Maine Memory Network

The Mainspring of Fashion

The mainspring of fashion is the process whereby members of one class imitate the styles of another, who in turn are driven to ever new expedients of fashionable change.

Northern Threads: Adaptive reuse

A themed vignette within "Northern Threads Part I," featuring up-cycled and reused historic fabrics.

Northern Threads: Bustle era fashions

A themed vignette within "Northern Threads Part I," featuring 1870s and 80s era bustle silhouettes.

Northern Threads: Silhouettes in Sequence, ca. 1780-1889

A themed exhibit vignette within "Northern Threads Part I," featuring a timeline of silhouettes from about 1775 through 1889.

Northern Threads: The rise and fall of the gigot sleeve

A themed exhibit vignette within "Northern Threads Part I," featuring the balloon-like gigot sleeve of the 1830s.

Sugar and Spice: Our Vintage Recipes

Sugar and Spice: Our Vintage Recipes showcases historic recipes, dating from the 18th century to the 1950s, like sweet treats, traditional favorites, promotional printings, medicinal concoctions, curious libations, and recipes that have fallen out of favor.

Samplers: Learning to Sew

Settlers' clothing had to be durable and practical to hold up against hard work and winters. From the 1700s to the mid 1800s, the women of Maine learned to sew by making samplers.

Northern Threads: Early Republic era Fashion dolls

A themed exhibit vignette within "Northern Threads Part I," featuring Early Repulic-era (ca.1780-1820) fashion dolls.

Of Note: Maine Sheet Music

Of Note: Maine Sheet Music features captivating covers of original sheet music along with stories about Maine connections to the songs. Before people had easy access to popular music from records, radios, and the internet, they played songs of the day on instruments at home, using sheet music purchased at music stores. Iconic Maine subjects like lobsters, pine trees, and winter were perfect for lyrics sung by luminaries like Rudy Vallée of Westbrook, and intricate artwork of Maine’s landscape graced the sheet music covers.

Gifts From Gluskabe: Maine Indian Artforms

According to legend, the Great Spirit created Gluskabe, who shaped the world of the Native People of Maine, and taught them how to use and respect the land and the resources around them. This exhibit celebrates the gifts of Gluskabe with Maine Indian art works from the early nineteenth to mid twentieth centuries.

Great Cranberry Island's Preble House

The Preble House, built in 1827 on a hilltop over Preble Cove on Great Cranberry Island, was the home to several generations of Hadlock, Preble, and Spurling family members -- and featured in several books.

Cooks and Cookees: Lumber Camp Legends

Stories and tall tales abound concerning cooks and cookees -- important persons in any lumber camp, large or small.

How Sweet It Is

Desserts have always been a special treat. For centuries, Mainers have enjoyed something sweet as a nice conclusion to a meal or celebrate a special occasion. But many things have changed over the years: how cooks learn to make desserts, what foods and tools were available, what was important to people.

Indians at the Centennial

Passamaquoddy Indians from Washington County traveled to Portland in 1920 to take part in the Maine Centennial Exposition. They set up an "Indian Village" at Deering Oaks Park.

Northern Threads: Civil War-era clothing

An exhibit vignette within "Northern Threads, Part 1," featuring American Civil War civilian and military clothing, 1860 to 1869.

Northern Threads: Mourning Fashions

A themed exhibit vignette within "Northern Threads Part I," featuring 18th and 19th century mourning jewelry and fashions.

Luxurious Leisure

From the last decades of the nineteenth century through about the 1920s, vacationers were attracted to large resort hotels that promised a break from the noise, crowds, and pressures of an ever-urbanizing country.

Songs of Winnebago

An enduring element of summer camps is the songs campers sing around the campfire, at meals, and on many other occasions. Some regale the camp experience and others spur the camp's athletes on to victory.

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.

Student Exhibit: The Story of the Heywood Tavern

The story of the Heywood Tavern in Skowhegan.

Northern Threads: Penobscot mocassins

A themed exhibit vignette within "Northern Threads, Part I," about telling stories through Indigenous clothing, featuring an essay by Jennifer Sapiel Neptune (Penobscot.)

Valentines

Valentines Day cards have long been a way to express feelings of romance or love for family or friends. These early Valentines Day cards suggest the ways in which the expression of those sentiments has changed over time.

Northern Threads: Outerwear, Militia & Cadet uniforms

A themed vignette within "Northern Threads Part I," featuring 19th century outerwear, bonnets, militia and cadet uniforms.

Cosmopolitan stylings of Mildred and Madeleine Burrage

Born in Portland, sisters Mildred Giddings Burrage (1890-1983) and Madeleine Burrage (1891-1976) were renowned artists and world travelers. Mildred's experiences studying painting in Paris and Italy, and the sisters' trips to Mexico and Guatemala inspired their artwork and shared passions for cosmopolitan and stylish attire. Housed at Maine Historical Society, The Burrage Papers include selections of original advertising drawings called "line sheets" from Parisian fashion houses dating from 1928 to 1936. Images of Madeleine's gemstone jewelry and Mildred's artwork accompany intimate family photographs of the sisters.