Biddeford

Wood Island Light is an active lighthouse on the eastern edge of Wood Island in Saco Bay, Maine. The light is just outside the entrance to Biddeford... Pool and the end of the Saco River. The lighthouse is a 47 feet tall conical white tower constructed of granite rubble. The light itself sits 71 feet above mean high water. It currently is automated and has an alternating green and white beacon every 10 seconds. Wood Island Light is Maine's second oldest lighthouse and the nation's eleventh oldest. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places as Wood Island Light Station on January 21, 1988, reference number 87002274. Wood Island Light was constructed in 1808 under the orders of President Thomas Jefferson. The original tower was an octagonal wooden structure that had rotted out by the 1830s. In 1839 a granite tower was erected replacing the original wood structure. The current tower was constructed in 1858 as a renovation of the 1839 tower to allow for the installation of a 4th order Fresnel Lense. Also built in 1858 were the current keepers dwellings which are still standing.
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Joan Wasser is a violinist, guitarist and singer/songwriter in the indie rock world. She began her career playing violin with the Dambuilders. She... has released three albums as a singer songwriter, the 2006 Real Life the 2008 To Survive and the 2011 The Deep Field. Her resume includes live performances and studio work with Lou Reed, Tanya Donelly, Sheryl Crow, Sparklehorse, Dave Gahan, Elton John, the Scissor Sisters, Antony and the Johnsons, Guillemots, Joseph Arthur, Rufus Wainwright, Fan Modine and Lloyd Cole. Wasser was raised in Norwalk, Connecticut, with a younger brother, Dan. She began piano lessons at age six, before starting her first violin lessons at age eight. Wasser played violin in school and community orchestras before leaving Norwalk for her college studies. Wasser began her career during her studies at Boston University where she was an early admittance student studying with the renowned Yuri Mazurkevich, who himself had studied under Russian violin virtuoso David Oistrakh.
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Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost portion of New England. It is known for its scenery—its jagged, mostly rocky coastline, its low, rolling mountains, its heavily forested interior... and picturesque waterways—as well as for its seafood cuisine, especially lobsters and clams. For thousands of years, indigenous peoples were the only inhabitants of the territory that is now Maine. At the time of European encounter, several Algonquian-speaking peoples inhabited the area. The first European settlement in Maine was by the French in 1604 on Saint Croix Island, by Pierre Dugua, Sieur de Mons. The first English settlement in Maine, the short-lived Popham Colony, was established by the Plymouth Company in 1607. A number of English settlements were established along the coast of Maine in the 1620s, although the rugged climate, deprivations, and conflict with the local peoples caused many to fail over the years.
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