The town is heavily influenced by the nearby University of Maine, and the long-lived Old Town Canoe Company maintains an outlet that attracts customers with a broad range of outdoor recreation interests. See photos. DeWitt Field, Old Town’s municipal airport, hash three runways. Since 1669, the area has been the principal home of the Penobscot Indians.
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.
Ogunquit, before 1980, was a village corporation and functioned for the most part as a town of its own, supporting its own police, fire, highway and sewer departments. The town is a well known actors and artists colony, featuring the historic Ogunquit Playhouse and beautiful beaches. Perkins Cove, south of the main village on Shore Road, combines a working waterfront, a restaurant, an art museum, and fine cottages.
(c1740-1816) succeeded in living her life according to Wabanaki traditions and, for the most part, on ancestral land because she was savvy enough to learn how to adapt to the encroaching white settlers and their way of life without assimilating into their culture. Her strength and independent nature enabled her to make a life for…
Jeremiah O’Brien (1778-1858) was a U.S. Representative; born in Machias, on January 21, 1778. He attended the common schools, then engaged in lumber manufacturing and in shipping. A member of the Maine State Senate 1821-1824, he was elected to the Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twentieth Congresses (March 4, 1823-March 3, 1829). O’Brien was chairman of the…
Waterville’s commercial strip that is Kennedy Memorial Drive continues into Oakland for about a mile before becoming a more scenic road. See photos. Here the village emerges as it sits at Messalonskee Stream. Long the home of the New England Music Camp, recreational opportunities include access to several of the Belgrade lakes.
Originally settled in 1831 and organized for the assessment of taxes in 1866, the town itself was incorporated on February 24, 1897. See photos. The main village, is located on the Mattawamkeag River, just south of Smyrna Mills. Its mountainous terrain, known as the Oakfield Hills, earned it the name “Switzerland of the Aroostook” by one observer. Sam Drew Mountain is the highest point at 1,516 feet.
Norway-South Paris is a community of two adjoining towns serving as a retail center for southern Oxford County. It includes a commercial strip with the usual array of auto dealerships and fast food. Pennesseewassee Lake, the largest of several in the town, abuts the main village and contributes mightily to local recreational opportunities. A clerical “correction” of the originally proposed “Norage,” the Indian word for falls, resulted in the name Norway.
Edgar Wilson Nye, a descendent of Benjamin Nye who came from England in 1635, was an American humorist born in the town of Shirley. He moved to Wisconsin with his family when he was two. Nye was a satirist and comic lecturer, who founded the Laramie, Wyoming Boomerang newspaper in 1881. He became famous writing…
Amos Nourse (1794-1877) a U.S. Senator from Maine, was born in Bolton, Worcester County, Massachusetts on December 17, 1794. He pursued a preparatory course and graduated from Harvard University in 1812. Nourse served as postmaster at Hallowell 1822-1841, when he then moved to Bath and acted as collector of customs at Bath 1845-1846. He studied…
The modest Northport Music Theater features contemporary American musical theater. See photos. In addition to its long coastline facing Islesboro on Penobscot Bay, the town has frontage on the three-mile long Pitcher Pond and all of its Knight Pond. The historic Bayside village, of closely space summer cottages, lies off U.S. Route 1. St. Clair Preserve protects nearly all of unspoiled Knight’s Pond with 304 acres of mixed forest, bogs, swamps and fields has been home to black bears, bobcats, fishers, foxes, and deer.
This sparsely populated, but growing community, is blessed with water resources including Bog Lake, Fulton Lake, the lower portion of Long Lake, and the winding upper reaches of the Machias River. See map. The main village lies on Maine Route 192 about ten miles north of Machias. A small settlement, Smith Landing, lies on the Machias River in the south of the town. Blueberries are the main crop produced in the old fields and harvested much the same way as in early times. Timber harvesting continues both privately by individuals and commercially by paper companies.
is a community in Hancock County within the town of Mount Desert. Its namesake harbor sits at the northeast side of the entrance to Somes Sound, which splits the island of Mount Desert. Routes 3 and 198 serve the village, passing Upper Hadlock Pond in Acadia National Park. The pond had been a source of…
North Yarmouth’s rapidly growing community, nearly triplng its population since 1970, is within easy reach of Yarmouth, Brunswick, and the greater Portland area. King William’s War started here when Indians attacked the settlement in the late 1680’s.
The North Berwick Woolen Mill is a historic landmark on the banks of the Great Works River that passes through the main village. See photos. More than a dozen National Register historic places testify to the town’s significant role in Maine’s early history.It is home to the historic Hussey Plow Company and a Pratt & Whitney defense plant.
(1857-1914) was born on the family farm in Farmington as Lillian Bayard Norton. According to one observer, she was “America’s first and most glamorous opera singer to attain true international prominence.” After the financial failure of the farm and, two years later, the tavern they bought, her family moved to Boston in 1864. Eventually Lillian…
(1798-1864) was born on June 18, 1798 in Readfield and became a millwright and a mechanic. He later moved to Dixfield where he developed several inventions. According to Stover in Eminent Mainers, they included a threshing and separating machine, a nail-making machine, patented in 1824, an accelerated spinner for hand-woven wool, patented in 1835, a…
Throughout its history Nobleboro remained a rural community, but because of nearby lakes, rivers, and seacoast, about 37% of its inhabitants are non-resident “summer people.” See photos. Damariscotta Lake is accessible and nearby Great Salt Bay is the state’s first marine shellfish protected area. Shipbuilding was once a major industry with twenty-six shipyards in town at the peak. Maine’s first recorded meteorite (and the second in the U.S.) arrived in 1823.
The history of the early press in Maine is marked by a decided lack of stability. Publishers often started a newspaper, formed a partnership, then moved on to begin another paper. Some of the papers endured, but few in their original form; many disappeared after several years. Almost one hundred years after New England’s first…
Built in 1872, the Sunday River Bridge, called “he most painted and photographed covered bridge in the state,” crosses the river of the same name. See photos. The Sunday River Ski Resort is located here. On Maine Route 26, Newry is the gateway to the hiking trails, including the Appalachian Trail, of Grafton Township. Step Falls Preserve, the first preserve of the Maine Chapter of the Nature Conservancy, has 24 acres of cascades and pools.