Written by William Ferrall
Photographed By Laurie RIchards

Ask Dorothy Hamill what lies beneath her almost lifetime passion for figure skating, and you’ll understand part of why Nantucket has recently become an attractive retreat for her.

“I remember falling in love with the wind in my face, the freedom of being alone, the movement,” Hamill said of discovering figure skating as a child in Connecticut. “I was also painfully shy, and being on the ice, I could be alone with the music, which I love.”

Four decades later, with figure skating still a leading focus in her life, Hamill said she loves “being anywhere near water.”

By the time she won the Olympic gold medal in figure skating in 1976 at Innsbruck, Austria, Hamill had captured the hearts and minds of fans around the world and especially in the United States. The 19-year-old had already been three-time United States Figure Skating National Champion from 1974 to 1976 and World Champion in 1976.Commentators praised her almost constant smile while on ice, while other skaters adopted her trademark “Hamill Camel” move combining a spin-and-sit maneuver. She was well on her way to becoming a cultural icon, both as a role model for other young girls and for her trademark bob haircut, still known by many as the “Dorothy Hamill.”Within a year of her gold medal-winning performance, a Dorothy Hamill doll had appeared on store shelves.

Such attention and accolades seem well deserved for someone who worked as hard as Hamill did to achieve her successes. Among her more lighthearted impacts on popular culture, Hamill said she “never really understood the haircut phenomenon.” She had long worn it short because of her distaste as a child for fussing with longer hair and because of its practicality for skating as a “washand- wear” cut.

“I guess it was just timing,” Hamill said. “It came after the sixties when everyone had long hair or Afros. I look back now and think how horrible it was, but a lot of people had it cut that way afterwards. It was just so crazy.”

All of the public attention aside, Hamill was in it first and foremost for the sheer pleasure of skating. “I was hooked from the minute I had my first lesson,” she explained about starting skating lessons at the age of eight. “From there, it just kind of snowballed.”

Girl interrupted

By most measures, that’s an understatement. At the age of nine, Hamill was developing her skating skills with one of the world’s top coaches alongside other skating hopefuls at the world-famous Lake Placid, New York, Olympic Ice Arena, site of the 1932 World Olympics. She recalled working sometimes 10 hours daily, at least during the summer, on the most rudimentary of skating moves. Year-round, including during school months, she practiced daily while trying to still find room for the playtime and boyfriends one might expect a young girl to seek out.

Whether it was back home in Connecticut or in Lake Placid, Hamill’s parents sustained her desire to skate. “I remember begging my mom for skating lessons,” Hamill recalled, “and she eventually acquiesced.” Conceding that she and her mother “had some rocky times,” including her mother’s odd failure to appear at the arena during her gold medal winning performance, Hamill nonetheless praised both of her parents for nourishing her early career.

“We were very hands-on,” she explained. “My mom made the pretty dresses, and my dad made the music.” Those were what Hamill described as “simpler times” for even accomplished skaters, before multiple coaches and agents, before commercial endorsements to help fund training and before amateurs turned professional early on for fees and salaries. “It’s a big business now,” reminded Hamill. “Even though I was a national champion, no one knew unless they were avid figure skater fans, so it was real overnight success [for me] with the Olympics.”

In fact, the word “luck” came up repeatedly as Hamill recalled her youth. She praised her mother, in particular, for “her brilliance as a mom who was really dedicated, who wanted to make sure that she was doing the right thing all the time so that I could fulfill my dream as it became.”

The dream was not always entirely pleasant, as Hamill recounted extensively in her recent autobiography “A Skating Life: My Story,” published last fall. Her earlier autobiography, “Dorothy Hamill: On & Off the Ice,” from 1983, focused more on her successes on the ice rather than her life off it.

In “My Story,” Hamill tells of the strains on her family caused by her pursuit of skating, including sacrifices made by her mother who also cared for two older siblings and by her father who was a career engineer. Her family’’s continuing financial strains, according to Hamill, contributed to her leaving the world of ice skating competition after the ’76 Olympics. Elsewhere in the most recent book, Hamill examines her lifelong struggle with depression, her two marriages that ended in divorce—her first marriage was to Dean Martin, Jr., the actor’s son who died in a plane crash not long after their divorce and who she has called “the love of her life”—her troubled business dealings with her second husband and a lucrative drug company endorsement that eventually soured. For several years from the mid- 1980s to mid-1990s, Hamill and her second husband owned the Ice Capades until declaring bankruptcy and selling the businessin 1996. The two have one daughter, Alexandra, who enters college this fall.

