A Day's Work: A Sampler of Historic Maine Photographs, 1860-1920

Bunting has a knack for spotting the unusual in a photograph, or some minor detail that, in fact, tells a major story about the how and why. From granite quarry operations to an itinerant cobbler in a sailing scow to hootchie-kootchie dancers at the state fair to deepwater ships, his page-long captions place these images in social and economic context--but this is not dry history. His research has uncovered a wealth of fascinating, often quirky detail (did you know that mummy wrappings were imported from Egypt for Maine papermaking?), and he makes frequent forays into the Maine storytelling tradition.

W. H. “BILL” Bunting is the author of a number of critically acclaimed works of history including Portrait of a Port: Boston 1852-1914; Steamers, Schooners, Cutters, and Sloops: The Marine Photographs of N. L. Stebbins; A Day's Work: A Sampler of Historic Maine Photographs, 1860-1920 (in two volumes); The Camera's Coast: Historic Images of Sea and Shore in New England; Live Yankees; and Maine on Glass: The Early Twentieth Century in Glass Plate Photography.  With Earle G. Shettleworth, Jr., he wrote An Eye for the Coast: The Monhegan and Maritime Photographs of Eric Hudson and Maine on Glass: The Early Twentieth Century in Glass Plate Photography.

Bill Bunting shipped as galley boy aboard the brigantine Yankee at age 13 and later completed a 25,000-mile world voyage as first mate of a 132-foot barkentine.