‘A stop-action tableau for the Penikese ages’
Director Toby Lineaweaver, centre, put this picture in a letter to benefactors, below, describing one boy’s journey towards completing the course. Some parts are omitted.
The quarterback is ready to pass…then, in the middle, is the one the quarterback has his eyes on: Jimmy…leaning hard into a turn, head down, face and stomach knotted, the very picture of concentration and determination. Wait a minute, Jimmy? Jimmy, the career slacker, underachiever, and goof-up, actually trying…extraordinary since few students exceeded him in his unfailing capacity for misfortune, underachievement, and self-destruction.
In most ways, Jimmy was Penikese-typical: multiple arrests, placements, and run-aways, substance abuse, reckless behaviour, you name it. A real nice kid, folks would say, but… On the island, Jimmy was happy so long as he was fishing, but made everything else an exhausting power struggle.
Yet Jimmy was irresistibly likeable, and people rooted endlessly for him. Nevertheless, the misdeeds mounted, and one day Jimmy was taken from the island to court to face the judge. On the way he tried to run. He was later taken to detention on the grounds of a former state mental hospital.
Staff agonized about Jimmy’s fate, finally deciding against readmission, feeling he would never change until he faced the ultimate consequence: jail. So Pam [the clinical director] and I drove to Taunton to personally deliver the news. A guard led us into a room with breezeblock walls and peeling yellow paint. Jimmy entered wearing an orange jumper, slippers, and a look of well-practised chagrin.
I told Jimmy he had run out of chances and could not come back. He nodded in acknowledgement, eyes down and watering, and then had a sudden outburst. The guard hurried him from the room.
Three months later, Jimmy amazingly had a chance of returning to Penikese. The island staff were given the final call. He was allowed to return on stern conditions. A week later, Jimmy bounded up the stairs of the onshore house and threw his arms around me and Pam, singing a joyous and repentant song.
Yet Jimmy continued to struggle, now with the pain of growing. He paid another brief visit to detention, and in the weeks before graduation developed a near-fatal case of “short-timer’s disease”: emotional outbursts, defiance, and desperate talk. The closer he got to the goal line, the worse it became, and we all wondered if Jimmy would ever make it.
At last, his final day arrived. That evening at the dinner table in kerosene lamplight, Jimmy, Mike, Shawn and myself shared an intimate good-bye. Later, tossing with sleeplessness, I had to get up and peer into Jimmy’s area, just to make sure he was alright. There he was, safe and soundly asleep. The next day, Jimmy graduated. Before departing the island for the last time, he left us with these words:
‘Even though it was hard for me to accept that people were trying to help me, I am glad I did, because it feels a lot better to say I completed Penikese instead of saying I failed it. Penikese was not an easy programme. During all the months I’ve been here I’ve learned a lot, but the most solid thing I learned was knowing that people stood by me, and that if I really want something I have to work for it’.
©Henrietta Butler 2026
Site under construction