enlarge John Patriquin/Staff Photographer

Claudette Nadeau runs an organic business, Roots-n-Shoots Greenhouses, at her farm in Montville. She and a group of local organic growers are concerned that corporations will use genetic engineering to control agriculture.

TO SEE Montville's ban on genetically modified crops, go to www.montvillemaine.org. For opposing views, see www.mainebioinfo.org and www.foodformainesfuture.org

MONTVILLE — Yellow bumper stickers here proclaim: "Montville Maine: The way life is."

It's a twist on the state's former tourism slogan: "Maine. The way life should be."

Like its inspiration, the Montville moniker, which also appears on the home page of the town's Web site, is existential and open to interpretation. But it clearly shows a streak of independent thinking.

Two weeks ago, that tendency drew some worldwide attention to Montville. At their annual town meeting, voters passed a binding ordinance banning the cultivation of genetically engineered crops. Supporters say Montville is the first American community outside California to do this.

The Maine Legislature also weighed in on the issue last week. After more than a year of debate -- lawmakers approved a compromise that, among other things, offers some legal protection to organic growers who unintentionally are exposed to genetically engineered seeds.

But it's hard to find middle ground in the Montville ban, and that's causing controversy. A Maine group that represents large biotechnology companies says the ban could chill research and development efforts and hurt the state's economy. Meanwhile, the Maine Department of Agriculture is asking the attorney general for an opinion on whether Montville's ordinance is legal, or violates the state's right-to-farm rules.

Genetically modified organisms, or GMOs, refer to plants, animals or microorganisms that are transformed by genetic engineering. In crops, changes to a plant's molecular biology can make it more resistant to drought or disease, for instance.

But opponents of genetic engineering say the technology is so new that the changes may have unintended, harmful consequences to people, animals and plants. In Europe, public concern over the safety of modified organisms has led to tight restrictions on imports and to consumer-labeling laws. Late last month, a French court upheld a controversial ban on a variety of pest-resistent corn produced by Monsanto, the large American seed company.

The global controversy over genetically modified products in the food supply rarely makes headlines in Maine. The votes in Montville and Augusta may bring the issue closer to home.

Behind the controversy are competing visions of agriculture, food safety, corporate power and, at the core, progress. They represent differing views of life in Maine -- how it is, how it should be.

FEARS OF CORPORATE INFLUENCE

Life, to take license with a slogan, is in the eye of the beholder in Montville.

The town of 1,000 residents has no school. No store. Not even a post office. Montville's a blur in the rear-view mirror for traffic sailing across Route 3 and the rolling hills between Augusta and Belfast.

Turn north on Route 220, however, and bump along muddy side roads. Pass front yards where melting snow has uncovered the junk cars, rusting appliances and other signs of rural poverty. In time, an outpost of another era appears in the hardwood forest -- plastic hoop greenhouses and a hand-built log home.

Thirty-eight years ago, Claudette Nadeau and Mike Beaudry followed their back-to-the-land instincts with $2,000 and an 8-month-old baby. Beaudry, a timber framer, soon created a cozy house that he has since expanded. Nadeau pursued her passion for plants, a venture that thrives today.

For 19 years, Nadeau's Roots-n-Shoots Greenhouses has been selling an expanding mix of organically grown, open-pollinated seedlings, varieties that sprout true to seed. That means this season's tomato seeds will produce seedlings next year that are exactly like the parent plant.

Many organic gardeners value these plant varieties. They save exotic seeds to create heirloom plants, cultivars that can be handed down for generations. For Nadeau, any threat from engineered seeds that could cross-pollinate with her heirloom varieties and...