Maine Memory Network

Theodore S. McLellan, Brunswick, ca. 1900

Contributed by: Pejepscot History Center Date: circa 1900 Location: Brunswick Media: Photographic print

Don't take the port out of Portland, 1986

Contributed by: Maine Historical Society Date: 1986 Location: Portland Media: Ink on paper

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The Shape of Maine

The boundaries of Maine are the product of international conflict, economic competition, political fights, and contested development. The boundaries are expressions of human values; people determined the shape of Maine.

This Rebellion: Maine and the Civil War

For Mainers like many other people in both the North and the South, the Civil War, which lasted from 1861-1865, had a profound effect on their lives. Letters, artifacts, relics, and other items saved by participants at home and on the battlefield help illuminate the nature of the Civil War experience for Mainers.

Farmington: Franklin County's Shiretown - Farmington Social Library, Regulations, ca. 1900

"This does not list the requirements for becoming a member of the Library. Note the rule on multivolume works : "...if the book so lost or injured be…"

Scarborough: They Called It Owascoag - Catch of the Day: Clamming and Lobstering - Page 2 of 4

"In 1973 Thurlow’s Shellfish Company, owned by David Thurlow, bought another processor, Googins Lobster Pound. Googins had the first depurification…"

Florence Ahlquist Link's WWII service in the WAVES
by Earlene Ahlquist Chadbourne

Florence Ahlquist, age 20, was trained to repair the new aeronautical cameras by the US Navy in WWII

Sister Viola Lausier: Finance Director with a big heart
by Biddeford Cultural & Heritage Center

A life dedicated to applying financial and leadership expertise in the service of others.

Longfellow Studies: Longfellow Amongst His Contemporaries - The Ship of State DBQ

Grade Level: 9-12 Content Area: English Language Arts, Social Studies
Preparation Required/Preliminary Discussion: Lesson plans should be done in the context of a course of study on American literature and/or history from the Revolution to the Civil War. The ship of state is an ancient metaphor in the western world, especially among seafaring people, but this figure of speech assumed a more widespread and literal significance in the English colonies of the New World. From the middle of the 17th century, after all, until revolution broke out in 1775, the dominant system of governance in the colonies was the Navigation Acts. The primary responsibility of colonial governors, according to both Parliament and the Crown, was the enforcement of the laws of trade, and the governors themselves appointed naval officers to ensure that the various provisions and regulations of the Navigation Acts were executed. England, in other words, governed her American colonies as if they were merchant ships. This metaphorical conception of the colonies as a naval enterprise not only survived the Revolution but also took on a deeper relevance following the construction of the Union. The United States of America had now become the ship of state, launched on July 4th 1776 and dedicated to the radical proposition that all men are created equal and endowed with certain unalienable rights. This proposition is examined and tested in any number of ways during the decades between the Revolution and the Civil War. Novelists and poets, as well as politicians and statesmen, questioned its viability: Whither goes the ship of state? Is there a safe harbor somewhere up ahead or is the vessel doomed to ruin and wreckage? Is she well built and sturdy or is there some essential flaw in her structural frame?