WALDOBORO, Maine — Clam diggers visit Elaine and Ralph Johnston’s hardware store in the seaside town of Waldoboro to scratch and scrape shells. Since Russia invaded Ukraine, they might as well pick up a more unusual item: the Ukrainian flag, which sells for $15.99.
Across Maine, yellow and blue banners – yellow for Ukraine’s rich wheat fields, blue for the sky above – fluttered from the flagpoles. It decorates lobster floats and barn doors, sea salt shingled houses and cabins nestled in pine forests.
Unlike in cities like New York and Chicago, where symbols of Ukrainian pride partly reflect a large diaspora, there are very few people of Ukrainian descent in Maine. But the flag’s widespread presence in the state suggests a different form of solidarity. The master craftsmen like to say that their spirit is an iron spirit, born of harsh winters and an equally harsh economy.
“The people there are doing a great job fighting for their land and survival, and we in Maine, we love that,” Ms. Johnston said. “We sell flags to people who feel like us.”
In Skowhegan, a town in rural Maine, Tom McCarthy, a contractor who also runs a Christmas wreath business, called a flag maker down the street.
“I said, ‘Make me the biggest Ukrainian flag you can,'” Mr McCarthy said. “He did.”
Mr McCarthy has no family connections to Ukraine, although he once hosted an exchange student from neighboring Belarus, which is run by an authoritarian leader with ties to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.
“Most people in Maine know what struggle is like, from pulp forests to potato fields, blueberries to lobster waters — we know that one day you have something,” said McCarthy. something and another day you don’t. “Ukrainian people, they are also survivors, and the planting of their flag is just a small sign. But that’s what I can do.”
Bill Swain, the flag maker McCarthy contacted, said he needed Google to see what the Ukrainian flag looked like when his neighbor called. Mr. Swain often made curtains for hotels and flags decorated with pine trees and stars, the old state symbol of Maine.
He said the distinctive blue color on the top half of the Ukrainian flag had to be ordered separately. It’s the rare blue (Pantone 2935, which in the company parlance is considered the authority on colors), not the navy (Pantone 281) of the Norwegian and Liberian flags or blue. royal (Pantone 293) of the Dutch and Slovenian flags.
Mr. Swain ordered a lot of fabric at Pantone 2935. Mr. McCarthy, who bought the 5 x 8 foot flag from him, told him that the Ukraine symbol would become popular.
Since making the first Ukrainian flag in April, Mr. Swain has sold more than 2,000 units, a faster rate than his American and Maine flags. Orders came in from all over the country — a reminder that flying the Ukrainian flag isn’t just a Maine phenomenon — and he’s donated a quarter of the proceeds to a charity that operates in the country. Ukraine. The oldest flagmaker at his company is 73. Mr. Swain installed the washers himself.
“When you make a flag, you want to do it right,” Mr. Swain said. “When you see flags printed rather than sewn like ours, you can tell right away they won’t last long.”
Maine is politically divided between the south coast and a large hinterland, and it is one of only two states where electoral college districts are separate. In the 2020 presidential election, President Biden prevails outside and former President Donald J. Trump prevails within.
However, the relationship with Ukraine is bipartisan.
Mr. McCarthy, a Vietnam War veteran, said: “Ukraine is not a red or green problem, but a green and yellow issue.
Kimberly Richards, of Friendship, Maine, is married to a third-generation lobsterman and paints the cedar floats white in a custom color combination. Commercial lobster farmers use bands of color to distinguish the floats that float above their traps. This year, she’s painted a lot of yellow and blue, buying blue paint from the Johnstons hardware store in Waldoboro.
“Most people in Maine, we understand the injustice that is happening there and we want to show our support to the people of Ukraine,” Ms. Richards said.
The family of Johnston, a hardware store owner, came to the United States from Finland, a country invaded by the Soviet Union at the beginning of World War II. Miss Johnston’s grandmother came to Maine as a little girl, trading one snowy land for another.
“We know how Ukrainians feel when Putin acts like that,” Ms. Johnston said.
The wave of Finns, along with Scots and Swedes, came to Maine to work in the granite quarries. Other immigrants arrived to transport timber and feed the paper mills on the land that was once home to the Wabanaki, a confederation of indigenous peoples.
However, only 4% of Maine’s current population is foreign-born, and although immigrants from Africa and Asia have arrived in the state in recent years, many have had to leave their homeland due to conflicts. sudden.
Muhidin Libah, an Aboriginal Bantu from Somalia, came to Lewiston, Maine, in 2005 after winning the visa lottery. He helps the state’s approximately 2,000 Bantus people access social services and apply their traditional agricultural acumen to colder climates. (An ethnic minority in Somalia, the Bantus were once enslaved by other ethnic groups.)
Mr. Libah saw Ukrainian flags flying from the farmhouses as he drove around rural Maine in search of Bantus’ arable land.
“Ukrainian flags in the yards in Maine, it’s nice to see that support,” Mr. Libah said.
However, he noted that while many Ukrainians sought refuge outside of their country immediately after the invasion, he spent 20 years in a refugee camp in Kenya before winning his chance. emigrate to the United States.
“I think part of it is because people associate white skin with Ukrainians,” Libah said. “You want to help someone struggling to look like you. Would they feel the same for an Afghan refugee or a Bantu refugee?”
Compared with migrants in Africa, Asia and the Middle East, Ukrainian refugees have been welcomed more quickly and with more open arms than in Europe and the United States.
Oleg Opalnyk, originally from Ukraine, moved to Maine in 2002 and now owns a contract and real estate business. He estimates there are only a few dozen Ukrainians in the state. When Russia invaded Ukraine, he longed to do something.
“At first, I wanted to go to Ukraine and fight,” he said, “but I realized that I could help people more from here than from there.”
Opalnyk has so far assisted 24 Ukrainians to Maine under a Department of Homeland Security program that allows about 100,000 Ukrainians to stay in the United States for up to two years if they have a financial sponsor. Opalnyk is also sponsoring 18 other Ukrainians who will be traveling to Maine in the coming weeks, he said.
Only one in 24 Ukrainians who arrived was allowed to work, Mr. Opalnyk said, making a lasting welcome from the community even more important. Residents of the cities of Lewiston and Auburn, where Ukrainians have settled in apartments provided by Mr Opalnyk, have donated clothes, furniture and food.
“They see the Ukrainian flag everywhere, on cars and on buildings, and they feel the good of the people of Maine,” Mr. Opalnyk said, referring to the newcomers. . “Americans, and especially Mainers, they have a sensitive heart for people who are suffering.”