Asked why she returned to the subject of her own life through a harsher lens aimed sometimes at when she was off her edge, Hamill said, “Part of it was being in a good place personally. A lot was the depression.There’s such a stigma attached to it. I thought it was important for people to know that you can be an Olympic champion, and everything seems great on the outside, but it’s not all as rosy and glamorous as it seems.”

Keeping an edge

Nantucket TimesIn person, sporting an updated version of her signature bob haircut, Dorothy Hamill appears younger than her 52 years and frequently offers her characteristic smile. She appears remarkably upbeat and is quick to offer a warm greeting despite her recent well-publicized bout with breast cancer, an affliction that runs in her family. By early spring this year, she had completed minor surgery and a round of radiation therapy.

Her prognosis is good so far, according to Hamill, who has undergone treatment at Johns Hopkins University, near her home in Baltimore.

“I’ve got great doctors,” noted Hamill, who thanks to a recently completed medical research study was given limited treatments that her doctors expect to be as effective as as more onerous procedures. Hamill recently began visiting Nantucket with John MacColl, her companion of about a year who’s a lawyer and businessman who already knew Nantucket.

“We were thinking about looking in Maine,” MacColl explained, “but I said let’s have a look at Nantucket.” The two have recently settled into a Nantucket home purchased earlier this year.

Hamill especially appreciates Nantucket’s Christopher Nugent Bovers Community Rink, home of Nantucket Ice, where she’ll appear on July 19 for the organization’s annual Celebrity on Ice benefit.

Without hesitation, Hamill praised the rink at Nantucket Ice as one of the top facilities in the United States and one notable for it’s “great” ice surface. Much of the focus at Nantucket Ice is on intramural amateur hockey teams and synchronized skating. A local girls synchronized team—girls ranging from age seven to 15 are in training at Nantucket Ice—has represented Nantucket both regionally and nationally in recent years, with Nantucket girls finishing last year in the finals of the Eastern U.S. Synchronized Team Skating Championship. Because of growing demand on Nantucket for the sport, Nantucket Ice will offer “a ton of programs” this year for the burgeoning program, according to team manager Jo Sullivan, whose daughter Elena is among the participants.

Hamill considers the endeavor an admirable one. “Synchronized skating is so good for the kids because it’s not just about jumps and spins,” said Hamill. “It’s not just about winning the Olympics, it’s about precision, timing and the quality of the edges—the fun things about skating. You don’t have to be an Olympic hopeful and you don’t have to do it at world-class level.”Nantucket Times

On the other hand, Hamill noted that even synchronized skaters find greater opportunities today in the world of skating, with colleges now offering scholarships and an increasing number of competitions. Besides the apparent fun and joy Nantucket girls are finding in the synchronized skating at Nantucket Ice, some of them still long to hone their individual figure skating skills and a handful on Nantucket. Although Nantucket’s synchronized team coaches, Kristin DeFrancisci and Belinda Young, also teach individually, the lessons are focused on team participation. A few young skaters have gotten the more specialized instruction they desire by taking regular lessons off island.

Ten-year old Farrell Duce, for example, has traveled to Tony Kent Arena in Dennis, Massachusetts on Cape Cod for the last 2-1/2 years to take lessons from a former coach of Olympian and Massachusetts native Nancy Kerrigan. “It’s really fun,” said Duce. “I get to hang out with skating friends, but it’s hard to play two other sports on some Saturdays.”

For Hamill, the sacrifices have been worth it to her, and she is far from forgotten or far from done with her career. For the last thirty years she has starred in several ice skating companies, performed in numerous televised ice skating productions including one for which she won an Emmy.

Last year, she was part of Broadway on Ice, to which she hopes to return when her health improves and the company develops a new touring program. Although Hamill conceded that “skating is going through a transitional period” of smaller audiences for both televised and in-person events, she doesn’t imagine doing anything else at this point, although stage acting has “been a consideration.” She noted that other well-known skaters in her age range have continued to perform well into mid-life.

