Geoff Howe, co-founder of Howe & Howe Tech, and Ron Lemons, business manager of H&H prepare to run Thermite through its paces.

“Money for us is the avenue to the next invention. And as we do this, we grow in our community. It’s not about the money, it’s about making something that lasts. It’s about leaving a legacy.”      –Geoff Howe, Howe & Howe Technologies

In the previous article, I alluded to my seemingly far-fetched hope that I might actually be trusted to operate one of Howe & Howe’s vehicles when I visited their headquarters last December. Happily, I was not disappointed. A freezing wind was blasting through Waterboro as I stood in the parking lot in front of H&H with Geoff Howe and Ron Lemons, the company’s business manager. Thermite, the company’s compact firefighting and emergency response robot was fired up and ready to go.

Geoff quickly ran through the functions of the various controls on Thermite’s remote, and as he did so, the little machine maneuvered around, looking like the hybrid of an airport crash truck and a skid steer loader. As Geoff handed the remote over to me, I noticed that Ron kindly placed himself between Thermite and my own vehicle, just in case I lost control of the powerful little contraption.

As I was aiming the nozzle and running Thermite around on its tank treads, I found myself grinning despite the freezing temperatures – the business of Howe & Howe Technologies is undeniably the bee’s knees.

Mike and Geoff Howe feel hugely fortunate on multiple levels. They have achieved success generating work based on their interests and principals, and their inventions result in greater safety for US soldiers, police officers, miners, firefighters, and many others. They have also successfully developed a team that lives by its commitment to the company’s ethos of innovation, ingenuity and hard work. The brothers clearly recognize how lucky they are, and as the business has continued to gain momentum, they have asked themselves – how to pay this good fortune forward Howe & Howe style? Build something phenomenal, of course. And that is exactly what is happening right now.

Outdoors Again

In 2010, when the Discovery Channel was filming the second season of Howe & Howe Tech, the shop built the prototype of an off-road wheelchair and named it Ripchair. It was a cousin to Ripsaw, the unmanned ground vehicle that first brought the Howe brothers into the public eye and perked up the ears of the Defense Department. The Discovery Channel producers thought it would make for better television if there were a personality that could be associated with the development of Ripchair. The brothers were lukewarm to the idea. As Geoff recalls, “That’s not really our cup of tea, and so we said, fine, if you guys want a character, find one.” The producers conducted a search, and through Togus VA Medical Center in Augusta, they selected Rocky Austin, a Navy veteran who had suffered a disabling back injury in the service.

Geoff continues, “And Rocky came in. As foolish as it sounds, it’s almost love at first sight – when you see the guy, and you see his character, and you know he’s a true Mainer at heart, and he’s a vet.”

The brothers spent a significant amount of time with Rocky, testing Ripchair, traveling, and even deer hunting. In the process, they got a small glimpse of how difficult it can be to accomplish even the most commonplace daily tasks from the seat of a wheelchair.

It was a galvanizing time for the inventors. Beyond just manufacturing Ripchair, their vision expanded to building a resort in Maine completely geared toward wheelchair users and truly accessible to them. That project, Outdoors Again, is now in progress.

Geoff recalls, “We sat down, and we said, we’re going to do this. We’re going to go big or go home. We want this to be the world’s first. Massive. A 15 to 20 million dollar program. How do we do it?”

Find out in the next installment. In the meantime, please visit howeandhowe.com and outdoorsagain.orgto learn more about Howe & Howe Technologies and get the latest on Outdoors Again.

by Rebecca Blaesing

One of the best parts of Startup Weekend was the sense of community the event fostered. Everyone involved in the event was incredible. As a student, it gave me a glimpse of what true teamwork really is, not just some silly project required with classmates you barely know. No matter what the issue was, people were always ready to help, whether it be design work or making a video for a team, or simply be willing to go pick up more coffee to fuel everyone forward. That community was also apparent through the social media aspect.

As the social media organizer, I alternated between tweeting to posting on Facebook to giving teams my insight on how to promote their idea to a younger generation wrapped up in the internet and a virtual world. Surprisingly, I was able to quite literally watch the feeling of community build just through tweeting on the Startup Weekend, Portland Maine twitter account. It was impressive to see how we jumped from about 50 followers to 80 in three days. The response to the live and constant tweeting was extremely positive and helped everyone following the event, be it those participating as coaches, judges, speakers or team members and those just supporting from afar, stay focused and excited for what was happening at PelotonLabs. Even though I wasn’t a participant, that interaction between people made me feel like what I was doing and what Startup Weekend was doing was worth it. The enthusiasm that was apparent just through direct interaction on Twitter, where teams supported ideas and helped each other was a great upside to being a part of this. That enthusiasm continued to build even after Startup Weekend ended; there was a feeling of euphoria after: something huge had been accomplished, and for many people, this is only the beginning.

