ROCKPORT, Maine — In 2017, Stephen Antonson, a New York City home furnishings artisan, and his wife, Kathleen Hackett, an interior designer and writer who counts Martha Stewart among her clients, bought a summer house in Rockport, Maine, a coastal town of fine arts, lobster boats and stunning views of Penobscot Bay.

At $320,000, the small, 19th-century clapboard house was among the lower-priced properties on Mechanic Street, known for its stately homes overlooking the town’s scenic working harbor.

The Antonson-Hackett home had no such vista. Although there was a lot behind their house in sight of the harbor, it was thickly wooded and owned by Ruth Graham, the widow who lived next door.

Almost immediately, the couple asked Graham about clearing her land of the trees that blocked their vi

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