Lest anyone think later generations might not know of her influence on the world of skating and popular culture, a cursory Internet search turns up more than a thousand references to Hamill. It’s even possible that her college-bound daughter Alex will someday listen to one of at least three songs, including two recent ones by popular hip-hop artists, that mention her by name.

Written by Marli Guzzetta, with Brian Murphy

Nantucket Choppers’ MySpace page reads like a shrine to all things loud and ornery, which is what you’d expect a self-respecting motorcycle company to champion, in addition to a gear-headed passion for rehabbing and rebuilding old “bikes” on Nantucket.

You can afford to be a little bit cheeky when the sound of your revving engine can turn the heads of every man, woman and child within a 100-yard radius on the island. And with increasing frequency.“There’s a core group of bikers here who have been bikers all their lives,” said Nantucket Choppers owner Brian Murphy. “But there has definitely been an increase, especially due to the popularity of biker TV shows, the formation of Nantucket Choppers and the increase in people just trying to beat gas prices.

”And a lot of these new riders are not salty old hog riders, but professionals, including Sanford Real Estate broker Tracy C. King. Citing motorcycles’ high fuel efficiency, King said she often prefers riding her bike to work. For $10 in gas, King estimated, she can go for about 125 miles.

In April, she and her boyfriend, firefighter Shawn Monaco, transported her 1600 CC 1983 Harley Davidson FXR to San Diego to participate in the El Diablo Run between Temecula, California and Baja, Mexico then back. King also often bikes with coworker Debbi Deeley- Culbertson, who owns a Harley and a Ridley, which she rides with her husband, Peter Culbertson, who owns two Harleys.

“Riding for me is like doing dressage work on a horse, which I also ride. I appreciate the skills work,”Culbertson said. “You really work your head and your body and your sense of balance while you’re also getting out with the sights and the smells.

”Island personal trainer Scotty Clauss and boyfriend Douglas Camp motor on three bikes — a Perewitz cherry-red custom bike, a self-built silver bagger, and a Yamaha sport bike.

“We ride year-round practically.We always go out on New Year’s Day,” Clauss said. “We mostly ride the Cape, and we go everywhere. All the back roads, all the towns. Every week it’s a different flower, or bush, or piece of architecture. I’m an athlete, so for me to be stationary is hard, but getting sensory overload is perfect.”
Murphy described riding as “almost therapeutic” and added that Nantucket Chopper apparel sales have been up, along with the number of bikes he sees on the road.

Established two years ago, Nantucket Choppers is averaging one major bike refurbishment to-date, including the 87 Harley 1100 that Murphy rides.

“I think it’s perfect for the island. It’s not a big bike, not too unwieldy,” said Murphy, who was enlisted by Dennis Parks and Christy Kickham to help run the island’s first charitable biking event last fall.

Owner of Dennis Parks plumbing, Parks is one of the island’s most avid riders. Kickham, a Nantucket Town Financial Committee member, Nicholls & David Property Manager Associate and Rose and Crown bartender, has had his biking license since he was a teenager. He joined Parks in creating the Nantucket Charitable Riders Association.

“I knew we could do something constructive and help a few people that maybe needed a hand,” said Parks. The pair contacted Murphy because they knew he’d held the position of Public Relations and Events Manager at Nantucket Cottage Hospital.

In September 2007, the trio—along with organizational help from Stacey Parks— brought the island biking community together for the first annual Harpoon Run. Thirty-two bikes participated in a procession from the Rose and Crown that followed the Daffodil Parade route to ’Sconset and back. Afterward, the bikers returned to the “Rally in the Alley” behind the Rose and Crown for food and refreshments.

Most of the riders who attended were from Nantucket, according to Kickham. “I think we’re helping spread awareness of biking on the island,” Murphy said. “To a certain extent, bikers get a bad rep. But this case shows that bikers can get together for a good cause, without trouble, and show we’re contributing members of the community.

Even before the Harpoon Run, these guys were all donating to different charities.” The Nantucket Charitable Riders Association hopes to see more of the island’s bikers when they repeat the event this coming September 27. All those interested in participating can email harpoonrun@yahoo.com. For more on Nantucket Choppers, go to nantucket-choppers.com.

