A retired journalist marks the state’s bicentennial by telling us, in more ways than one, how we got here from there.
Bill Nemitz
Bill Nemitz has worked as a journalist in Maine since 1977, when he became a reporter for the Morning Sentinel in Waterville after graduating from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
He moved to Portland in 1983, working first as a reporter for the Evening Express and later as a city editor and assistant managing editor/sports for the Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram. He began writing his column in 1995. While focusing on Maine people and issues, his work has taken him three times to Iraq and twice to Afghanistan, where he was embedded with members of the Maine Army National Guard and the Army Reserve; to Belfast, Northern Ireland, for the 1998 referendum on the Good Friday Peace Accord; to Manhattan for the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks; to the Gulf Coast for the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina; and to Haiti following the 2010 earthquake. Nemitz is a past president of the Maine Press Association and for many years taught journalism part-time at St. Joseph's College of Maine in Standish. He also served for eight years, including three as chairman, on the board of trustees for the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies in Portland. In 2004, the Maine Press Association named Nemitz Maine Journalist of the Year for his reporting on the Maine Army National Guard’s 133rd Engineer Battalion in Iraq. In 2007, he received the Distinguished Service Award from the New England Newspaper Association. In 2015, Nemitz was inducted into the Maine Press Association Hall of Fame. Nemitz lives in Buxton with his wife, Andrea. They have five children and four grandchildren.
Bill Nemitz: The truth is vaccines save Maine kids’ lives. Let’s keep it that way.
For all the time they’ve spent talking in recent months, supporters of Question 1 have said precious little.
Bill Nemitz: He picked up a WWII dog tag – and couldn’t let go
Thanks to a Royal Australian Navy veteran, a Portland soldier’s legacy rises from the battlefield on which he died.
Bill Nemitz: As Trump skates away, King warns, the Senate forever loses its balance
Maine’s junior senator decries not just a newly emboldened president, but a forever-weakened Congress.
Bill Nemitz: Back then, Collins called Trump ‘unfit.’ What’s changed?
Maine’s senior senator would do well to heed her own words from 2016 about the man who would become president.
Bill Nemitz: A Maine school, an election and an assault on democracy
The kids at Coffin School in Brunswick thought they’d elected a chickadee for their new school. They thought wrong.
Bill Nemitz: ‘All aboard’ for a trip back in time
The Maine Narrow Gauge Railroad seeks community support as it links Maine’s past with its future.
Bill Nemitz: Another crisis, another empty promise from CMP
Recent disconnect notices that contradict state law are but the latest example of a utility that’s in the dark.
Bill Nemitz: He tried to save the world but could not save himself
Dave Bakis spent 12 years traveling through 40 countries to help kids in need. Then, just before Christmas, he took his own life.
Bill Nemitz: Just an old cooking pot … or is it something more?
Steve Hill thought he’d never again see his favorite piece of cookware. Then fate took over.