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Articles 1 - 30 of 34
Full-Text Articles in History
How Maine Viewed The War, 1914–1917 (1940 Reprint), Edwin Costrell
How Maine Viewed The War, 1914–1917 (1940 Reprint), Edwin Costrell
Maine History
Originally published in 1940, as the United States once more evaluated possible involvement in global conflict, How Maine Viewed the War, 1914– 1917 looks backward to Maine on the eve of World War I. Author Edwin Stanley Costrell (1913–2010), through a study of newspaper coverage of the years 1914 to 1917, provides a thought-provoking account of a Maine people wrestling with ambivalence over US involvement in the Great War; of a citizenry seeking to reconcile ethnic diversity with national unity; and of a nation divided over pacifism, militarism, isolationism, and internationalism and increasingly moving toward war with Germany. Costrell was …
Republican Ascendancy: The Gubernatorial Career Of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain And Its Consequences, 1866-1881, Michael Bailey
Republican Ascendancy: The Gubernatorial Career Of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain And Its Consequences, 1866-1881, Michael Bailey
Maine History
Joshua Chamberlain is a revered hero of the Civil War, an icon for both scholars and the broader public. His life after the Civil War, however, remains largely unexplored. This article uses Chamberlain’s addresses, legislative records, and other primary sources to explore his four-year career as governor of Maine. Reflecting an interesting national parallel, this article reveals Chamberlain’s rise, his policies, and the consequences of those policies. Having risen to political prominence with the Republican Party thanks to the popularity of the Civil War, Chamberlain and his party enacted a number of policies designed to promote industrialization and economic growth …
Research Note: James G. Blaine’S Effort To Have John L. Stevens Appointed Minister To Hawai’I In 1869, Paul T. Burlin
Research Note: James G. Blaine’S Effort To Have John L. Stevens Appointed Minister To Hawai’I In 1869, Paul T. Burlin
Maine History
Paul T. Burlin is Professor of History at the University of New England. He is founding chair of the Department of History at the University where he also served as interim dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. Among his book publications is Imperial Maine and Hawai’i (Lexington 2006).
Elijah Lovejoy’S Oration On The Fiftieth Anniversary Of American Independence: An Essay Discovered, William G. Chrystal
Elijah Lovejoy’S Oration On The Fiftieth Anniversary Of American Independence: An Essay Discovered, William G. Chrystal
Maine History
On July 4, 1826, the American republic celebrated its fiftieth anniversary with great fanfare. In this research note, the author provides a transcript of an oration delivered in China, Maine on that day. The speaker was local schoolmaster Elijah P. Lovejoy, better known for his tragic death eleven years later. By then an abolitionist newspaper editor in Alton, Illinois, Lovejoy was killed in 1837 by a pro-slavery mob. Lovejoy’s 1826 oration, then, serves as both a compelling look at the celebration of America’s Jubilee in rural Maine and an early example of the ideological convictions which led Lovejoy to abolitionism. …
Contested Memory: John Badger Bachelder, The Maine Gettysburg Commission, And Hallowed Ground, Crompton Burton
Contested Memory: John Badger Bachelder, The Maine Gettysburg Commission, And Hallowed Ground, Crompton Burton
Maine History
In the grim aftermath of the Battle of Gettysburg, John Badger Bachelder, a young artist from New Hampshire, arrived on the field with a master plan to become the preeminent historian of the battle. However, Bachelder quickly learned he could not monopolize the memorializing of those who gave all for the Union. For the next thirty-one years, his vision for remembrance would, by necessity, become a shared one with veterans who were emotionally invested in the preservation of the hallowed ground. The consequence of this collaboration was a uniquely American approach to commemoration in which individual states formed commissions to …
“We Respect The Flag But….”: Opposition To The Civil War In Down East Maine, Timothy F. Garrity
“We Respect The Flag But….”: Opposition To The Civil War In Down East Maine, Timothy F. Garrity
Maine History
Although Maine is commonly remembered as one of the states most supportive of the Union during the Civil War, many of its citizens were implacably opposed to the conflict, and they voiced their opposition loudly and persistently from the war’s beginning until its end. Others weighed in on the topic more quietly but just as forcefully when they refused to enlist and evaded conscription by any effective means. While many studies have explored the history of Copperheadism and associated the political movement with populations that were urban, immigrant, and Catholic, there has been almost no prior investigation of Down East …
The Transformative Power Of Work: The Early Life Of Senator Margaret Chase Smith, Jeannette W. Cockroft
The Transformative Power Of Work: The Early Life Of Senator Margaret Chase Smith, Jeannette W. Cockroft
Maine History