Written by Jillian Fraker
Photographed By Laurie Richards

For the newly engaged Terry Sanford and Marla Mullen, a recent afternoon picnic on Old North Wharf at Mary F. Slade Cottage launched another succession of summer outings with friends.With grilled food from E.J Harvey of Nantucket’s Sea Grille and wines from the island’s new Epernay—served in plates and glasses from Nantucket’s Lion’s Paw boutique—the couple created a quintessential Nantucket-themed gathering.

Over Harvey’s first course of yellow tomato gazpacho soup with an avocado puree, the couple toasted early summer. Joining them for lunch were close friends Dalton and Jennifer Frazier, Seth and Brooke Christian and Brendan Mailloux, and Rebecca Becker. Pet canines Zili and Loki romped around the lawn.

“I’ve lived or spent time in every cottage on Old North Wharf,” said Sanford. “These afternoons are why we all come here.” The couple was taking a break from their Boston-based business Territory Real Estate, an online flat-fee realty company. “To us, this afternoon is quintessential Nantucket,” remarked Mullen. “The wharf is simple, mostly untouched. Its our piece of the island, frozen in time.”

When the Sanford family bought the Slade cottage, the quarter board now hanging in the living room came with it. Digging through Nantucket’s historical records reveals that Mary F. Slade was a shipping bark built in 1848 and sailing out of the New England port of Boston. A shipwreck of a Mary F. Slade is also documented off the coast of California in 1859 near Cape Mendocino. As with any good Nantucket treasure, there might yet be a firm connection to the island, awaiting discovery by future researchers.

Wharf builders

At a meeting held in November of 1719, the Proprieties of Nantucket Island voted to allow the building of wharves from Brant Point to Gravelly Point and south to Straight Wharf. One share of common land—and probably the wharves— equaled 720 sheep in value. Nantucket’s Great Fire of 1832 destroyed the area from South Water Street to Cross Wharf but it was quickly rebuilt.

By 1845, if one were to stroll down the wharf, the congestion of businesses there would have been impressive. Butchers, blacksmiths, sail makers, block and spar builders, fish merchants and ship chandleries bustled with customers, in an area that has since been transformed into a peaceful escape from the island’s busy Main Street. By 1875, picnickers might have watched “sloop boats” coming in and out of the harbor for blue fishing. The fee then was just $8 a day or $1 an hour. The Mary Slade cottage is thought to have been built around 1912.

In fact, the wharf has long entertained guests. In 1929, the first waterfront carnival was held on Old North Wharf to benefit the Cottage Hospital. Chances at games, quahogs, littlenecks and hot dogs were sold. The recently elected Massachusetts Governor Frank Allen attended with his wife, and playwright Austin Strong showed Long John Silver’s pistols.

In 1933, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt sailed into Nantucket Harbor near Old North Wharf, where the legendary Wharf Rat Club made him an honorary member. Roosevelt’s yacht, Amber Jack II, later flew the club’s burgee from her yardarm. In 1964, Hugh W. Sanford and Alfred F. Sanford purchased Old North Wharf from Richard Everett.

Today, the Sanfords continue to treasure the past while taking time out to enjoy the wharf’s simple luxuries. On this day, the source of greatest joy to those at brunch came from chefs E.J. Harvey and Jeff Knab. Following their soup course, the two served up a salad of arugula and feta cheese with a mint vinaigrette. A half grilled lobster came off the grill to be garnished with a smoked corn relish. Seared tuna burgers, served on whole grain bread with fresh salsa,joined the lobster. A side of roasted fingerling potato salad, grilled asparagus and lemon aioli filled out diners’ plates.

A sweet and luscious lemon curd Brule and goat cheese tart, with fresh berries and strawberry tarragon sorbet, made for a memorable end to the meal. Over dessert, after their party moved inside, Sanford reminisced about his childhood nights spent on the wharf: “At night, growing up, our floor used to not be insulated.When the wind would starting howling, it would blow right through the wooden walls of the cottage,sweeping in under our rug in the living room making the rug float in the air, literally.”

Written by William Ferrall
Photographed By Jeffrey Allen

Back a decade or so ago, when cool and modern were things done over in America but rarely on Nantucket, The Pearl restaurant and lounge began changing the island’s dining out scene. Its large-scale design elements and sleek, sophisticated furnishings gave an initial shock to some. The huge, almost floor to ceiling saltwater aquarium to the left inside the door and the glowing quartz crystal bar to the right both excited and hypnotized visitors. They still do except, perhaps, for The Pearl’s most repetitive, jaded or oblivious diners.

