Monthly Archives: April 2016

How a pay-it-forward chain at Dunkin’ Donuts made Bangor feel like home

My mom and I at the University of Maine Honors College banquet in May 2015.

My mother was diagnosed with Stage 3 colon cancer when she was 34 years old. I was 14 at the time, a freshman in high school, and didn’t fully understand the severity of the situation. But I knew enough to realize I might lose my mom. What I didn’t know was how my hometown would […]

Enduring legends of Bangor’s own ‘Lover’s Leap’

An old postcard, circa 1920, shows Lover's Leap and the old Maxfield tannery, which burned in the '70s. This photo is from the collection of Richard Shaw.

Forbidden love. The ever-enduring plotline traverses centuries and cultures, appearing in stories that help tell the story of a place and its people. Bangor, Maine, is no exception. I had heard of Lover’s Leap on the Kenduskeag Stream before. I meandered down the winding trail that hugs the banks of the stream last summer and […]

New vintage store in downtown Bangor is like going home

Ivy & Lace at 173 Park Street, Suite 3 in Bangor opened in December of 2015. It offers a variety vintage items at reasonable prices and is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.

“Can we go thrift shopping?” my sister Mataya asked over the phone as we planned our weekend together last Friday. I responded with an enthusiastic “yes,” and started to throw ideas her way. We could go to Goodwill, of course, and maybe the Salvation Army. “There’s a new place called Ivy & Lace I want […]

The home I hope to find in Bangor

Mattawamkeag River in Island Falls, Maine, as seen from the bridge on Old Patten Road in September 2015.

“This is the story of a small town tucked away in the great north woods of Maine. Its history — more or less typical of that of scores of other rural towns in this part of the State — carries little of more than local interest, because nothing extraordinary ever occurred in Crystal.” In 1937, […]