Jerry Stelmok is a native and lifelong resident of Maine. He successfully escaped life as a teacher in the early 1970s when he moved with his growing family to West Quoddy Head, the easternmost point in the United States, to learn wooden-boat building. The move led to the acquisition of The Island Falls Canoe Company and more than a quarter-century of crafting wood-and-canvas canoes based on the designs of early builder E. M. White. Stelmok has authored several books on wood-and-canvas canoes, including The Art of the Canoe with Joe Seliga (MBI, 2002) and Not Your Average Bear & Other Maine Stories (Tilbury House, 2007). He has a son and two daughters, now adults, and lives in Atkinson, Maine.