‘Inflexibly territorial’

1913 postcard of the way Downeast community.

Cutler, Maine, harbor.

“Many small towns I know in Maine are as tight-knit and interdependent as those I associate with rural communities in India or China; with deep roots and old loyalties, skeptical of authority, they are proud and inflexibly territorial.”

– Paul Theroux (born 1941), famed travel writer and novelist

Do what you have to do

Cutler Harbor. The town, in extreme eastern Maine, is in a beautiful if harsh region. Fishing, mostly lobstering, is still very important. In recent years, a few people “from away” have built summer places along the shore. The water will quickly get your attention if you try to swim in. The Gulf of Maine is warming these days, but not so much you want to dive in on one of far Downeast Maine’s very few hot days.

“Do you know how I got through the change of life? I went out and built a camp from driftwood on the outer shores of Cutler (Maine}.

— From Ruth Farris’s weekly column in the Machias Valley (Maine) News Observer in 1994.

— Photo by Walter Siegmund

'Inflexibly territorial'

The harbor of Cutler, Maine. The tiny town is way Downeast.

Many small towns I know in Maine are as tight-knit and interdependent as those I associate with rural communities in India or China; with deep roots and old loyalties, skeptical of authority, they are proud and inflexibly territorial.

-- Paul Theroux, novelist and travel writer