Contrary to the conventional narrative of Margaret Chase Smith’s life, her public career did not begin with her 1930 marriage to politician Clyde H. Smith. By the time of that marriage, she was already an experienced political leader and an accomplished professional. Her transformation from an uneducated, working-class girl to an ambitious, upwardly mobile, middle-class woman was the result of her employment at the local newspaper, the Somerset County Independent-Reporter, and her subsequent involvement in the Business and Professional Women’s Club. The author received her Ph.D. in history from Texas A&M University and is an associate professor of history …
Ambassador To Norway, Historian Of Bethel: The Career Of Margaret Joy Tibbetts, Andy Deroche
Ambassador To Norway, Historian Of Bethel: The Career Of Margaret Joy Tibbetts, Andy Deroche
Maine History
Margaret Tibbetts grew up in Bethel, graduated from Gould Academy, and later earned a Ph.D. from Bryn Mawr. As a career Foreign Service officer, she served in Europe and Africa in a variety of positions until being named U.S. ambassador to Norway in 1964. Her work as one of the first female ambassadors set the stage for future women to play even bigger roles in U.S. foreign relations. The author grew up in Hanover, Maine, and attended Rumford High School. Majoring in history, he earned a B.A. from Princeton University, an M.A. from the University of Maine, and a Ph.D. …
“Maine And Her Soil, Or Blood!”: Political Rhetoric And Spatial Identity During The Aroostook War In Maine, Michael T. Perry
“Maine And Her Soil, Or Blood!”: Political Rhetoric And Spatial Identity During The Aroostook War In Maine, Michael T. Perry
Maine History
The Aroostook War was a two-month standoff during the winter of 1839 between Maine and New Brunswick. Overlapping boundary claims had created a disputed territory rich in timber but lacking organization. Troops were mobilized, but war was averted when national leaders in Washington and London recoiled at the prospect of a third war between the two nations. The “war” has been dismissed by contemporary observers and historians alike because of the lack of shots fired. What has largely been overlooked, however, is the large body of political rhetoric churned out by Maine’s Democrats and Whigs during the dispute. In examining …
William King, First Governor Of Maine: His Known Portraits And Their Stories, Deanna Bonner-Ganter
William King, First Governor Of Maine: His Known Portraits And Their Stories, Deanna Bonner-Ganter
Maine History
This article studies the known studio portraits of William King (1768-1852), first governor of Maine, finding that the leader’s personal life and professional travels led to sittings with such noted master painters as Gilbert Stuart, Edward Greene Malbone, and Chester Harding. These living portraits reflect period styles, while later likenesses require a broad understanding of formal state portraiture and its historical elements. One portrait, having resurfaced recently, was found to have hung in the Hall of Flags in the State Capitol for almost thirty years; others required considerable research to determine their provenance. The Honorable James G. Blaine played an …
Research Note: Searching For Democracy In Colonial Southern Maine, William Robbins
Research Note: Searching For Democracy In Colonial Southern Maine, William Robbins
Maine History
The following article was originally written as a seminar paper for James Henderson’s colonial history class during Robbins’s brief tenure as a graduate student at the University of Maine. The methodology used in this research was quite innovative when it was written in 1966, as the so-called new social history had only just emerged. This era marked an exciting time in the social sciences, with new methods that allowed the historian to approach history “from the bottom up.” Using census records, land records, tax lists, suffrage lists, and an array of other data, historians were able to uncover what life …
Settling Oxford County: Maine’S Revolutionary War Bounty Myth, Jean F. Hankins
Settling Oxford County: Maine’S Revolutionary War Bounty Myth, Jean F. Hankins
Maine History
It is a common assumption that many New England frontier towns were founded by veterans of the Revolutionary War who had been given land for their service to the country. Author Jean Hankins's careful research in deeds, records, and legislative acts shows that this was not the case in representative Oxford County towns. Although there were a variety of bounties given for land in these towns, few had anything to do with the Revolutionary War. The Revolutionary War bounty myth persists, the author specidates, because it is an appealing way to begin the history of these towns, and because, since …
Governors Of Maine With Oxford County Ties, Stanley R. Howe
Governors Of Maine With Oxford County Ties, Stanley R. Howe
Maine History
Seven of Maine's seventy-two governors or acting governors were either born in what is today Oxford County or served from that county which was incorporated on March 4, 1805, two hundred years ago this year. Five of these seven left a legacy as chief executives of the state. Hannibal Hamlin, who served briefly as governor, made important contributions by holding other offices, and Sebastian Streeter Marble ably filled out his predecessor’s term, but is nearly forgotten today: Below they are described in the order of their service. Dr. Howe received his Ph.D. from the University of Maine in 1977. He …
