Sutton Island, in Hancock County,

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and north ...

, United States, is a small,

private island A private island is a disconnected body of land wholly owned by a private citizen or corporation. Although this exclusivity gives the owner substantial control over the property, private islands remain under the jurisdiction of national and some ...

south of

Mount Desert Island Mount Desert Island (MDI; french: Île des Monts Déserts) in Hancock County, Maine, is the largest island off the coast of Maine. With an area of it is the 52nd-largest island in the United States, the sixth-largest island in the contiguous ...

, and north of Cranberry Isles. Its dimensions are roughly 2.1 km on its east–west axis by 1.1 km north to south. The island is one of the five Cranberry Isles; the others are

Great Cranberry Island Great Cranberry Island is an island located in Maine. It is the largest of the five islands of the Town of Cranberry Isles, Maine. It is roughly long and wide. Great Cranberry Island is a favorite vacation spot for many. Access to the island i ...

, Islesford (also known as Little Cranberry Island),

Baker Island Baker Island, formerly known as New Nantucket, is an uninhabited atoll just north of the Equator in the central Pacific Ocean about southwest of Honolulu. The island lies almost halfway between Hawaii and Australia. Its nearest neighbor is Ho ...

, and Bear Island.James Kaiser, ''Acadia: The Complete Guide: Mt. Desert Island and Acadia National Park'' (3d ed.: Destination Press: 2010), pp. 270-73. The island has only a summertime population. Sutton island is the second smallest of the Cranberry Islands, and is close to Northeast Harbor.
American Guide Series: Maine, A Guide "Down East"
',

Federal Writers' Project The Federal Writers' Project (FWP) was a federal government project in the United States created to provide jobs for out-of-work writers during the Great Depression. It was part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), a New Deal program. It ...

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, i ...

, p. 285.

History

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

formerly owned two properties on the island, each with a seaside home. One was donated to the university in 1958, the other donated to the university around 1942. The homes were infrequently used; Harvard sold them both in 2007 in light of mounting maintenance costs. From at least the 1950s until 2008, the island received mail service via a private ferry, which delivered mail to the island by leaving it "in a specially marked trash can on the dock for recipients to pick up."Maine island loses mail delivery tradition
Associated Press (August 3, 2007). The

U.S. Postal Service The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the U. ...

ended the practice in 2008 due to security concerns; residents of the island now must journey by boat to the Northeast Harbor post office, to retrieve their mail.

Population, transportation, and points of interest

The island's population is seasonal; it is currently inhabited by humans only in summertime, although in the past Sutton Island had year-round residents. The poet

Rachel Field Rachel Lyman Field (September 19, 1894 – March 15, 1942) was an American novelist, poet, and children's fiction writer. She is best known for the Newbery Award–winning ''Hitty, Her First Hundred Years''. Field also won a National Book Award, ...

maintained a summer home on the island. The island has no roads, bridge to the mainland, nor airstrip. It is primarily accessed by

mail boat Mail boats or postal boats are a boat or ship used for the delivery of mail and sometimes transportation of goods, people and vehicles in communities where bodies of water commonly separate or separated settlements, towns or cities often where b ...

from Northeast Harbor or by

ferry A ferry is a ship, watercraft or amphibious vehicle used to carry passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A passenger ferry with many stops, such as in Venice, Italy, is sometimes called a water bus or water taxi ...

or water taxi from

Southwest Harbor, Maine Southwest Harbor is a town in Hancock County, Maine, United States. Located on Mount Desert Island, the population was 1,756 at the 2020 census. The municipality contains within it the villages of Southwest Harbor, Manset, Seawall, Wonderland, ...

. There is a cemetery on Sutton Island.

Wildlife

Sutton Island has a "100-year-old

osprey The osprey (''Pandion haliaetus''), , also called sea hawk, river hawk, and fish hawk, is a diurnal, fish-eating bird of prey with a cosmopolitan range. It is a large raptor reaching more than in length and across the wings. It is brown o ...

nest perched on an outcropping of rocks." Sutton Island is also known for the tall tale legend of Christopher Adams. A seafarer that was stranded via shipwreck on the island in the early 1800’s. His infamous whistle is still heard by inhabitants to this day.Meredith Laitos
Chartering Mount Desert Island
''Sail Magazine'' (November 2, 2012).

References

{{authority control Islands of Hancock County, Maine Islands of Maine Coastal islands of Maine Private islands of Maine