In my opinion, Startup Weekend may turn out to be one of the best things brought to Maine. What better way for the Maine Center for Creativity to foster creativity and the arts than by supporting and being part of an event that is all about being creative and innovative at the same time? Perhaps the hardest part of being creative is sharing your idea, and giving the world the ability to say no to it. Startup Weekend became a safe place, where ideas were given a place to grow, change, and ultimately become feasible in a real world context. It’s a big risk to become part of something like that, but it’s genius to bring like-minded people together and give them an opportunity. That opportunity could turn into so many things: a team that won like Goals with Friends, or just networking and finding people you work well with in a professional and creative environment. This is the side of business most people never see, the side that is about taking chances and putting words to paper and making what you want to happen, happen. It’s trial and error; a thirty second pitch about a compostable event porta-potty, finding a team and realizing you’ve got something good here, and the ability to learn from your mistakes, and then make some new ones after that. Startup Weekend is the best kind of learning from outside a classroom setting. The kind of learning that you never knew you needed or wanted, but will influence you for a long time, or until the next Startup Weekend happens in Maine!

Ripsaw – the unmanned ground vehicle that started it all.

Friends of mine who live in York County have driven past Howe & Howe Technologies in Waterboro daily for years and had no idea what goes on inside. To a passing commuter, it looks like your average large industrial facility. In fact, Howe & Howe is a hotbed of cutting edge technological innovation, both military and commercial. It’s the Kitty Hawk of modern, often life-saving robotic engineering. There’s a Fender bass and a framed movie set photo of The Rock adorning the walls. And it’s right here in Maine.

You may have seen the Discovery Channel Show that focused on Geoff & Mike Howe, the identical twin brothers who founded the company, and it’s definitely worth a peek online. Reality TV dramatics aside, it’s a great glimpse into the business that stemmed from the creation of Ripsaw – the unmanned ground vehicle that made the U.S. Army perk up its ears and pay attention to these two native Mainers.

Better yet, visit their website – howeandhowe.com <http://howeandhowe.com>  – and take a walk through the photo galleries. Here’s the bio from their home page – it spells out Howe & Howe’s attitude and ethic very effectively:

Since its creation, Howe and Howe Technologies Inc. has become a world leader in extreme vehicle fabrication and one of the foremost creators of advanced robotic platform solutions and applications. With a reputation for innovation, efficiency, and outstanding ethics, Howe and Howe Technologies continues to exceed expectations and impress industry and clients alike, from the US Government to National utility companies to Hollywood movie makers. It is the ability to approach a problem uniquely, and overcome any obstacle or challenge that a project presents, that has allowed Howe and Howe to show, time and again, that sharp minds with the right motivation can change the world.

“Are we outside the box? I wasn’t aware there was one.” – Mike Howe

My request to interview the brothers was kindly granted, and in mid-December, I stopped in at the appointed time. When I was buzzed into the lobby at Howe & Howe’s Waterboro headquarters, there was no mistaking the fact that there’s some pretty closely guarded activity going on here. Signs clearly informed me that the place was bristling with security cameras, and that my sad lack of top-secret clearance meant that I would be relegated to the public areas of the building. (Dang it! My visions of operating a Howe & Howe vehicle were slightly dashed, but not for long…)

I sat down with Geoff & Mike Howe in a conference room and asked them to describe the origins of their interest in engineering and high-tech invention, and how that might have translated into where they are today. What I got were very funny, yet cringe-worthy stories of a shared childhood in Maine, and it certainly explained a lot.

When the Howe brothers turned 8, their mother gave them an axe. What?! Yes. An axe. And without suffering permanent harm to themselves or innocent bystanders, they successfully built a one-room log cabin with it.

On another occasion, Mom suddenly realized that the house was strangely dark. Mike & Geoff told me with pure delight how they had been on a mission to ignite model rocket engines that day, but didn’t have a launcher. Mom, a teacher, was raising them singlehandedly, and there simply wasn’t extra money available to go buy one. No problem – the brothers had picked up some handy ideas from watching “Mr Wizard’s World” – the 80’s TV series in which Don Herbert demonstrated all manner of science experiments. They’d learned, for instance, that light bulb filaments contain magnesium, which has wonderfully incendiary properties. Geoff tells the story:

We just started spying around the house and saying, ‘You know what? I think if we break the glass of the bulb, keep the filament good to go, take a 110 cord, cut it up, and duct tape the filament onto the end of the wires, stuff it up into the rocket, and then plug it into the wall, we SHOULD be able to ignite these rockets.’