Thomas Brackett Reed, Civil Rights, And The Fight For Fair Elections, Wendy Hazard
Thomas Brackett Reed, Civil Rights, And The Fight For Fair Elections, Wendy Hazard
Maine History
Few causes in American history have proved more enduring than the effort to ensure all citizens the right to vote. From the enfranchising of African-Americans after the Civil War to the granting of women’s suffrage and the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965, the country has struggled to live up to its image as the guardian of the ideal that every citizen has a guaranteed right to vote. The prolonged presidential election of 2000 and the vote-counting debacle in Florida once again focused national attention on the issue of enfranchisement. Democrats argued that the Florida election, whether by …
William Burney And John Jenkins: A Tale Of Maine’S Two African-American Mayors, Elwood Watson
William Burney And John Jenkins: A Tale Of Maine’S Two African-American Mayors, Elwood Watson
Maine History
William Burney and John Jenkins were, respectively, mayors of Augusta and Lewiston. While this in itself is not unusual, the fact that they were African-American city leaders in a state where African-Americans make up less than one percent of the population is quite distinctive. Burney was elected mayor of Augusta in 1988, and Jenkins mayor of Lewiston in 1993. The article discusses their childhood and teenage years, their coming of age in college, and their early careers in the private sector. It suggests that these formative experiences, particularly their religious upbringing and their relation to white peers, was important in …
Principle And Expediency: The Ku Klux Klan And Ralph Owen Brewster In 1924, John Syrett
Principle And Expediency: The Ku Klux Klan And Ralph Owen Brewster In 1924, John Syrett
Maine History
During the early 1920s the Ku Klux Klan gained considerable support throughout the United States and in Maine. In 1924 Ralph Owen Brewster, later a senator, secured the Republican nomination for governor with the Klan’s support. The dominant issue in the election was whether the state should continue to fund parochial schools. Brewster urged that this aid be ended, and the Klan enthusiastically endorsed his candidacy. Brewster narrowly won the primary and then easily won the September election. In this article John Syrett explores the relation between Brewster and the Klan. Mr. Syrett is a Professor of History and former …
Harold Marsh Sewall And The Truculent Pursuit Of Empire: Samoa, 1887-1890, Paul T. Burlin
Harold Marsh Sewall And The Truculent Pursuit Of Empire: Samoa, 1887-1890, Paul T. Burlin
Maine History
The conflict between Thomas F. Bayard, Grover Cleveland's first Secretary of State, and his subordinate, Harold Marsh Sewall of Bath, Maine, who was U.S. consul general to Samoa, was not a disagreement about the goals of American policy. Their disagreement related more to tactical considerations. And at that level, generational differences probably drove them apart. Specifically, the meaning of the Civil War for the younger generation of which Sewall was a part may well have contributed to his “truculent" pursuit of empire, a posture that totally unnerved the older Bayard. Paul T. Burlin is Associate Professor of History and Chair …
The Administrative Code Of 1931: William Tudor Gardiner And Government Reform, Claude G. Berube
The Administrative Code Of 1931: William Tudor Gardiner And Government Reform, Claude G. Berube
Maine History
Welfare reform, downsizing government and making government more efficient are issues that could be taken from some 1990s political candidate's campaign handbook. But they have been longstanding themes in Maine's political history. Administrative reform was a key element in William Tudor Gardiner's two terms as governor from 1929 to 1933. No study of Gardiner's career would be complete without examining the events encompassing the Administrative Code of 1931, a comprehensive reform bill that was intended to change the way Maine government operated. Claude G. Berube earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in history from Saint Anselm College in 1988 and …
The Attempt To Repeal Maine’S Personal Liberty Laws, Jerry R. Desmond
The Attempt To Repeal Maine’S Personal Liberty Laws, Jerry R. Desmond
Maine History
Many issues divided the nation before the Civil War. One in particular involved the passage of Personal Liberty laws in the northern states, which circumscribed the conduct of officials handling fugitive slaves. While Maine was not a prominent destination for runaway slaves, its Personal Liberty laws, redrafted in 1857 by the state's new Republican majority, were particularly forceful and therefore particularly odious to Southern planters. As the secession crisis loomed, Maine reconsidered the constitutionality of the laws and their political expediency: Would the state bend to the needs of national reconciliation? Mr. Desmond, born in Island Falls, Maine, received M.A. …
