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Online Exhibits

Your results include these online exhibits. You also can view all of the site's exhibits, view a timeline of selected events in Maine History, and learn how to create your own exhibit. See featured exhibits or create your own exhibit


Exhibit

Chinese in Maine

In 1857, when Daniel Cough left Amoy Island, China, as a stowaway on a sailing ship from Mt. Desert Island he was on his way into history as the first Chinese person to make his home in Maine. He was soon followed by a cigar maker and a tea merchant who settled in Portland and then by many more Chinese men who spread all over Maine working mostly as laundrymen.

Exhibit

Ice: A Maine Commodity

Maine's frozen rivers and lakes provided an economic opportunity. The state shipped thousands of tons of ice to ports along the East Coast and to the West Indies that workers had cut and packed in sawdust for shipment or later use.

Exhibit

Hannibal Hamlin of Paris Hill

2009 marked the bicentennials of the births of Abraham Lincoln and his first vice president, Hannibal Hamlin of Maine. To observe the anniversary, Paris Hill, where Hamlin was born and raised, honored the native statesman and recalled both his early life in the community and the mark he made on Maine and the nation.

Exhibit

Maine Streets: The Postcard View

Photographers from the Eastern Illustrating and Publishing Co. of Belfast traveled throughout the state, especially in small communities, taking images for postcards. Many of these images, taken in the first three decades of the twentieth century, capture Main Streets on the brink of modernity.

Exhibit

Northern Threads: Two centuries of dress at Maine Historical

Organized by themed vignettes, Northern Threads shares stories about Maine people, while exploring how the clothing they wore reveals social, economic, and environmental histories. This re-examination of Maine Historical Society's permanent collection is an opportunity to consider the relevance of historic clothing in museums, the ebb and flow of fashion styles, and the complexities of diverse representation spanning 200 years of collecting.

Exhibit

J.A. Poor and the Portland-Montreal Connection

John A. Poor's determination in 1845 to bring rail service to Maine and to make Portland the winter port for Montreal, along with the steel foundry he started to build locomotives and many other products, helped boost the economy of Portland the state.

Exhibit

Canning: A Maine Industry

Maine's corn canning industry, as illuminated by the career of George S. Jewett, prospered between 1850 and 1950.

Exhibit

Maine Through the Eyes of George W. French

George French, a native of Kezar Falls and graduate of Bates College, worked at several jobs before turning to photography as his career. He served for many years as photographer for the Maine Development Commission, taking pictures intended to promote both development and tourism.

Exhibit

Art of the People: Folk Art in Maine

For many different reasons people saved and carefully preserved the objects in this exhibit. Eventually, along with the memories they hold, the objects were passed to the Maine Historical Society. Object and memory, serve as a powerful way to explore history and to connect to the lives of people in the past.

Exhibit

Making Paper, Making Maine

Paper has shaped Maine's economy, molded individual and community identities, and impacted the environment throughout Maine. When Hugh Chisholm opened the Otis Falls Pulp Company in Jay in 1888, the mill was one of the most modern paper-making facilities in the country, and was connected to national and global markets. For the next century, Maine was an international leader in the manufacture of pulp and paper.

Exhibit

Lt. Charles A. Garcelon, 16th Maine

The son of Maine's surgeon general and nephew of a captain in the 16th Maine, Charles A. Garcelon of Lewiston served in Co. I of the 16th Maine. His letters home in the first 17 months of his service express his reflections on war and his place in it.

Exhibit

Nuclear Energy for Maine?

Maine Yankee Nuclear Power Plant in Wiscasset generated electricity from 1972 until 1996. Activists concerned about the plant's safety led three unsuccessful referendum campaigns in the 1980s to shut it down.

Exhibit

Prohibition in Maine in the 1920s

Federal Prohibition took hold of America in 1920 with the passing of the Volstead Act that banned the sale and consumption of all alcohol in the US. However, Maine had the Temperance movement long before anyone was prohibited from taking part in one of America's most popular past times. Starting in 1851, the struggles between the "drys" and the "wets" of Maine lasted for 82 years, a period of time that was everything but dry and rife with nothing but illegal activity.

Exhibit

San Life: the Western Maine Sanatorium, 1928-1929

Merle Wadleigh of Portland, who was in his mid 20s, took and saved photographs that provide a glimpse into the life of a tuberculosis patient at the Western Maine Sanatorium in Hebron in 1928-1929.

Exhibit

La Basilique Lewiston

Like many cities in France, Lewiston and Auburn's skylines are dominated by a cathedral-like structure, St. Peter and Paul Church. Now designated a basilica by the Vatican, it stands as a symbol of French Catholic contributions to the State of Maine.

Exhibit

Presidents and Campaigns

Several Mainers have run for president or vice president, a number of presidents, past presidents, and future presidents have had ties to the state or visited here, and, during campaign season, many presidential candidates and their family members have brought their campaigns to Maine.

Exhibit

John P. Sheahan, 1st Maine Cavalry, 31st Maine Infantry

John P. Sheahan of Dennysville served in the 1st Maine Cavalry from August 1862 until March 1864 when he was commissioned as a lieutenant in Co. E of the 31st Maine Infantry. His letters reveal much about the life of a soldier, including political views and thoughts about the war.

Exhibit

Power of Potential

The National Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs (NFBPWC) held their seventh annual convention in Portland during July 12 to July 18, 1925. Over 2,000 working women from around the country visited the city.

Exhibit

Westbrook Seminary: Educating Women

Westbrook Seminary, built on Stevens Plain in 1831, was founded to educate young men and young women. Seminaries traditionally were a form of advanced secondary education. Westbrook Seminary served an important function in admitting women students, for whom education was less available in the early and mid nineteenth century.

Exhibit

Maine Medical Center, Bramhall Campus

Maine Medical Center, founded as Maine General Hospital, has dominated Portland’s West End since its construction in 1871 on Bramhall Hill. As the medical field grew in both technological and social practice, the facility of the hospital also changed. This exhibit tracks the expansion and additions to that original building as the hospital adapted to its patients’ needs.

Exhibit

Enemies at Sea, Companions in Death

Lt. William Burrows and Commander Samuel Blyth, commanders of the USS Enterprise and the HMS Boxer, led their ships and crews in Battle in Muscongus Bay on Sept. 5, 1813. The American ship was victorious, but both captains were killed. Portland staged a large and regal joint burial.

Exhibit

Shepard Cary: Lumberman, Legislator, Leader and Legend

Shepard Cary (1805-1866) was one of the leading -- and wealthiest -- residents of early Aroostook County. He was a lumberman, merchant, mill operator, and legislator.

Exhibit

William King

Maine's first governor, William King, was arguably the most influential figure in Maine's achieving statehood in 1820. Although he served just one year as the Governor of Maine, he was instrumental in establishing the new state's constitution and setting up its governmental infrastructure.

Exhibit

Toy Len Goon: Mother of the Year

Toy Len Goon of Portland, an immigrant from China, was a widow with six children when she was selected in 1952 as America's Mother of the Year.