“The marsh grasses were a more vivid green than usual, the brown tops of those that were beginning to go to seed looked almost red, and the soil at the edges of the tide inlets seemed to be melting into a black, pitchy substance like the dark pigments on a painter’s palette.”

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From “Marsh Rosemary,” a story by Sarah Orne Jewett, inspired by a trip to Wells in 1886.

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Marshland lined the road along the oceanside town of Wells, where farmers, shipbuilders, and fishing and seafaring families built a thriving economy based on skilled work. Although haying on the salt marsh and Captain Zeb Tilton are long gone, the folklore and sea yarns remain through the art of poets, painters, writers, and photographers.