Star Island Pelicans

 

Star Island incoming Chief Executive Officer Joe Watts, speaks during a press conference aboard the M/V Thomas Laighton at the Isles of Shoals Steamship Company to talk about its upcoming season and Third Annnual Gosport Regatta fundraiser in support of its sustainablility program on Wednesday in Portsmouth. Seated at left is Jack Farrell, Star Island Facilities Superintendent.

PORTSMOUTH — A veteran employee of Star Island Corp. who has held just about every job available on the island and off has been tapped to be its next chief executive officer.

Joe Watts, current general island manager, was named by the Star Island Corp. board of trustees to succeed Victoria Hardy, who is retiring at the end of the year. The announcement was made Wednesday aboard the M/V Thomas Laighton, owned by the Isles of Shoals Steamship Co., which makes regular stops at Star Island during the summer months.

Star Island Corp. owns and maintains Star Island off the coast of Portsmouth. On the island is the Oceanic House hotel and a number of cottages and guest houses. Weekly conferences and retreats, some affiliated with the Unitarian Universalist and congregational churches and some not, take place throughout the summer.

Hardy, who has been chief executive officer since 2007, is retiring to spend more time with her family in Washington state.

“Since Vicky announced her plans to retire, the board gave much thought as to how to approach the search for a new CEO,” said board President Russell Peterson, a financial planner from York, Maine.

He said, before the board committed to a national search, “We knew that we had a qualified internal candidate in Joe. We had a long discussion with him” at the board meeting in Boston last month.

“Joe has done an impeccable job as island manager,” Peterson said. “It’s in the best shape it’s been in for a long time. He is mature, and he’s ready for the seriousness of the job.”

For Watts, 41, it’s the ultimate job in a long succession of work he’s done at Star Island, going back to his college years. Actually, he started coming to Star Island as a youngster, he said. In college, he was a “pelican,” the affectionate name given to the young people who do everything from waiting on tables to cooking food to helping with the many island chores.

He was hired as assistant island engineer in 1998, and that began a series of jobs with Star Island Corp., including facilities manager, volunteer coordinator and publications coordinator. As general manager, he’s in charge of all aspects of running the island from early June to late September, when it’s open.

His new job will be to guide the facility into the future, “to preserve the traditions of Star Island while on the other hand introduce change in exciting ways.”

The board has committed, for instance, to make the island as self-sustaining as possible and has instituted the Green Gosport Initiative, named for the town that once existed on the island. Its goal is to reduce the island’s use of fossil fuels as much as possible. The board hired the Island Institute in Rockland, Maine, to study the feasibility of installing a solar array that could meet the island’s power needs.

Watts said it’s exciting to be part of that initiative, as well as to find new, varied and interesting programming that is affordable and family friendly.

“I love Star Island — both the place and the people. I’m dedicated to Star, and I’m ready for the challenge,” he said.

For more about Star Island, visit www.starisland.org.

Photos from a summer working on Star Island, Isles of Shoals. All photos by Sarah O’Connor.

http://www.seacoastonline.com/articles/20090909-NEWS-909090327

By Susan Morse
smorse@seacoastonline.com
September 09, 2009 2:00 AM

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. — Josh Blake, 19, “the merman” planned on Tuesday to bicycle seven miles from Portsmouth to Fort Foster in Kittery, swim seven miles to the Isles of Shoals, and then run seven miles around Star Island, in a one-man triathlon to raise money to clean up the oceans.

At 3:20 p.m. on Tuesday, Blake was two miles out to sea and doing well, said girlfriend Rosa Greeley, who was in the lobster boat that was spotting Blake for the trip.

“He’s had a PowerBar,” she said.

There were no signs of Blake’s most dreaded fear in the open ocean: sharks.

Blake took off on bicycle on the first leg of his “777 Triathlon” at 1 p.m., from Hannaford on Islington Street in Portsmouth, wearing a wetsuit and sneakers. He carried swim goggles and strapped a diver’s knife to his leg to help combat any sharks.

In his backpack he carried five Moe’s sandwiches — some for Greeley and lobster boat captain and friend Jimmy Severance — seven Power Bars and numerous bottles of water. He planned to eat at least one Moe’s while he was in the water, he said, while treading water on his back.

“I’ve been a swimmer all my life,” said Blake, who made news last year after swimming across the Piscataqua River at the Memorial Bridge.

Friend and mentor Robert Wheeler called Blake’s swimming style “powerful.” His daughters know Blake from the Portsmouth High School swim team where Blake swam the 50- and 100-meter freestyle and butterfly, he said.

“He’s an animal in the water,” said Wheeler, a teacher at Southern New Hampshire University at Pease. “My daughters think he’s a ‘merman.’”

Blake said he expects the swim to take three-and-a-half to four hours.

He got advice from fellow Isles of Shoals swimmer Gary Sredzienski of Kittery, Blake said, who told him the hardest part was swimming in a straight line in the strong currents.

Blake planned the start of his swim at slack tide, he said. He headed into the ocean at Fort Foster and swam out to Whaleback Light where he met Severance’s boat.

Blake lives on Star Island and works there as a lifeguard. On Tuesday morning, he took the 6:30 a.m. boat to Portsmouth, knowing he’d be treading the same water later that day. He then had breakfast at his grandfather’s and father’s house on Badgers Island.

This is his first long-distance ocean water swim. He’s been practicing, while living on Star, by swimming to nearby White and Lunging Islands.

On the way back from one island swim, “I heard echoes,” said Blake. “It was dolphins.”

He also routinely sees seals, but so far, not sharks, of which he said, “I’m terrified.”

Swimming to the Isle of Shoals is a lifelong dream, he said.

“I love the ocean, I’ve always wanted to swim to the Isles of Shoals.”

Born in York, Blake grew up in Eliot and Kittery where he regularly swims around Badgers Island.

He attended Eliot Elementary School and Marshwood Middle School. He’s moved around a lot, he said, attending Traip Academy and living in Maryland before going to Portsmouth High School where he was a senior last year.

He’s taking classes online to finish high school, he said.

He wants to go to college to major in environmental science. He is also looking at joining the Coast Guard to become a rescue swimmer.

The 777 Triathlon is raising money for the Environmental Cleanup Coalition, an organization working to rid the ocean of garbage. Blake has raised $3,200, with $2,250 coming from people attending the Life On A Star II Conference on Star Island and other donations from individuals who have visited the island, including “The West Wing” actor Bradley Whitford, who gave $500, said Blake.

“I want to raise awareness,” said Blake. “We have huge, huge problems in the ocean and it’s killing us.”

When he arrives at Star Island, his fellow coworkers, called Pelicans, will be there to greet him. On Wednesday, it’s business as usual as he gets up for work at 7 a.m.

This is a first annual event, he said.

“I’m going to make it,” he said, before peddling off.