Maine Memory Network

Music in Maine - Opera, Orchestras and Stages

"… they billed Blauvelt as, “America’s favorite Concert Prima Donna Soprano.” Opera gloves were a standard accessory for eveningwear and attending the…"

Music in Maine - Rock and Roll, Punk, and Elvis

"… it coincided with other big changes in the rock concert world: national concert promoters, electronic ticket sales, and even the music was changing."

The Kotzschmar Memorial Organ

A fire and two men whose lives were entwined for more than 50 years resulted in what is now considered to be "the Jewel of Portland" -- the Austin organ that was given to the city of Portland in 1912.

Music in Maine - Music Education

"The original stage, benches, and chairs are in use by the New England Music Camp as of 2024. Walter Damrosch Walter Damrosch conducting at…"

Music in Maine - Community Music

"Sometimes Grange halls served as town library and offered adult education. Leeds Grange Hall stage, 1975Leeds Historical Society The Grange…"

Music in Maine - Radio Cowboys and Country Music

"Married in 1940, Rita used the anglicized stage name Betty Cody. They performed and recorded music on RCA records with a band called the Lone Pine…"

Music in Maine - Community and School Marching Bands

"… Clouthier department store, and played vaudeville stages in New York. Franco Bands Alphonse Cote, Lewiston, 1918Franco-American Collection…"

Music in Maine - Country Music

"… it became part of his signature style on and off stage. Chronic health problems forced Curless to take frequent breaks from the music business…"

Music in Maine - Music Makers

"… he and his wife Emma performed on vaudeville stages including in New York, Boston, Washington DC and Philadelphia."

Lillian Nordica: Farmington Diva

Lillian Norton, known as Nordica, was one of the best known sopranos in America and the world at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries. She was a native of Farmington.

Le Théâtre

Lewiston, Maine's second largest city, was long looked upon by many as a mill town with grimy smoke stacks, crowded tenements, low-paying jobs, sleazy clubs and little by way of refinement, except for Bates College. Yet, a noted Québec historian, Robert Rumilly, described it as "the French Athens of New England."

Bookplates Honor Annie Louise Cary

A summer resident of Wayne collected more than 3,000 bookplates to honor Maine native and noted opera singer Annie Louise Cary and to support the Cary Memorial Library.

Inside the Yellow House

Photographer Elijah Cobb's 1985 portfolio of the Laura E. Richards House, with text by Rosalind Cobb Wiggins and Laura E. Putnam.

Summer Folk: The Postcard View

Vacationers, "rusticators," or tourists began flooding into Maine in the last quarter of the 19th century. Many arrived by train or steamer. Eventually, automobiles expanded and changed the tourist trade, and some vacationers bought their own "cottages."

We Used to be "Normal": A History of F.S.N.S.

Farmington's Normal School -- a teacher-training facility -- opened in 1863 and, over the decades, offered academic programs that included such unique features as domestic and child-care training, and extra-curricular activities from athletics to music and theater.

Designing Acadia

For one hundred years, Acadia National Park has captured the American imagination and stood as the most recognizable symbol of Maine’s important natural history and identity. This exhibit highlights Maine Memory content relating to Acadia and Mount Desert Island.