This Maine man knows how to find the land’s hidden histories in the woods

BANGOR DAILY NEWS • April 13, 2026

For decades, Tom Wessels has pioneered and publicized this art of “reading the forested landscape” in New England. An author and retired professor now living in Blue Hill, the ecologist is still teaching others how to find these clues – not just to uncover human history, he said, but to help people see the stories of the interconnected relationships at work in nature.