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Fact Book / Doing Business in Maine
Q UA L I T Y O F L I F E
VO L . X X X I N O. X I X
her career options open, she says she'd
love to become a midwife, OB-GYN
or anthropologist.
From late June through late
August, lobstering trainees spend
more than 50 hours on the water and
the docks learning how to set and
haul traps, maintain their gear and
safely operate a boat under profes-
sional supervision.
Despite growing up so near the
ocean, for many it's their first time
on the water.
"I was a little nervous at first,"
admits 16-year-old David, a rising
sophomore at South Portland High
School who started the program as
a freshman. "I was always thinking,
'What if the boat tips over?' We've got
all these traps." It never did, and now
he finds that "the rougher the waves,
the more exciting" the outing. He'd
like to attend college on a basketball
or football scholarship.
As for his harvest, "I had my
worst day when I caught five lob-
sters, but that's still pretty good,"
David says on the dock before set-
ting off on the boat. "Catching any
lobster is good!"
Charting the next chapter
In addition to financing and staffing
the program, Luke's Lobster — a
wholesale and retail business with
restaurants known as "shacks" on
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C O N T I N U E D F RO M P R E V I O U S PA G E
P H O T O / J I M N E U G E R
Ben Conniff, co-founder and chief innovation officer of Luke's Lobster, says that
Lift All Boats is intended for students without existing connections to lobstering.