It took a few tries – and more than a few broken light bulbs – to get it right. And the result was so spectacularly entertaining that Geoff & Mike kept doing it until there was not a single bulb left in the house. What did Mom think? Geoff remembers, laughing, “She had a little meltdown.”

Many horrific/hilarious tales of near-electrocution and maiming later, it was very clear to me that necessity was a vital ingredient in the development of the Howe brothers’ innate ingenuity. With a few basic tools, a basement workshop, a nearby sandpit, and plenty of unstructured time, they immersed themselves in endless experimentation. And the fact that this was a shared obsession only compounded their results. It wasn’t all mayhem – they also happily recalled summers at a relative’s home on Popham Beach, snorkeling and scrambling around on Fox Island at low tide. Every bit of this open-ended exploration with materials at hand helped to fire their creativity and curiosity, and they credit all of this experience as a key to their success.

And so it goes to this day. When the Howe Brothers tackle a new project, they put the same inventiveness and determination into it that they did at lighting those rocket engines. And they try their darnedest. Someone might lose a finger, but isn’t nine enough?

I’ll wrap up this installment by saying that the story of Howe & Howe couldn’t make a better kick-off feature for this blog, because it crystallizes exactly what we’re trying to celebrate and promote about creativity and innovation in Maine. It’s Yankee ingenuity at its best – improvise, adapt, and make do under challenging circumstances. Like Mainers do.

Date: Wednesday, November 14th 2012

Time: 5:30pm – 7:30pm

Location: Lee Hall, Wishcamper Center, USM Portland Campus

Please email intern@mainecenterforcreativity.org to register.

Join us November 14th at USM for an exciting evening exploring Product Design!

Are you interested in Product Design? Does your company need Product Design? Could your company use the services of an industrial “product” designer? Find out why you can’t ignore Product Design if you want to stay competitive in an increasingly complex marketplace.

The design process is a physical transformation of an idea based upon needs or wants by consumers or the marketplace at large, into a product that is appropriate to its purpose. Product Designers take a systematic and creative approach to conceptualizing and evaluating ideas before turning them into tangible products. Product Design is vital in creating loyal customers for businesses large and small, local and international.

Moderator Patric Santerre, of ARCADIA designworks will give a brief overview of the definition of Industrial “Product” Design, and weave in its history in Maine. We will hear from a local start up, Bitzy Baby, whose founders decided to re-design a product when the existing marketplace was not meeting their needs as parents.

SAPPI, a global pulp and paper company with mills in Maine, and a commitment to creating new operations through innovation and design throughout the world will share their growth story and the importance of product design for the business to business market.

]]> http://www.mainecenterforcreativity.org/creative-toolbox-industrial-design/feed/ 0 http://www.mainecenterforcreativity.org/pecha-kucha-night-9/ http://www.mainecenterforcreativity.org/pecha-kucha-night-9/#comments Thu, 25 Oct 2012 14:08:29 +0000 creativity http://www.mainecenterforcreativity.org/?p=1010 SPACE Gallery
538 Congress Street
$5 cover charge
6:30 pm doors open and 7:20 pm event starts.

What is Pecha Kucha?

Started in 2003 by Klein Dytham Architects, PechaKucha Night is an opportunity for people of all stripes to present …

“My mom warned me about not climbing up a ladder,” says Maginnis, founder and executive director of the Maine Center for Creativity, a Portland-based nonprofit tasked with promoting the state’s creative economy.

Instead of climbing a ladder, Maginnis tapped her background in strategic marketing to bring local business and cultural interests together to organize the Art All Around competition, an international contest drawing more than 500 artists from 80 countries eager to compete for the chance to turn South Portland’s industrial waterfront into a record-setting work of art.

“At first it was just little ole’ Jean Maginnis asking 15 people to help, then it was 20, 50, 100. Before you knew it, the whole community was getting engaged in transforming a group of oil tanks into the world’s largest public art painting,” she says.

So far, the sprawling results of the Art All Around competition, a collaboration between MCC and Sprague Energy, have been the organization’s most visible effort. When completed, the $1.3 million project will span 16 oil storage tanks lining Casco Bay, featuring the abstract, maritime-inspired work of London-based artist Jaime Gili.

