The Island Maneskootuk

Maneskootuk Island lies prominently in the eastern part of Maines ten-square-mile Rangeley Lake, in one of the state's most beautiful vacation regions, the western mountains. The pristine island has had a colorful, lively history that is lovingly-and candidly-recounted by the woman who holds the current deed, Carolyn Garrigues Scofield. The Island Maneskootuk includes accounts of the historic island's flora and fauna, its various boats, old and new structures, gardens, and countless resident and local characters. There are colorful accounts by the author and her family and visitors, as well as the descendants of early Maneskootuk residents, describing life on the island through many decades, llustrated throughout by fifty pages of historic and family photos. Setting the tone for The Island Maneskootuk is the author's heartfelt approach to the island treasure that has meant so much to her, her family and now her grandchildren. "The Dicksons built their big house and lived in splendor, the public rented accommodations on the island when Dr.Clough invited physicians, the Persians turned the island into a mini-principality, and then we, the Scofields stepped ashore. "We stepped foot on our Maneskootuk in late afternoon. The grass was at least a foot high, and the dandelions blazed at their peak. The sun was still hot and everything was still. We marveled at this place, this magical land, and began immediately to bask in the peace and serenity of our island home. "Our Maneskootuk adventure was about to begin."

"Over the past several decades and increasingly since the beginning of the pandemic, second homeowners have left a distinctive mark across both rural and urban America. As wealthy elites reallocate capital into housing investments other than their primary residence, they extend the breadth of their influence to places as different as the backwoods of northern Maine and the cobblestone streets of Beacon Hill. Across these varied geographies, the purchase of second homes has become a social problem, placing pressure on housing markets, igniting political tensions, and putting strain on local community dynamics. While this movement of capital may be in part motivated by financial returns, this alone cannot fully explain what motivates second homeowners, nor does it capture the depth of their influence. Privileging Place examines how place-identity-which is to say, a felt identification with a particular kind of place-leads many affluent people to shift a portion of their capital and their lives to a new place and to exert an influence on that place in a particular way. Drawing on interviews with over sixty second homeowners as well as community observations from two years of field research in Rangeley, Maine, and Boston, Massachusetts, Meaghan Stiman looks at the ways in which place-identity motivates the movements of a particular subset of second homeowners, namely, the upper-middle class. Belonging to the top 20% of American income earners, these second-home buyers are predominantly white and tend to concentrate their wealth in suburbs and other affluent, resource-rich areas. In Privileging Place, Stiman shows that, for the upper-middle class, second home ownership is a way to promote an identity for themselves through the place where they buy their second home (whether rural or urban). But because these projects are second homes, developed on the side while still holding onto the valued resources of their suburban primary residences, Stiman argues that such place-identity projects rely on further deepening inequalities in urban and rural places. To the second homeowners, these are not places to work, go to school, or contribute to community life, but are places to imagine a version of themselves as urban or rural people and to imprint their version of urban or rural life onto the community where they live part-time. By tracing the way upper-middle class values and practices unfold between secondary city and country homes and their suburban hometowns, this book offers a detailed look into the spatial concentration and diffusion of white, upper-middle class privileges in the United States"--

To Finnan and Cormac This is a short history of everything I wanted to tell you and would have if I had the time and opportunity. I have already enjoyed the delight of starting the conversation with each of you, but the truth is, these thoughts can be more complete by writing them. And you can revisit them if you choose. They were and are really stories, and I wish more of them were about what we will have shared over the next twenty years. But now is now, and that is where we are at the moment. To end this phase of our conversation in your young lives and to foreshadow our future discussions, I suggest that what you can profitably watch for is the complicated lesson that cooperation is the successful long term strategy in the competition of life.