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Full-Text Articles in History

Model Cities, Housing, And Renewal Policy In Portland, Maine: 1965-1974, John F. Bauman Dec 2010

Model Cities, Housing, And Renewal Policy In Portland, Maine: 1965-1974, John F. Bauman

Maine History

Shepherded through Congress by Maine Senator Edmund Muskie, the 1967 Model (or Demonstration) Cities Program was originally intended for the nation’s large, ghetto-ridden metropolises where it would target a host of social and economic programs including housing. Thanks to Senator Muskie, both Portland and Lewiston benefited. Before the Nixon Administration scuttled the program in 1973, Portland had created a host of innovative housing, social welfare, law enforcement, and educational programs, shifting the city’s urban renewal program away from its strict emphasis on brick-and-mortar planning. Portland was unique in making Model Cities a part of its downtown renewal. Energizing the city’s …


The Hillbillies Of Maine: Rural Communities, Radio, And Country Music Performers, Erica Risberg Dec 2010

The Hillbillies Of Maine: Rural Communities, Radio, And Country Music Performers, Erica Risberg

Maine History

During the first third of the twentieth century, the United Sates underwent profound social, technological, and economic changes that fundamentally altered rural society. This shift created a divide between rural and urban dwellers, and by the 1930s, country people were developing their own cultural expressions, often reflecting the unique folkways of various regions — the South, Appalachia, the Ozark Plateau, the rural West. One such manifestation of country culture was old-time, or country-western music — also known as hillbilly music. At the time, radio broadcasting was at an experimental stage in reaching an American audience. Station WBLZ in Bangor covered …


“Taking Up The Slack”: Penobscot Bay Women And The Netting Industry, Nancy Payne Alexander Dec 2010

“Taking Up The Slack”: Penobscot Bay Women And The Netting Industry, Nancy Payne Alexander

Maine History

Between 1860 and 1900 the economy of Penobscot Bay communities changed dramatically, from the steady growth and prosperity of their natural resource-based economy to the decline in population and a painful transition to manufacturing and service industries. Both men and women had enjoyed independence in their labor in the old economy. The new cash economy made it necessary for them to seek out new ways of supporting their families, with home manufacture, or putting out work, one way of earning an income. They remained independent from an employer’s direct supervision and earned cash payment, a change from the face-to-face economy …


Saving Schoodic: A Story Of Development, Lost Settlement, And Preservation, Alan K. Workman Jun 2010

Saving Schoodic: A Story Of Development, Lost Settlement, And Preservation, Alan K. Workman

Maine History

Remote, isolated, and nearly barren Schoodic Point, now the easternmost part of Acadia National Park, was long bypassed by early explorers and settlers. It might have seemed destined to remain deserted, a candidate for coastal parkland preservation in the twentieth century. But like such distant outposts as Vinalhaven, Swan’s, and Ironbound islands, Schoodic in the nineteenth century was overtaken by extensive land development, logging, and settlement by fishermen farmers. Eventually its proximity to Bar Harbor made it a target for vacation resort cottages. Yet Schoodic’s peninsular ecology and elements of its social circumstances helped it escape such development in favor …