘Joy to the World’?”

And with that, King starts strumming, and the room fills up with voices, some better than others. After the final note, Bernie stands up. “Okay,” she announces. “We’re going to do ‘Little Drummer Boy.'” She points to the men. “It’s your job to go ‘ba-rum-pa-bum-bum.'”

“And if the men don’t do it right, we all have to start over,” Benson adds.

“This is fun!” Bernie says, excitedly, and then proceeds to play the role of director, pointing to the men to sing their part. When we finish, the room erupts in applause.

Outside, a light snow begins falling.

No chance we’re making it to Matinicus today. Last night’s storm dumped nearly a foot of snow and by 7:00 a.m. the weather still isn’t over. A blue light spreads over the harbor, where a few snow-covered boats circle around their anchor points. Nearby, clusters of houses line the land side, their snow-topped piers jutting out like fingers into the water. As Jillian pulls together a breakfast of eggs, bacon, and muffins, Tracy Batteese, caretaker at the Keeper’s House Inn, makes a quick visit.

“There are 10 inches,” he announces.

“Already?” Jillian asks.

“Yep,” he says.

“And the wind is supposed to blow?” Jillian asks.

“Gale winds already,” he says. “Gotta run.”

Daley pops into the dining room. “Just got a text from Matinicus,” she says. ‘Blowing like hell out here.'” She purses her lips. It’s been six weeks since she was last on the island, and if she doesn’t visit now, it could be another couple more before she’s able to return. She looks out at the boats. She knows it’s a bad sign when the lobstermen are playing it safe. “If they were going out, they’d have already been here and had coffee,” she says. Daley starts thinking about alternatives. Maybe she can get back to the mainland and fly over. “I’ve got some people who are expecting us,” she says.

As the snow continues to fly, Billy Barter saunters in, wearing a blue sweatshirt and rubbing his cold hands together. “You looking for some breakfast, Billy?” Jillian asks.

“Sure,” he says, grinning, taking a seat at the table.

Over the next 15 minutes, others come aboard. Payson Barter, Billy’s son, is one of them; so is Bill Clark, another longtime lobsterman, who’s spent the last couple of nights at writer Linda Greenlaw’s house, trying to free up her frozen pipes. “She called, and I was unlucky enough to answer,” he says with a big laugh. He also has to bail out his skiff. “Because Derek didn’t do it,” he says, half jokingly, to his young sternman, Derek Sibbald, a tall, lanky kid who’s living alone in his family’s place for the winter.

“You’re never going to live that down,” someone cracks.

“I think there are a lot of things I’m never going to live down,” Derek replies.

“I hope I don’t have to take a pair of oars out of your next paycheck,” his boss says.

“You should have gotten longer oars,” Derek says.

As more guys file onto the boat, the banter continues. For the next hour they pick at the remnants of their breakfasts, refill their coffee cups, and tell stories about characters who have blown in and out of their lives: Remember Victor the crop duster? He married seven times, four times to the same woman. His last girlfriend, she introduced herself as the Alabama Slammer. Redheaded girl. Not very shy.

Finally, Billy looks out the window. “Snow is done,” he says. And with that, the boat empties. The work that so many have put off — the clearing of walkways, the shoveling out of cars — must begin.

And so it does. Slowly, life begins to emerge, and in doing so reveals something about how this community works. There’s an accepted division of labor. One guy plows the roads; another is responsible for driveways. It’s community capitalism. There’s no room, no space, to get greedy. No need to form conglomerates. Everyone is needed. Later that morning, as a small group of us make our way to the library, Payson passes us in his Jeep Cherokee, with a blown-out back window and a couple of shovels; he’s going to help out some elderly friends. Derek, too, shovel in hand, starts work on freeing up his truck.

“Is the store open?” Daley asks.

He looks up the road to the building. “Not right now,” he says. Then he pauses. “You know, I’m not sure it’s even going to open today.” There’s an easiness in his voice, an understanding that that’s just how it goes out here.

With the Matinicus trip postponed until tomorrow morning, the Sunbeam crew settles into its extended visit. Johnson goes cross-country skiing, while Daley checks on a resident and then gets a haircut from another. At the Community Center, Benson watches a taping of the school’s version of A Christmas Carol. As the Ghost of Christmas Past remembers his lines, the pastor talks with the librarian about collecting toys for the kids on Matinicus. Later, a crew of us head over to Black Dinah Chocolatiers, a local chocolate maker, whose owners, Steve and Kate Shaffer, are trying to meet a rush of Christmas orders. They’re hungry, and Jillian has made them sandwiches.

