October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1691 New royal charter for Massachusetts, now includes Maine 1803 Louisiana Purchase treaty ratified by Congress 1861 Wells-built vessel Betsy Ames is captured…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1775 Benedict Arnold expedition to attack Quebec is hit by a hurricane for three days with floods of rain making the marchers miserable.…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1775 Benedict Arnold expedition arrives at Norridgewock Falls 1897 Neal Dow, crusading prohibitionist, Mayor of Portland, member of the Maine House of Representatives,…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1775 The Benedict Arnold expedition to Quebec arrives at Long Falls. 1785 Birth date of Ebenezer Herrick, who attended the Maine constitutional convention,…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1768 Birth date of Joshua Hall of Frankfort, legislator and Governor of Maine in 1830, elected by the Legislature after 49 ballots. 1883…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1832 First publication of the newspaper the National Republican in Saco published by Dow & Marble. 1871 Birth date on Indian Island of…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1918 Red Cross is mobilizing the nursing force of the City of Portland to help in caring for the many who have been…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1918 With the number of cases of influenza in the Italian quarter of Portland, the Italian church at 235 Fore Street has opened…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1842 Webster-Ashburton Treaty settling the boundary dispute with England was ratified by Great Britain. 1870 Samuel Cony of Augusta, Maine Governor from 1864…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1691 Charter of William and Mary issued, outlining the governance of the Province of Maine and that area between the Kennebec and St.…
October 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 1789 Birth date in Massachusetts of John Ruggles, a Jacksonian U.S. Senator from Maine (1835-1841). After politics, he practiced law in Thomaston. 1829…
See photos. Richard Boynthon settled the area in 1631 and hosted meetings of the councilors governing Sir Fernando Gorges‘ Province of Maine in the early 17th Century. Thomas Roger planted an apple orchard in 1638 that became known as “Rogers’ Garden by the Sea” by 1657. The Boston to Portland railroad passed within two miles of town in 1842 and the Grand Trunk Railroad connected Old Orchard Beach to Montreal in 1853, encouraging Canadians to visit the beach. By 1873 the Boston & Maine Railroad passed through the town, now served by Amtrak.
Maud Wood Park (1871-1955), who spent a substantial part of her life in Maine, was born on January 25, 1871 in Boston. She was a Radcliffe graduate who became an organizer, civic leader, and speaker for causes that moved her. Park organized her College Equal Suffrage League. Married at 26 and widowed, her later marriage…
(1778-1862) A model of early 19th century upward mobility and entrepreneurial skill, Stephen Parsons came to Edgecomb in 1801 with his wife, Margaretta Frederick Randall, daughter of Benjamin Randall, founder of the Free Will Baptist denomination. His career from that point was marked by continuous success for most of the rest of his life. Beginning…
Dr. Edith Marion Patch taught entomology at the University of Maine and served as director of entomology at the Maine Agricultural Experiment Station from 1903- 1937. Patch was the first woman to head a state agricultural experiment station department and was honored for her scholarship and educational leadership in 1930 by being elected president of…
William Robinson Pattangall (1865-1942) was at once a humorist, politician and sage. He was born in Pembroke, Washington County, and graduated from the University of Maine in 1884. At the turn of the century, Pattangall became well known for his biting political satire in two books: The Meddybemps Letters and The Maine Hall of Fame.…
(1863-1955), Arctic explorer and writer, was born in Washington D.C. and raised in a wealthy environment as the oldest of four children. After graduating from high school, she attended a business college and worked as a clerk at the Smithsonian Institution where her father taught languages. At a dancing class, she met Robert E. Peary,…
Peary (1856-1920), who summered on Eagle Island, received a degree in civil engineering from Bowdoin College in 1877. He then returned to his boyhood home in Fryeburg and worked as a land surveyor. He later became a noted Arctic explorer, famous as the discoverer of the North Pole, though many experts believe that the claim has not…
Peddle, Charles “Chuck” Ingerham (1937-2019) was an inventor electrical engineer, best known for the microprocessor that sparked a boom in personal computer industry in the 1970s. Born in Bangor, he earned an engineering degree from the University of Maine in 1960, after a stint in the Marine Corps. In the 1970s he developed several computer…
The proportion of Black or African Americans reported living in Maine by the U.S. Census more than doubled between 2000 and 2010, from .5% to 1.2%. The total number in 2010 was nearly 16,000. Significantly affected by an influx of people from Somalia, 3.6% of Androscoggin County’s population consisted of African Americans. Nearly 7,000 (2.6%)…