AG Literary Events
Thursday, June 11, 2026
5:00 pm-7:00 pm Eastern
Pascal Hall, 86 Pascal Ave, Rockport, Maine
The Pascal Hall Authors Series, presented in partnership with the Lesher Family Foundation and Maine Media Workshops + College, brings free literary events to the community in Rockport, ME each summer.
Heather McGhee designs and promotes solutions to inequality in America. Throughout her career in public policy, including her time serving as the president of the non-partisan “think and do” tank Dēmos, Heather has crafted legislation, testified before Congress, and helped shape presidential campaign platforms. She is the author of the New York Times bestselling book The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together. Heather is an educator and most recently served as a Distinguished Visiting Lecturer in Urban Studies at the City University of New York’s School of Labor and Urban Studies. An influential voice in the media, she regularly appears on NBC’s Meet the Press and MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Deadline White House and All In.
Cate Blackford is the Public Policy Director at Maine People’s Alliance, where she leads the development of MPA’s policy agenda and legislative strategy, in close collaboration with members and allies, to advance their mission and meet the moment. She has spent her career working to connect the people most excluded from state and local decision making to the process and supporting them in shaping solutions. She has worked on housing, hunger, consumer protections, fiscal policy, establishing universal benefits like retirement and paid leave, and many other issues. She holds a BA from UMaine and Masters in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School, which she’s using to ensure other people don’t need advanced degrees to feel like they belong in developing policy solutions. She lives on Isleboro with her husband and two children.
