Summer on the Maine Coast | Photographer Richard Schultz

In search of summer on the Maine coast, we dispatched photographer Richard Schultz to capture the sights, people, and moments of a Maine summer.

By Mel Allen

Jun 11 2010

At a compound in Harborside on Cape Rosier that has been in one family for more than a century, a friend of Richard Schultz’s throws a traditional clambake.

Photo Credit : Richard Schultz

Summer on the Maine Coast — Nearing sunset at Reid State Park, Georgetown.
*Photo Credit : Richard Schultz*

Richard Schultz left his Rhode Island home last August, carrying a map of Maine dotted with “spots I thought had potential.” His assignment: Roam the coast of Maine; capture the sights, the people, the moments. “This is my favorite thing to do,” he says. “I’m given a broad guideline, and then I interpret how my eye sees it without a detailed agenda. It’s a treat to take whatever catches my eye.”

The eye of Richard Schultz has been seen in national magazines for years, including Rolling Stone,Time, and National Geographic, and, during much of the 1990s, many of Yankee’s most memorable photos carried his name. About a decade ago, he took his vision to the world of commercial photography. “We’d have 50 to 75 people or more at a time on a set,” he says. “Everything had to be perfectly controlled.” Our asking him to just take off brought him back to his roots.

The Kennebunk Plains, a Nature Conservancy site off Route 99, is one of the best blueberry picking spots in southern Maine.
*Photo Credit : Richard Schultz*

Sparsely populated (and car-free) Peaks Island comes alive in summer with youth unafraid of Casco Bay's chilly waters. — Sparsely populated (and car-free) Peaks Island comes alive in summer with youth unafraid of Casco Bay’s chilly waters.
*Photo Credit : Richard Schultz*

Pemaquid Point Lighthouse, overlooking Muscongus Bay on the tip of the Pemaquid Peninsula, attracts 100,000 visitors each year.
*Photo Credit : Richard Schultz*

Schultz grew up by the sea, in Marblehead, Massachusetts. His cousin, Bill Eppridge, one of America’s most famous photojournalists (he shot the iconic photo of a busboy cradling Robert Kennedy’s head as he lay dying), took the teenaged Richard across the country on photo shoots. “It seemed an amazing career,” Schultz says. “People paying you to travel around the world–what more could you ask for?”

After studying photojournalism at Indiana University, Schultz apprenticed with Louie Psihoyos (director of The Cove, winner of this year’s Academy Award for best documentary). His life course was set.

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“I use him as someone whom I totally look up to,” Schultz says. “Like when people say, ‘What would Jesus do?’ For me, it’s ‘What would Louie do?’ He’s the total consummate photographer. We were always on the road shooting. I gained insight into how you had to mentally prepare.”

Maine Coast in Summer | Photographs — Martin Gorham, a dragger fisherman, is just off his boat at Portland Fish Pier. “I love this picture,” says Schultz. “I love his looks, his attitude. He’s a total hardscrabble fisherman. It’s 11 a.m. and he’s just finished unloading his boat and they are going drinking.”
*Photo Credit : Richard Schutlz*

Youth is served on the shore at Ocean Park in the town of Old Orchard Beach.
*Photo Credit : Richard Schultz*

When Richard Schultz came home from his Maine journey, he had traveled from Kittery to Mount Desert Island. (“The coast of Acadia,” he says, “deserves a whole separate trip. I want to go back.”) He brought with him more than 9,000 frames. “I find it totally freeing to shoot a lot,” he says. “I’m driven by light. It’s the light that makes images beautiful. And I love the juxtaposition I find in Maine. In the morning I can be with a lobsterman and then later out shooting a Rockefeller.” He found families picking blueberries on the Kennebunk Plains and fishermen bringing their catch into harbors; children playing and teenagers working; classic cottages and seaside hotels that time has passed by. Mostly he found summer playing out in the lives of people who for a moment or two allowed a stranger with a camera to hold them still.

Brian Boru, an Irish themed pub in Portland. "It was Sunday morning," recalls Schultz. "Raining. I was walking around, and about to give up finding something. I'd been in Portland two days and was frustrated, thinking maybe I should head north. I started walking back to my car and I heard music. It was an Irish Sunday brunch. See you can't always plan what you'll find." — Brian Boru, an Irish themed pub in Portland. “It was Sunday morning,” recalls Schultz. “Raining. I was walking around, and about to give up finding something. I’d been in Portland two days and was frustrated, thinking maybe I should head north. I started walking back to my car and I heard music. It was an Irish Sunday brunch. See you can’t always plan what you’ll find.”
*Photo Credit : Richard Schultz*

On the water in Wiscasset, Kalei Sprague takes orders for lobster rolls and ice cream at Sprague Lobster and Clam Bake, her family's stand. "This just looks like summer to me," says Richard. — On the water in Wiscasset, Kalei Sprague takes orders for lobster rolls and ice cream at Sprague Lobster and Clam Bake, her family’s stand. “This just looks like summer to me,” says Richard.
*Photo Credit : Richard Schultz*

MORE SUMMER ON THE MAINE COASTMaine Coast in Summer | Photographs

Mel Allen

Mel Allen is the fifth editor of Yankee Magazine since its beginning in 1935. His first byline in Yankee appeared in 1977 and he joined the staff in 1979 as a senior editor. Eventually he became executive editor and in the summer of 2006 became editor. During his career he has edited and written for every section of the magazine, including home, food, and travel, while his pursuit of long form story telling has always been vital to his mission as well. He has raced a sled dog team, crawled into the dens of black bears, fished with the legendary Ted Williams, profiled astronaut Alan Shephard, and stood beneath a battleship before it was launched. He also once helped author Stephen King round up his pigs for market, but that story is for another day. Mel taught fourth grade in Maine for three years and believes that his education as a writer began when he had to hold the attention of 29 children through months of Maine winters. He learned you had to grab their attention and hold it. After 12 years teaching magazine writing at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, he now teaches in the MFA creative nonfiction program at Bay Path University in Longmeadow, Massachusetts. Like all editors, his greatest joy is finding new talent and bringing their work to light.

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