Located along one of the busiest transportation corridors in the state — Amtrak, the Portland International Jetport and I-295 are all within sight — the oil tank project reflects MCC’s mission to build Maine’s visibility as a creative and innovative place.

“Frankly, before this happened, there were not too many things making the arts and cultural piece of our economy very visible, so we took a canvas that is 260,000 square feet and let people know we are creative and innovative here,” says Maginnis.

Public art can often come under close scrutiny from the community, as evidenced by the “Tracing the Fore” sculpture that was removed from Portland’s Boothby Square in response to public outcry. But Maginnis says any project that keeps people talking is doing its job.

“I think the role of public art is really to bring about a public discussion, which means you can’t be afraid of a little panning,” she says.

Likewise, there was some pressure to choose a Maine artist for the project, an idea that Maginnis and the selection committee dismissed early on.

“We can’t put Maine on the map if we are just talking to ourselves,” says Maginnis. “We want to export our ideas and import the dollars. Maine has always been an international, open port back to its shipbuilding days. I think that’s why Maine is a place where new ideas and creative things are happening.”

Five of the tanks have been painted thanks to support from individuals and businesses like Sprague, Greg Boulos, accounting and management consulting firm BerryDunn and Portland law firm Jensen, Baird, Gardner and Henry, who offered pro-bono legal work to help bring the project to life. But it will take another $350,000 to see the project through, according to Maginnis. “I hope our community will help us finish it sooner rather than later,” she says.

MCC also launched the speaker-driven Creative Toolbox series and Pecha Kucha, an expedited presentation model originating in Tokyo (the term means “chit chat” in Japanese) giving participants a lightning-round style opportunity to share their “big idea” with the crowd in six minutes or less.

Maginnis spearheaded the creation of the state’s first Creative Industry Award, a first-of-its-kind recognition of individuals who demonstrate the power of art and commerce combined. The first award was presented in September to Idexx founder David Shaw and his wife, actress Glenn Close, for their support of cultural and entrepreneurial endeavors in Maine.

For Maginnis, the mission of MCC was born out of both economic reality and personal experience. “I saw that the state was not growing enough, so that any campaign to promote [creativity] would be taking a piece of a pie that wasn’t big enough to begin with,” says Maginnis.

But it was an announcement from her teenage son that brought Maine’s stagnant creative horizon into focus.

“He let me know that he didn’t have enough opportunity here in Maine and that he would have to move out,” says Maginnis, whose son is now a stand-up comedian living in New York City.

“Everyone has heard this ‘brain drain’ story, it can be told a million times, but that’s when I decided to use my marketing and business skills along with my interest in the arts to help expand economic development and cultural growth,” she says.

Maginnis traces the origin of MCC to a 2004 statewide summit on Maine’s creative economy. Noticing that growth in some of Maine’s legacy industries had continued to decline, Maginnis was eager to explore new business models that would help drive Maine’s economy. According to a 2004 study by the New England Foundation for the Arts, Maine’s arts and culture sector grew 24% between 1997 and 2002 to become larger than the state’s pulp, paper and wood harvesting industries.

“When I formed MCC in 2005, I saw the numbers were going up in the creative industries and down in the traditional industries. In fact, we didn’t have growth [in pulp, paper and manufacturing] for 15 to 20 years before that, so why would we keep doing the same thing?” says Maginnis.

A big part of marketing and promoting the state’s creative economy is about expanding the term’s definition, according to Maginnis.

“There is a perception that the creative economy is just individual artists, writers or performers, and it does include them, but it also includes 14 other areas,” says Maginnis, citing research and development, advertising, architecture and software and examples of industries one might not associate with the creative economy.

“I often feel like a translator, because I understand business models and how important products and markets and development are, but I also understand the creative process from the artist’s point of view and I understand how they overlap,” she says.

Clarification: This story has been modified to reflect the support of law firm Jensen, Baird, Gardner and Henry and accounting firm BerryDunn to Maine Center for Creativity’s tank project.

http://www.mainebiz.biz/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20121015/CURRENTEDITION/310119987/0/FRONTPAGE

What is Pecha Kucha?

Started in 2003 by Klein Dytham Architects, PechaKucha Night is an opportunity for people of all stripes to present their work. We welcome a broad mix of participants to present their designs, thoughts and ideas in a format of 20 slides x 20 seconds each.  If you’re an architect, graphic designer, illustrator, painter, landscape designer, photographer or some creative type, then come and tell the world about your ideas in 6 minutes and 40 seconds.  PechaKucha is a fast-paced, friendly social hour where you can see and/or present work while enjoying a beer and meeting other designers and artists.

