Life on Matinicus Island
Matinicus lies 23 miles out to sea, the most remote inhabited island on the Atlantic seaboard. Its unique culture has been little understood by the outside world. When a moment of violence “crossed a line that had never been crossed before,” the islanders were caught between a precious past and a precarious future.
Vance Bunker turned 70 this year, a large, grizzled man with broad shoulders, ham-size hands, and a weathered face. He’s hard of hearing and walks arthritically. Once, nearly 20 years ago,he was the captain of a lobster boat,the Jan-Ellen, that pulled three doomed tugboat sailors out of a January sea on a night when the storm swells were eight feet high and the wind chill was 50 below. Medals followed, and media stories, a standing ovation on the floor of the Maine State House, a citation in the Congressional Record. For 17 years after that night-and more than 30 years before it-he was a lobsterman on Matinicus Island: one of its most esteemed, remembered by some for his cussedness, by others for the size of his hauls, and by at least a few for the sick children he sometimes flew, in his private plane, to medical care on the mainland. (“[He] was my personal hero,” blogged journalist Crash Barry, a former Matinicus lobster-boat sternman. “A gentle, funny giant … He drove a boat like it was an extension of his body … Kind and generous, tough and strong …”)
Today, two years after putting a bullet into the neck of another lobsterman, in defense, he says, of his daughter, Vance Bunker is a pariah on the island: legally acquitted but privately unforgiven, widely but quietly reviled. Although he still does business on Matinicus and hauls traps in its waters, he lives year_round on the mainland now, his island home of 30 years up for sale, his life there — a lifetime — now behind him. He says he isn’t angry, but it’s hard to believe him, and his wife says no such thing. Even the few who defend him, including parents who recall what he did for their children, are too fearful of their neighbors to say so publicly.
And it doesn’t end with him. Three families have been fractured. A man is partially paralyzed. Old wounds have deepened. A fragile, prized way of life, unchanged for generations, has never seemed more in peril. And on this little island, where a brooding sort of silence has settled over things, it’s hard to find anyone who doesn’t fear for the future.
“A saddening has happened here,” Suzanne Rankin says. “It’s happened to me, to the island–it’s happened to us all. We’re living it, every one of us, every single day. Vance and S.T. [Vance Bunker's wife, Sari] don’t see that, I don’t think. How could they possibly, with all their troubles? My heart goes out to them–but they don’t see it at all.”
Rankin lives, with her husband, Tom, in a 200-year-old farmhouse along a gravel road, the only through road here, midway between the school and the church. She’s in her late sixties, an attractive, courtly woman with frosted gray hair and blue, intelligent eyes. Though not born here herself-she arrived with Tom less than 30 years ago, which makes her almost an interloper by the island’s way of seeing things-she can trace her own ancestry here back nearly to the settlement’s beginning: to Phebe Young, who came with her husband in 1763. She is the island’s historian, the clerk-secretary of its church, and a member of its school board. Her devotion to the place seems almost ingrown.
It’s the same with everyone here. You almost have to be devoted to choose to live in such a place: some 15 miles off the coast (23 miles by ferry from Rockland); no year-round stores, or bars or eateries, or doctors or policemen or paved roads, and only one industry; where the fog drops around you like a curtain for days at a time, the same three families have been fighting the same fights for 200 years, and the ferry comes once a month in winter. As the natives are fond of saying: You live here because you love it, or you don’t live here at all.
But lately, since that July morning two years ago, when Vance Bunker shot Chris Young-and the island’s clan-based, sometimes brutish culture was suddenly the stuff of cable-TV news–the islanders’ devotion, while no less total, has stiffened and turned fearful.
“A line has been crossed that was never crossed before,” Suzanne Rankin says. “There’s no going back. The question is: Where will the next line be?”
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Wendell Berry-like. awesome read.
Nice article
Having never heard of Matinicus Island, I am now intrigued and curious to learn more about the island, then and now. The article was very well written and painted a lovely picture of the island and its residents.
THIS IS THE MOST INFORMATIVE ARTICLE I HAVE READ ON “ANY” OF THE MATINICUS ISLAND ‘HAPPENINGS” WITHIN THE PAST COUPLE OF YEARS. BEING BORN IN BATH & HAVING VISITED MATINICUS IN 2008, JUST AFTER THE POST OFFICE BURNED, …I WAS SO DISTURBED ABOUT THE SHOOTING…I JUST “KNEW” THERE WERE UNDERCURRENTS THAT MOST PEOPLE COULDN’T OR “WOULDN’T UNDERSTAND”…THIS EXPLAINED A LOT THAT WAS ONLY ELUDED TO IN LOCAL NEWS PAPERS…I HOPE VANCE BUNKER & HIS FAMILY AND THE OTHER FAMILIES CAN MOVE ON AND GET BACK TO THE WAY “IT USED TO BE”…EVEN IF IT ISN’T “QUITE THE WAY” SOME PEOPLE FROM “AWAY” WOULD LIKE TO SEE IT…IT’S MATINICUS….LET IT BE……
In regard to “A Break in the family” May I suggest the novel Speak to the winds by Ruth Moore, Written in 1956 it is so stunningly true to the author, That the characters and life style described in the piece that it is almost prophetic, the author could well be speaking of this decadesprior to Manticus Island.
Americans, whether on the mainland or on an island are subject to American laws and not subject to generationally declared fiefdoms! Living on a public street for seven generations doesn’t give one the right to decide who can go down that street or who can catch the bugs that crawl on that street. Mantinicus sounds a bit too Mafiaesque in its operation. Now one of its younger generations is impaired for life attempting to defend what he thought the Godfathers told him he needed to do. Neighbors don’t have to like each other but they do have to acknowledge and live by the laws that govern the property they live on. As long as Mantinicus’ current mindset exists, the younger will suffer while attempting to defend the misguided beliefs of their elders.
Recently(December 6), my dad, Robert Young passed away. My fondest memories of Dad were going to breakfast before he would put me on a boat to the Island (Matinicus) Most of the time it would be the mail boat. What a long ride it seemed. There to welcome me would be my grandfather, Clyde Young. At the time I thought Dad was just sending me to get me out of Mom’s hair, but now I realize that his purpose was to teach me the values that was instilled in him. Even at that time, the “lobster wars” were among the fisherman of the island. I would hear stories, but ignored them because I was there to have fun. And that was what I did. I would spend most of my time fishing or roaming the island, and occasionally taking a ride on Grampy’s boat. Thinking back I know that my experiences on the island were mostly made up of people working hard and enjoying the simple things that life had to offer. I remember the smiles of many and just sitting on the shore and watching the boats. I felt safe on the island. Since I was young, I have been to the island a few times. It makes me sad that such a community, as small as it is, cannot see the example that has brought to the eyes of young and old. Now I see families falling apart and the memories of my youth disappearing.
I know my Grandfather would be proud of me. Today I am co-owner and operator of a small seafood business. We process seafood(clams, lobster, crab, and shrimp). And also have a seafood retail and wholesale shop and take-out. I guess once you have the smell of the sea in your blood, it is hard to stray away from what you were taught as a child. “Work hard and enjoy the simple things in life.”. Thank you Grampy and Dad