07/29/2026
Our community has such a rich history of maritime-centered culture, the Festival always wants to highlight the ways that the next generation is learning and engaging with maritime craft. On the day of the Festival, we have had some educational institutions in attendance that will illustrate the various ways that our young people are being encouraged to embrace the Blue Hill Peninsula’s Maritime Heritage.
If you wander down to the “Big Tent” , near the Town Wharf, you’ll find two Blue Hill Peninsula (and beyond) high schools speaking about their boat building projects and maritime studies. George Stevens Academy, incorporated in 1891, is built on the very land of their namesake, George Stevens (1775-1852), who was a gentleman that invested in many of the large sailing ships being built on the nearby Parker Point Road. In the vein of that, George Stevens Academy has long been carrying on the Maritime legacy through hands-on boatbuilding projects, navigation and even having a Sailing team that competes regionally through the New England Scholastic Sailing Association.
The second High School has a shorter history, but no less engaging with the maritime traditions. The Blue Hill Harbor School, founded in 2007, has its foundations in the “EdVisions” model, which focuses on relationships, students-led curriculum and rigor. The Harbor School is fledging in their maritime program, but kicked it off this previous May, where the student engaged in the task of building a scow-styled rowboat using only traditional tools and materials in the process. Their boat, Blue Harbor, will be available to guests of the festival to take for a “row” around the waters of Blue Hill.
This skill-building and appreciation for maritime craft doesn’t end for Peninsula-area youth in High School. Many of our young people choose to attend Maine Maritime Academy (MMA) in Castine, Maine to study the ins and outs of all the maritime trade including engineering, transportation/shipping, scientistic pursuits and mariners. Serving the local community since 1941, MMA continues to reinvent and reinvigorate the maritime world through hands-on education that puts their students right on the deck of many ships. We hope that you’ll visit them in the Big Tent and see how this place of higher learning is taking heritage and putting it into actions for the future.
We hope that you'll join us on the Festival date itself - August 15th from 10 to 3pm and experience these great institutions of learning for yourself! Hope to see you there!