So come thirsty, bring along your friends and be prepared to get inspired!

Would you like to present?

If you are interested in presenting your work at a Portland, Maine PechaKucha, please send an email to: PechaKuchaPortland@gmail.com

Include the following:

• Name, profession and telephone number

• 2-5 images only of your work (saved as a jpg., each image maximum size: 1280×768, we are not able to review files outside of these parameters)

• Some biographical information about yourself and what you would like to present.

For more information about PechaKucha Maine, go to http://pechakuchaportland.org/index.html
For information about PechaKucha Global, go to http://www.pecha-kucha.org

What is Pecha Kucha?

Started in 2003 by Klein Dytham Architects, PechaKucha Night is an opportunity for people of all stripes to present their work. We welcome a broad mix of participants to present their designs, thoughts and ideas in a format of 20 slides x 20 seconds each.  If you’re an architect, graphic designer, illustrator, painter, landscape designer, photographer or some creative type, then come and tell the world about your ideas in 6 minutes and 40 seconds.  PechaKucha is a fast-paced, friendly social hour where you can see and/or present work while enjoying a beer and meeting other designers and artists.

So come thirsty, bring along your friends and be prepared to get inspired!

Would you like to present?

If you are interested in presenting your work at a Portland, Maine PechaKucha, please send an email to: PechaKuchaPortland@gmail.com

Include the following:

• Name, profession and telephone number

• 2-5 images only of your work (saved as a jpg., each image maximum size: 1280×768, we are not able to review files outside of these parameters)

• Some biographical information about yourself and what you would like to present.

For more information about PechaKucha Maine, go to http://pechakuchaportland.org/index.html
For information about PechaKucha Global, go to http://www.pecha-kucha.org

The Maine Center for Creativity to host annual Creative Toolbox Series with USM Professor Raphael DiLuzio and Joseph S. Giordano from Synecticsworld

The Maine Center for Creativity, in collaboration with the University of Southern Maine and sponsored by Fairchild Semiconductor, will host its annual Creative Toolbox Series Wednesday, May 9^th from 6pm-8pm at the University of Southern Maine.

USM Professor Raphael DiLuzio and Joseph S. Giordano from Syneticsworld will be discussing design science in relationship to businesses, a cross-discipline method for individuals to dynamically engage in collaborative groups for creative problem stating and solving.

What: Maine Center for Creativity’s Creative Toolbox Series

Where: USM Portland Campus, Wishcamper Center, Room 102. Free campus parking

When: May 9th, 2012

Time: 6:00pm to 8:00pm

Cost: $35 registration fee: $15 for MCC members & USM Alumni; free for USM students. Registration: Register at intern@mainecenterforcreativity.org

Highlights: Raphael DiLuzio, Professor of Art and New Media the University of Southern Maine will share his insight and partake in a question and answer session on Design Science and how it can affect your business.  Guest speaker: Joe Giordano, Synectics World, Cambridge, MA.

Design Science draws from the core synectics, visual and process thinking into a combined theoretical approach, tool set and coherent cognitive method. Elements of all these, especially design and visual thinking are innate aspects of how we perceive the world. Unfortunately, both design and visual thinking are neither developed nor nurtured as we grow from childhood to adulthood. Many aspects of our life require visual thought, and design is directly or indirectly a part of many disciplines or field of study.

Raphael Diluzio is a writer, dreamer, imagineer, inventor and artist whose practice is centered in visual image making, primarily in the relationship between traditional studio art and digital time-based media. He is a practicing artist and tenured Professor of Art and New Media the University of Maine.  Raphael actively writes and publishes his theories on time-based painting and working in a Time-Based Medium as well as critically examining how new and/or Time-Based Media affects our culture. Raphael continues to produce new works exhibited internationally, most recently in Belarus, Geneva, Barcelona, Slovenia and Rhode Island.  He currently resides in Maine.

Guest Speaker: Joe Giordano is a Principal with Synecticsworld, Inc. a Cambridge-based company specializing in innovation.  Currently, Joe is working with organizations who are seeking breakthroughs by helping individuals and teams collaborate, become more creative and inventive, and develop newness within their organization. Joe works with organizations on developing consumer and customer insights, new product development, branding, positioning and process improvement.  Joe’s specialties include learning and development program design and delivery, competency development and mapping and large meeting design and facilitation for behavioral change.