You’re bound to find plenty of the first inside on many nights, enjoying and fawning over chef-owner Seth Raynor’s Asian-inspired, coastal cuisine or gawking at the usually lively crowd.

For those who’ve been around since it’s inception, they know this is how it has always been at The Pearl, especially at the height of summer when dinner reservations can be hard to come by or long-lines of would be bar patrons linger by The Pearl’s Federal Street porch. Only the throng that typically gathers on late weekend nights around the patio front door at the adjoining Boarding House, The Pearl’s older sister establishment, usually match this buzz in Nantucket’s downtown.

Yes, The Pearl especially has something of a rep as a hangout for hipsters and eye-candy, but neither Seth Raynor nor his wife and co-owner Angela Raynor make much of a deal from that. If a Hollywood star or billionaire mogul sits down beside you inside The Pearl, don’t count on reading about it in Boston papers or seeing your photo on society pages. We’re all about giving our customers a comfortable and enjoyable experience with whatever privacy they want, assured Angela Raynor.

This summer, fans of both restaurants can chose their own level of comfort at the two from morning to night, as The Pearl adds a late night Menu, something rare on Nantucket, and BoHo, as many affectionately call it, dishes up hearty weekend brunches in the fresh air on its patio, or in the cozy confines of its bar and dining room on blustery days. Some diners already appear to be taking the name Boarding House for its traditional meaning. We’re seeing guests in the morning who were there at The Pearl for last call the night before, said Angela Raynor Pearl and Boarding House are found on their menus. Food enthusiasts have raved about The Pearl’s signature Salt and Pepper Wok Fried Lobster, the Yellow Fin Tuna Martini, Sauteed Nantucket Fluke or the Grilled Center Cut Sirloin Steak. Downstairs at the Boarding House, you’ll find Pistachio Crusted Organic Salmon, Sicilian Style Spaghetti with sea urchin and Provencal Fish Stew, in preparations overseen by Boarding House chef de cuisine Erin Zircher.

For late nights until after midnight, ask about The Pearl’s refreshingly small bite dishes that are heavy on Asian flair or just plain fun, like the Dog and Pony Show gourmet hot dog and beer. On some nights, Boarding House staff will bring The Pearl’s bites to their BoHo digs so that sports fans can take in the big game on television screens over there.

Fresh and worldly When The Pearl first opened, the Raynors had already proven their topnotch abilities with fine cuisine for a half dozen years at the Boarding House, where their fresh approaches to classic French cooking methods both are former culinary school students trained in traditional cooking techniques and ingredients served as a solid underpinning to a menu influenced by American, continental and worldwide cuisine. Both are inveterate travelers who bring home to their Nantucket restaurant kitchens the tastes and preparations they encounter elsewhere. Although she mostly manages business tasks in both restaurants, Angela Raynor has worked in kitchens in New York and France and has stepped in temporarily to replace departing chefs. Seth Raynor traveled extensively throughout Southeast Asia in preparation for opening The Pearl. As a family with their young children Nathaniel and Jacqueline, they’ve taken extended vacations in Hawaii and South America among other places. Each time, they bring back their culinary discoveries.

It was Seth Raynor’s trip to San Francisco that helped spur their founding of The Pearl. He was already experimenting with the occasional Asian dish at the Boarding House when he visited the west coast and discovered even more authentic Asian food styles and products. Soon, he was adding more of those to the Boarding House menu.

Angela Raynor recalled that one regular but slightly perturbed customer eventually asked, When is Seth going to be done with his Asian period? When neighboring business owner Michael Molinar decided to remove his flower shop from next door to the Boarding House, the Raynors jumped on the opportunity to give Seth full rein with his Asian bent.

Not being stagnant ranks high among the Raynors’ goals for both restaurants. Their menus are driven by current market ingredients, with local origins when possible. And Angela Raynor has recently re-booted their beverage offerings with wine steward Jamie Nickerson to feature an array of organic, biodynamic and sustainable wines, cocktails and beverages.

Boarding House | 508-228-9622
The Pearl | 508-228-9701
12 Federal Street | boardinghouse-pearl.com