North Haven June 1895

North Haven June 1895

North Haven Island, June 1895 This is a view of the southern shore of the North Haven Island waterfront viewed from the Fox Island Thoroughfare in June of 1895. The roadway behind the waterfront buildings is Main Street. In the center is C. S. Staples General Store which additionally offered ice for sale, boats to let and featured a livery stable. Mr. Staples was also an undertaker. The Ferry Terminal (currently) is located a short distance to the right of the section of the waterfront shown in this photograph. W. S. Hopkins also operated a General Store in this area. It had been a ship's chandlery at one time, not surprising, given its proximity to the busy Thoroughfare. The building with the sign SHIP STORES may have been W. S. Hopkins General Store. HORTH HAVEN HISTORY As early as 3300 BC, the island was visited by the Red Paint People. Later it became part of the territory of the Penobscot Abenaki Indians, who hunted and fished in canoes along the coast. Captain Martin Pring, the explorer from Bristol, England, "discovered" North Haven and Vinalhaven in 1603. He called them the Fox Islands, a name which survives on the Fox Islands Thoroughfare, a mile-wide strait separating the towns which provides passage for boats crossing Penobscot Bay. Settled in the 1760s, North Haven was originally the North Island of Vinalhaven, from which it was set off and incorporated on June 30, 1846 as Fox Isle. It was changed to North Haven on July 13, 1847. An act was passed by the state legislature in 1850 which gave the majority of island inhabitants "the right to have such roads as they deemed fit." The majority thereupon decided to have no roads at all, or else roads obstructed with gates or bars at the discretion of landowners. Not surprisingly, the minority of inhabitants petitioned to amend the act. Fishing and farming became chief occupations. The surface of the town is even, and farmers produced hay as a staple crop. Boatbuilding became an important industry, and even now the community has two boatyards. But many inhabitants were fishermen who caught lobsters, scallops and oysters. In the 1880s, the island was discovered by "rusticators," seasonal residents first from Boston, then followed a decade or two later by others from New York and Philadelphia. North Haven is best known today for its sizable summer colony of prominent Northeasterners, particularly Boston Brahmins, drawn to the island for over a century to savor its simple way of life. The southern side of the Fox Islands Thoroughfare is often informally considered part of North Haven, since Vinalhaven's north shore is nearly a dozen miles from that community's town center. In contrast to Vinalhaven, North Haven's economy relies less on the lobster industry and more on sustaining its summer resort community. Energy for the community is partially provided by the wind project in Vinalhaven through the Fox Island Electric Cooperative.[6] Although the island is a popular destination, it actually provides few tourist amenities-two inns, a grocery store, two seasonal restaurants, a pizza shop, and two gift shops-and is instead geared toward those with vacation homes on the island. A small population of Mouflon sheep (native to Europe and western Asia) escaped from an animal enclosure owned by Thomas Watson, Jr. on the island in the 1990s and still survive there.