Ephraim was born May 17, 1725 in Billerica, Massachusetts, then moved with his parents to Oxford the following year. In 1754 he married Martha Moore, better known today as Martha Ballard, who kept a diary of her life as a midwife and citizen in Hallowell. He journeyed from Massachusetts up the Kennebec River and leased…
Born Martha Moore in 1735 Oxford, Massachusetts, she married Ephraim Ballard in 1754. In 1777 she joined her husband in Hallowell, to which he had traveled seeking land and work. The following year Ballard began her practice as a midwife. It was not until 1785 that she started her now famous diary, which chronicled daily…
(1843- c. 1926) In 1911 Wilton was a thriving community whose merchants and factories supplied a wide variety of goods and services from automobiles to granite and steel. Like many of its contemporaries, Wilton had a free public library, an electric light and power company and a private academy. The town’s development was greatly facilitated…
Bates was formerly the Maine State Seminary. It changed its identity and was incorporated in 1855. Located in Lewiston, it is recognized as one of the nation’s finest colleges of the liberal arts and sciences. In the U.S. News & World Report 2002 edition of “America’s Best Colleges,” Bates was ranked 22nd among 218…
National Register of Historic Places – Listings Photos, and edited text are from nominations to the National Register of Historic Places researched by Maine. Historic Preservation Commission. Full text and photos are at https://npgallery.nps.gov/nrhp Bath Historic District [Roughly bounded by High, Beacon, and Court Streets, U.S. 1 and Kennebec River] In this area Bath’s prospering…
(1831-1921) moved to Portland from Massachusetts with his family when he was nine years old. He had a varied education in academies around Portland and Lynn, Massachusetts, including classical and legal training. Baxter, in partnership with William G. Davis, established dry goods and wholesale businesses which prospered and led to their founding the Portland Packaging…
Leon Leonwood Bean (1872-1967) was born and raised in Greenwood in rural Maine. Orphaned at an early age, he worked at odd jobs, including a stint on a farm in Hebron, and did as much hunting and fishing that he could. It was not until he was 39 years old in 1911 that his business…
Charles Best (1899-1978) was born to Canadian parents who were living in West Pembroke, at the time. [Frank A. Beard photo] He grew up there, graduated from the local high school, then attended the University of Toronto where he received his M.D. degree in 1925. In 1921 he, along with his colleague Frederick Banting, discovered…
Publications A Volunteer Poilu (1916) Full Speed Ahead (1919) Firelight Fairy Book (1919) Starlight Wonder Book (1921) The Living Age (Editor, 1921) Book of Gallant Vagabonds (1925) The Sons of Kai (1926)The Outermost House (1928) Herbs and the Earth (1935) American Memory (1937) Five Bears and Miranda (1939) The Tree that Ran Away (1941) Chimney…
Early settlers from Biddeford in England may have given the area its name. Biddeford was destroyed during Queen Anne’s War, but was resettled beginning in 1714. Lumbering was the major industry until the early 19th century; textiles dominated for 100 years from mid-century. First Irish, then French Canadians came to work in the mills. See photos.
(1752-1804) was a wealthy and influential Philadelphia banker and a financier during the Revolutionary War, a United States Senator, and an owner of great tracts of land in Maine, once totaling two million acres. He was also the founder of the country’s first Bank in 1781. In 1786 he secured the Bingham Purchase, in two…
(1845-1915) was born and raised in Waldo County and rose to become a media baron in the early years of the 20th century. His grandfather, Joseph Blethen, settled in what is now Thorndike and built his homestead in the 1810’s after moving from Durham. He became moderator of the town meeting in 1814, and later…
A sagamore of the Norridgewock Indians, killed in the English colonials’ raid on Norridgewock in August of 1724. He was shot fleeing the attackers in an attempt to warn others. Also, a Boy Scout camp by that name in the town of Belgrade, Camp Bomazeen, Pine Tree Council B.S.A., Horse Point Road. It is named…
The Maine Reader: The Down East Experience 1614 to the Present Day. Houghton Mifflin Company. Boston 1991. Edited by Charles and Samuella Shain. 524 pp. Maine: A Literary Chronicle. New York 1968. W. Storrs Lee. Funk and Wagnalls. 487 pp. The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators, and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier. Colin Woodard. Viking. New…
is a liberal arts institution located in Brunswick. In June 1794 Massachusetts Governor Samuel Adams signed an act to establish Bowdoin College promoted by James Bowdoin III, who gave financial support to its formation and named it in honor of his father, James Bowdoin II. Massachusetts Hall, Bowdoin’s first building was constructed, with delays, between…
(1726-1790) was an investor in the Kennebec Purchase Company, which owned substantial property in Maine. His son, James III, arranged for the establishment of Bowdoin College, naming it for his father, James II. He owned several thousand acres in Bowdoinham at his death. Born in Boston on August 7, 1726, he was well placed in…
Home of long time resident and author E. B. White, the Hancock County coastal town hosts a general store and library at the intersection of Route 175 and the road to Naskeag Point and Naskeag Harbor. It lies across Eggemoggin Reach from Little Deer Isle.
Harrison Bird Brown was a widely recognized 19th century marine and landscape painter. Born in Portland in 1831 and orphaned at an early age, he was apprenticed to a house and ship painting firm. His best work dates from the 1860’s and early 70’s when his style was delicate and detailed and his colors rich…
Charles Farrar Browne born in Waterford on April 26, 1836. His father operated a store in Waterford, engaged in farming and did some surveying. Browne attended local schools and, though he did well, he was more likely to be a prankster and a doodler than a serious student. When he was thirteen his father died…
Named for Captain Henry Y. Brown, who received a land grant for service in the French and Indian Wars, the town sits between the New Hampshire border and the Saco River. The Stone Mountain Arts Center, with excellent attractions and food, brings visitors from long distances. See photos.