Resistance In “Pioneer Territory”: The Maine Naacp And The Pursuit Of Fair Housing Legislation, Eben Simmons-Miller
Resistance In “Pioneer Territory”: The Maine Naacp And The Pursuit Of Fair Housing Legislation, Eben Simmons-Miller
Maine History
While Charles Lumpkins details the organizational strategies of the civil-rights movement in Maine, Eben Miller focuses on the politics of fair housing. Outlining the “geography of segregation” in Maine, he describes the resistance to fair housing and the means by which the NAACP documented civil-rights violations, drafted legislation, built coalitions of concerned black and white citizens, and advanced the “moral and ethical responsibility ” of all Mainers to work for fair housing legislation. Mr. Miller, from Woolwich, graduated from Bates College in 1996. His article is based on research done for an honors thesis. Mr. Miller shared some of this …
Civil-Rights Activism In Maine, 1945-1971, Charles L. Lumpkins
Civil-Rights Activism In Maine, 1945-1971, Charles L. Lumpkins
Maine History
Like civil-rights activists everywhere, those in Maine challenged racism and inequality in postwar America. Two factors - the size of the African-American minority in Maine, and the subtle but insidious forms of racism in the state - shaped NAACP strategies in Bangor, Lewiston, Brunswick, and Portland. Beginning with a small core group in the 1950s, the NAACP succeeded in building a basis for civil-rights legislation in Maine - a legacy, as Lumpkins points out - shared by all Mainers today. A native of Massachusetts, Mr. Lumpkins earned a M.L.S. from Simmons College in 1977 and a M.A. in history from …
Blending Loyalties: Maine Soldiers Respond To The Civil War, Andy Deroche
Blending Loyalties: Maine Soldiers Respond To The Civil War, Andy Deroche
Maine History
Scholars agree that during the Civil War most Federal soldiers saw their primary purpose as saving the Union, but their loyalty to the Union was expressed in complex ways. Using a sample of thirty-seven collections of Civil War correspondence and diaries, Andy DeRoche assesses the soldiers ’ view of the war, the Union, the Conscription Act, and the elections of 1864. Above all, loyalty to family structured their thinking about these momentous national questions.
The Margaret Chase Smith Library, Gregory P. Gallant
The Margaret Chase Smith Library, Gregory P. Gallant
Maine History
Description of the contents and organization of the Margaret Chase Smith Library in Skowhegan, Maine.
Margaret Chase Smith’S 1950 Declaration Of Conscience Speech, Dennis L. Morrison
Margaret Chase Smith’S 1950 Declaration Of Conscience Speech, Dennis L. Morrison
Maine History
In 1948 Margaret Chase Smith of Maine became the first woman elected to the Senate entirely on her own merit. She went on to enjoy a long and distinguished career in Congress. The highlight of this career was Smith’s 1950 speech against foe McCarthy, known as her Declaration of Conscience. In the following article, Dennis Morrison analyzes the speech and traces its origins to Smith’s early life in Maine.
Declaration Of Conscience, Margaret Chase Smith
Declaration Of Conscience, Margaret Chase Smith
Maine History
Text of Senator Margaret Chase Smith's address to U.S. Senate on June 1, 1950
Westward From Maine: A Study Of The Washburns As Classic American Myth, Theodore A. Webb
Westward From Maine: A Study Of The Washburns As Classic American Myth, Theodore A. Webb
Maine History
This article reviews the lives of the seven Washburn brothers as examples of possible metaphors of American life in the 19th century.
Cuban Annexation, Slave Power Paranoia, And The Collapse Of The Democratic Party In Maine, 1850-1854, David B. Demeritt
Cuban Annexation, Slave Power Paranoia, And The Collapse Of The Democratic Party In Maine, 1850-1854, David B. Demeritt
Maine History
This article reviews the impact of attempts to annex Cuba to the United States prior to the Civil and also the direct impact of this issue on the politics of the State of Maine.
Who Were The Whigs And Democrats? The Economic Character Of Second-Level Party Leadership In Tidewater Maine, 1843-53, Wayne M. O'Leary
Who Were The Whigs And Democrats? The Economic Character Of Second-Level Party Leadership In Tidewater Maine, 1843-53, Wayne M. O'Leary
Maine History
This article analyses the religious, socio-economic and vocation characteristics of the members of the lower house of the Maine legislation during the period 1843-1853. This analysis is used to differentiate the members of the Whig and Democratic Parties in Maine at that time.
The “Plumed Knight” At Home: An Intimate Sketch Of James G. Blaine, H. Draper Hunt
The “Plumed Knight” At Home: An Intimate Sketch Of James G. Blaine, H. Draper Hunt
Maine History
This article is a detailed overview of the personal and political lives of Maine's James G. Blaine.
Samuel Spring Gardner, A Maine Parson In Alabama, Michael J. Daniel
Samuel Spring Gardner, A Maine Parson In Alabama, Michael J. Daniel
Maine History
This article recounts the experience of Samuel Spring Garner, of Maine, who moved to Alabama after the Civil War to assist in the Reconstruction effort. Emphasis is placed on Mr. Garner as an example of a “carpetbagger” who did not conform to the general stereotype of those individuals.