The Dogfish Head behind Dogfish Head

“In all men in some degree the wilderness wish exists, however hidden in the haste and habit of the world we make. For me, this wish is symbolized and fulfilled by log cabins I have known, built, or lived in. I am thinking especially of certain remote cabins on the banks of rivers or the shores of little-known lakes.”

That quote, written by author and outdoorsman E.W. Smith to fellow author E.B. White, is hand-painted on the inside wall of Sam and Mariah Calagione’s home-brewing operation at Dogfish Head Point in Southport, Maine. If it weren’t for the internationally familiar, Delaware-based beer and spirits maker, Dogfish Head Point would be little known where the wilderness wish exists. The quote adorns the home brewing operation of the Calagiones because, as Sam said in an email July 22, they built their home brewery into the front porch of a cabin on Dogfish Head looking out at the Sheepscot River.

Dogfish Head’s connection to Maine is familiar to many. Now, more than two decades after it opened as the smallest commercial brewery in the country, Maine continues to serve as a place of refuge for Sam, Mariah, their two children and extended family.

A fews days before his email, on July 19, Sam was standing in the second-floor living room of the family’s waterfront home built on a ledge overlooking the river. He pointed to a rock formation to his right and then another to his left. This is Dogfish Head Point, he said, explaining how the point got its name from local lobstermen who kept catching dogfish sharks in their lobster traps because the animal was attracted to the point’s sandy bottom – a rarity along most of Maine’s rocky Down East coast.

Sam has been spending time in Southport since he was a child. He and his dad were jogging on Dogfish Head Road when Sam told his dad he was thinking about forgoing a career as an English teacher to instead dive headfirst into the beer-brewing business. His dad’s response – Dogfish Head would make a good name – is part of the company’s lore.

Mariah comes from a long line of notable Miltonians, but her connection to Maine is nearly as strong. She and Sam are high school sweethearts – they both attended Northfield Mount Hermon preparatory school in Massachusetts – and she has been spending time in the area since she was a teenager.

The Calagiones purchased their Maine house in 2013. Mariah was the one who saw the house for sale on Dogfish Head Point. She and Sam were on a boat ride around the point when she noticed a for sale sign on the property. They immediately called a real estate agent.

“The agent kept trying to sell us on other houses nearby, but we wanted this one. We weren’t very good negotiators,” said Mariah. Laughing, Sam just shook his head in agreement.

Mariah said they get there a few times a year. More recently, because of COVID last summer and the kids staying there this summer, Sam and Mariah have spent more time in Maine. It used to be one or two weeks, once or twice a year, but they’ve been able to get up there for a month at a time, said Mariah, adding that the town shuts off water in the winter, so they don’t head north then.

Sam and Mariah’s two college-age children – Sammy and Grier – are spending the summer working in Maine, each living with friends in separate small cabins on the property. During the tour, Sam quickly showed off the cabin Sammy is living in. He hadn’t prepared the kids for a visitor, and he thought his son’s cabin was likely to be less embarrassing. Sammy and a friend were inside hanging out, enjoying an afternoon off, plucking away on a guitar, with nothing embarrassing to hide behind the couch.

In addition to serving as a place for the Calagiones to gather, the property is also where the Calagiones can get their home-brewing fix. This brewing facility in Southport has a specific name – The Calagione Family Home Brewery at Dogfish Head, Maine – and, said Sam, it has four times more brewing capacity than the Rehoboth Beach operation had when it first opened. He and Sammy have been experimenting there for a few years now. The parts were shipped to the Dogfish Head brewery in Milton and then trucked to Maine before being carried by hand down the narrow dirt driveway leading to the house.

“I thought it was going to be this small thing, but when I saw it in person, it was much bigger,” said Mariah, again laughing. And again, Sam, on the other side of the room, shrugged in a that’s-who-I-am kind of way.

On tap at the home brewery were two beers – a New England grained German lager and a sessional ale called Sea Wheat, brewed with Maine-grown wheat, maple syrup and seaweed pulled from the rocks of Dogfish Head.

Primarily, the home brewing setup is for personal use, but Sam said there’s been at least one brew that had its turn at “commercial evolution” – Walking Run.

Down the road from their house is the Southport General Store, which has existed in some form or another since the 1880s. It stocks a wide selection of Dogfish Head’s liquid offerings. In the beginning years of the company, the store also sold Dogfish Head clothing, said Mariah.

After the home tour, we spent time sitting on one of the few grassy areas of the property. It overlooks the river, and the Calagiones obviously felt at peace in that spot. There was talk of the goings-on in Delaware, but those issues – and the traffic on Route 1 – seemed a long way off as boats motored by under partly cloudy skies.

It was nearing dinner time, and the Calagiones wrangled up any of the college-aged kids who wanted to come along. They had a reservation for four, but six people came; Sam said everyone could squeeze in.

Dinner was at Robinson’s Wharf, one of the few commercial establishments it might be faster to get to by land than by water. In some ways, this area of Maine is like the Eastern Shore – miles-long peninsulas jutting into a body of water, where it takes a long up-then-back-down drive by vehicle, but there’s a direct route by water. The dinner party took the Calagiones’ boat, The Wind, to the restaurant, because when in Maine, the Calagiones do everything they can to spend time outside. Sitting at a picnic table, Sam said many of the lobsters served at Chesapeake & Maine are sourced from here.

Grier and her friend, Holliday Wear, went along for dinner at Robinson’s. Sam tried to convince Grier to go see music legend Ramblin’ Jack Elliott on her birthday. Elliot happened to be playing at a venue in Boothbay Harbor, a nearby town. This man was there at the beginning of folk music and was a strong influence on Bob Dylan, said Sam.

Grier’s quick response was, “No.” She said she didn’t know what she was going to do on her birthday, but it wasn’t going to involve going to see a 90-year-old musician with her mom and dad. Sam and Mariah laughed it off. It was the expected response.

After dinner, the group made its way back to the boat. The afternoon was quickly turning to evening, and a layer of fog was beginning to settle. The weather made Mariah and Grier long for the family’s other place of refuge, which was also little known until just a few decades ago – the hot, sandy beaches of Delaware.

“Don’t get me wrong; we love it up here, but I can’t wait to be back in Delaware with my feet on the sand and have it be hot enough to justify getting in the water,” said Mariah.