That evening a dozen of us return to the Community Center for volleyball in the building’s old gym. The weekly game is championed by Bernie, who hits the phone hard every Wednesday afternoon to put together a couple of teams. Tonight’s two squads are largely made up of her own family, four different generations of Barters, who aren’t afraid to tease or target one another. There’s Bernie directing her serve to her 12-year-old great-grandson, Michael. There’s Danny, manning the net and blocking a return by his father, Bernie’s son Payson. Score is only loosely kept, and as the tallies cruise past 21, there’s no end in sight. It’s only when Bernie’s team hits 51 that she raises her arms triumphantly.

– – – –

Twenty-three miles out to sea, Matinicus is the most remote inhabited island on the Atlantic Seaboard. It’s a trip through open ocean, and the wind and water are not always forgiving. En route, up in the helm talk turns to some of the challenging journeys the crew has weathered: the 12-foot swells on a Christmas Eve trip from Matinicus that Benson’s wife and two young sons had been a part of; the journey from Vinalhaven that King and Johnson made by themselves a few years ago.

“It was dark,” Johnson says. “For about 15 minutes it was miserable, stuff flying all over the boat. It wasn’t unsafe, but we’d had enough of it. Then we got into Northeast Harbor, and it was so calm.”

At a little after 11:00 in the morning, the Sunbeam docks in Matinicus, and almost immediately visitors arrive. A husband whose wife stepped on a hot poker; does Daley have any cream for her? She does. A lobsterman who injured his hand with a clamp and wants it looked at. “I still have 500 traps in the water,” he tells Daley, shaking his head. “Was hoping to get my boat out of the water yesterday, but that wasn’t going to happen. It’s just been blowing.”

By early afternoon, Daley and Benson leave the boat, hoofing it around the island to meet different residents. Buildings, both precarious and rooted, line the land’s rocky edge, while behind them runs a patchwork of ice-coated roads. Chimneys pump out woodsmoke, which dissipates over a thick forest of tall pines.

One of the few houses that sits back from the water is a white shingled Cape; a red pickup parked out front still hasn’t been shoveled out. It’s also Daley’s first stop. She knocks on the door. The home’s owner, Rick Kohls, barks out, “Who is it?”

“It’s Sharon,” she says.

Kohls, who’s in his fifties with a thin salt-and-pepper beard, a green baseball cap perched atop his head, sheepishly opens the door. “That was a quite a greeting,” she says.

“Sorry,” he says, walking her into his living room, where a TV plays an episode of Cheers. Above the doorway hangs a sign that says, “Beware of Hack Fishermen.” The house is warm, smelling of cigarettes. Four cats brush up against our legs as we take a seat on the sofa.

“You want some coffee?” Kohls says, standing up again.

“I’m fine,” Daley says, letting her host resume sitting in his recliner. “I haven’t seen you in a couple of months. How was your trip to New Hampshire?”

Kohls nods his head. “You mean my yearly hunting trip?” he says. “Good. We got the hunting part done early, and the rest of the time we were drinking.”

Daley releases a small smile. “Did you stack your firewood like I asked?”

“If you look in there,” he says, pointing to a back room and sounding slightly annoyed, “you’ll see I have firewood.”

Daley smiles again. “Now you don’t miss me anymore,” she says.

“Exactly,” Kohls says, letting out a big laugh.

For 15 minutes they talk about the snow, Kohls’s recent taking to Facebook, and his late partner, June, who died a few years ago. Daley’s visit is low-key. She’s not there to check his blood pressure or ask pointed questions about his health. She transitions easily between nurse and friend.

“It’s funny,” Daley tells me later, “but with this work, unlike in my personal life, I can go to where the person is. If somebody won’t quit smoking, I can accept that; I can work with them on smoking less. I’m not judgmental. I’m not trying to pull them some place where they’re not. I wish I did that in my personal life.”

– – – –

By 10:00 the next morning, the Sunbeam begins the four-hour trip back to Northeast Harbor. It’s calm on the water. While Johnson steers, Benson works his way through some 80 Christmas cards he’ll send to island residents, writing a personal note on each one. “Just a few of my closest friends,” he says with a laugh.

As we close in on the mainland, Cadillac Mountain and Mount Desert come into view. Benson pauses for a moment to take in the scenery. He wrings out his right hand, then fixes his gaze back on the cards. “Okay,” he says. “Just a few more to go.”

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