Maine Memory Network

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.

Wired! How Electricity Came to Maine

As early as 1633, entrepreneurs along the Piscataqua River in southern Maine utilized the force of the river to power a sawmill, recognizing the potential of the area's natural power sources, but it was not until the 1890s that technology made widespread electricity a reality -- and even then, consumers had to be urged to use it.

Lincoln County through the Eastern Eye

The Penobscot Marine Museum’s photography collections include nearly 50,000 glass plate negatives of images for "real photo" postcards produced by the Eastern Illustrating and Publishing Company of Belfast. This exhibit features postcards from Lincoln County.

Dressing Up, Standing Out, Fitting In

Adorning oneself to look one's "best" has varied over time, gender, economic class, and by event. Adornments suggest one's sense of identity and one's intent to stand out or fit in.

Chansonetta Stanley Emmons: Staging the Past

Chansonetta Stanley Emmons (1858-1937) of Kingfield, Maine, experimented with the burgeoning artform of photography. Starting in 1897, Emmons documented the lives of people, many in rural and agricultural regions in Maine and around the world. Often described as recalling a bygone era, this exhibition features glass plate negatives and painted lantern slides from the collections of the Stanley Museum in Kingfield on deposit at Maine Historical Society, that present a time of rapid change, from 1897 to 1926.

Northern Threads: Bustle era fashions

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

World War I and the Maine Experience

With a long history of patriotism and service, Maine experienced the war in a truly distinct way. Its individual experiences tell the story of not only what it means to be an American, but what it means to be from Maine during the war to end all wars.

Northern Threads: Mourning Fashions

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

Rum, Riot, and Reform - Influential & Interesting Documents

"… Great Secret X The Drunkard's Looking Glass, ca. 1812 Collections of the Dyer Library / Saco Museum Reverend Mason Locke Weems (1759-1825)…"

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.

Rum, Riot, and Reform - Business as Usual

"… Collections of Maine Historical Society, Gannett Glass Plate Negative Collection One of the major figures of American industrialization, Henry Ford…"

Rum, Riot, and Reform - Taverns, People, and Scenes

"… (now Brown) Street, and a decanter of liquor and glasses were set on the coffin" Reverend Elijah Kellog (1813-1901), 1886 Stacey Tavern…"

Rum, Riot, and Reform - A Call to Temperance

"… enemy that steals men's brains away, and the way glass rattled and the liquor flowed was a caution to rumsellers."

Rum, Riot, and Reform - Drinking Implements

"… X Goblet, 1690-1710 England Blown glass Courtesy of Arlene Palmer Schwind X Bottle, 1810-1835 Western Pennsylvania Blown glass…"

Rum, Riot, and Reform - Drinking: Elegance and Debauchery

"1860 Blown, cut, and engraved glass; engraved with the initial M Collections of Victoria Mansion; The Morse-Libby Mansion This glassware represents…"

A Craze for Cycling

Success at riding a bike mirrored success in life. Bicycling could bring families together. Bicycling was good for one's health. Bicycling was fun. Bicycles could go fast. Such were some of the arguments made to induce many thousands of people around Maine and the nation to take up the new pastime at the end of the nineteenth century.

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.

Northern Threads: Adaptive reuse

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

Music in Maine - Opera, Orchestras and Stages

"… Weston Sewell's mother-of-pearl inlay opera glasses, Livermore Falls, ca. 1904Maine Historical Society Dusty rose opera cape ca."

Civil Defense: Fear and Safety

In the 1950s and the 1960s, Maine's Civil Defense effort focused on preparedness for hurricanes, floods and other natural disasters and a more global concern, nuclear war. Civil Defense materials urged awareness, along with measures like storing food and other staple items and preparing underground or other shelters.

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.

Home: The Longfellow House & the Emergence of Portland

The Wadsworth-Longfellow house is the oldest building on the Portland peninsula, the first historic site in Maine, a National Historic Landmark, home to three generations of Wadsworth and Longfellow family members -- including the boyhood home of the poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The history of the house and its inhabitants provide a unique view of the growth and changes of Portland -- as well as of the immediate surroundings of the home.

A City Awakes: Arts and Artisans of Early 19th Century Portland

Portland's growth from 1786 to 1860 spawned a unique social and cultural environment and fostered artistic opportunity and creative expression in a broad range of the arts, which flowered with the increasing wealth and opportunity in the city.

Poland Spring: Summering in Fashion

During the Gilded Age at the end of the nineteenth century, Americans sought to leave increasing urban, industrialized lives for the health and relaxation of the country. The Poland Spring resort, which offered a beautiful setting, healing waters, and many amenities, was one popular destination.