Maine Historical Society - Programs Podcast

Jacqueline Field, adjunct curator; Recorded February 23, 2017 - Costume historian and adjunct curator of MHS, Jacqueline Field, discusses the economic implications of world war. Prior to World War I, Germany provided the world’s supply of textiles dyes. As the war began, embargoes were imposed and trade routes disrupted. The lack of dyes forced American industries to scramble and figure out to create their own dyes effectively. White became very fashionable in the meantime. Hear about the impact of this economic shift and visit us to see the beautiful fashions on display in the World War I and the Maine Experience exhibition.

Recorded January 12, 2017 - Listen to a conversation between Lucas St. Clair, the man behind the newly named North Woods national monument, and Steve Bromage, MHS Executive Director. The Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument in Maine’s northern woods region came by the determination and grit of St. Clair. This federally protected land promises to revolutionize the region’s economy, but it did not happen without controversy. Questions about its future still remain. Guests learned about this vast area of land given to the American people, and had an opportunity to ask their own questions. Audio quality is faint at times but it's worth a listen!!

Dr. Ronald Epp, author and historian; Recorded October 26, 2016 - Author and historian Dr. Ronald Epp speaks about his important book, documenting Dorr's pivotal role in the creation of Acadia National Park. The first biography of George B. Dorr ever written, Creating Acadia National Park: the Biography of George Bucknam Dorr is based on painstaking research both in the US and abroad, including federal, state, and private archives. Newly-discovered and uncatalogued sources are supplemented by in-person interviews.

Mount Desert Historical Society Executive Director Tim Garrity; Recorded September 22, 2016 - George Dorr intended for Acadia National Park's "noble granite masses" to "become true historic documents that will record forever to succeeding generations the human background of the Park." However, no history lasts forever. The French historian Fernand Braudel taught that "History is the child of its time." The names that Dorr gave to Acadia's mountains tell us as much about the time of the park's founding as it does about the more distant past. In this illustrated lecture, reprized from the MHS Annual Meeting in 2016, Tim Garrity reflects on the history of the park as we understand it now and as the founders understood it a century ago.

Paul Ledman, Author; Recorded August 11, 2016 - In Walking Through History: Portland, Maine on Foot , Paul Ledman brings the city’s history to life through photos and maps, appealing to city residents as well as its visitors. Enjoy this short talk by Ledman at the book launch for Walking Through History: Portland, Maine on Foot .

Recorded June 23, 2016 - Through historical anecdotes and fascinating oral histories, Maine Nursing: Interviews and History on Caring and Competence explores the remarkable sacrifices and achievements of Maine's nurses who have served tirelessly as caregivers and partners in healing at home and abroad, from hospitals to battlefields. Authors Susan Henderson and Juliana L'Heureux talk about their book.

Recorded July 6, 2016 - In companion to Images of Destruction: Remembering the Great Portland Fire of 1866 --our exhibit examining the city's devastating fire of July 4, 1866--enjoy the fascinating look at the history behind this infamous event. On this sesquicentennial anniversary of the fire, former State Representative Herb Adams lead a discussion with Maine State Historian Earle G. Shettleworth, Jr., and authors Allan Levinsky and Michael Daicy on the reason for the fire, its impact on the city of Portland, how the city rose from the ashes to rebuild, and the ephemera and memory of this important event on generations of Portland families. Watch the Video Images of Destruction: Remembering the Great Portland Fire of 1866 and related programs are supported by Luminato Condos : Building inspiration for a city on the rise.

Rob Sneddon, journalist and sports historian; Recorded May 25, 2016 - Journalist and sports historian Rob Sneddon discussed the infamous Muhammad Ali-Sonny Liston fight of May 25, 1965, which ended in chaos at a high school hockey rink in Lewiston, Maine. Sneddon dug deep into the fight's background and delivered new perspective on boxing promotion in the 1960s; on Ali's rapid rise and Liston's sudden fall; on how the bout ended up in Lewiston--and, of course, on Ali's phantom punch. That single lightning-quick blow triggered a complex chain reaction of events that few people understood, either then or now. The following clip was shown at the lecture: Muhammad Ali Vs Sonny Liston II | Full Match 1965.

Recorded March 10, 2016 - Orson Horchler, aka Pigeon, discusses the exhibition Pigeon's Mainer Project: street art meets history , his process, and inspiration behind his work. He leads a discussion about immigration, questioning and debunking the notion of who gets to call themselves a "Mainer."

Speaker: Michael Dekker; Recorded October 20, 2015 - For eight decades, an epic power struggle raged across a frontier that would become Maine. Between 1675 and 1759, British, French and Native Americans clashed in six distinct wars to stake and defend their land claims. Author Michael Dekker, a former trustee on the Lincoln County Historical Society board of directors and a member of the Boothbay Region Historical Society, shares his extensive research on the wars.

Speaker: John Babin, MHS Visitor Services Manager; Recorded October 27, 2015 - Maine Historical Society Visitor Services Manager John Babin—who has led tours in the Wadsworth-Longfellow House for more than a decade—talks about his new book on Longfellow. You'll feel as though you've stepped back in time to the poet's early days and landed in 19th century Portland—the bustling seaport town that so heavily influenced his life and work. Other speakers include Kathy Amoroso, Maine Memory Network; Alan Levinsky, co-author; and Herb Adams.

Speaker: Libby Bischof, Associate Professor of History, USM; Recorded January 31, 2015 - In addition to wearing only black apparel for up to a year, mourners in 18th and 19th century New England abided by fashions and customs that demonstrated intense grief. Libby Bischof, Associate Professor of History at the University of Southern Maine and a board member of Spirits Alive, the friend's group of Portland's historic Eastern Cemetery, explored these practices, utilizing examples from Maine Historical Society's collections.

Speaker: Matthew Edney, Osher Professor in the History of Cartography, University of Southern Maine; Recorded January 22, 2015 - Matthew Edney, Osher Professor in the History of Cartography at the University of Southern Maine, uses the collections of the Maine Historical Society and USM’s Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education to analyze urban maps as cultural documents and interpret Portland’s spatial history from the colonial era through the nineteenth century. Early maps of Portland manifest the duality of Portland, as a conventional city and a port city. View Slides (PDF) as you listen to podcast .

Speaker: Emerson "Tad" Baker; Recorded January 8, 2015 - Author Emerson "Tad" Baker explores the catalog of explanations that have been put forward over the years to solve the mystery of what happened during the Salem Witch Trials in 1692. Behind the events in Salem and surrounding towns was a unique convergence of conditions, including a new charter and government, a grim and bloody frontier war in Maine, and sectarian and political power-struggles. Baker is a professor of history at Salem State University and the award-winning author of many works on the history of early Maine and New England.

Speaker: Richard Judd, Professor of History, University of Maine; Recorded December 9, 2014 - After more than a decade of extensive research, the Historical Atlas of Maine presents in cartographic form--maps, paintings, graphs, and text--the historical geography of Maine from the end of the last ice age to the year 2000. Organized in four chronological sections, the Atlas tells the principal stories of the many people who have lived in Maine over the past 13,000 years. Dr. Richard Judd, professor of history at the University of Maine, spoke about co-editing the Atlas with Stephen J. Hornsby.

Speaker: Matthew Jude Barker; Recorded December 2, 2014 - Did you know that the second-youngest recipient ever of the Medal of Honor was 14-year old John Anglin, son of Irish emigrants who grew up near Gorham's Corner? Or that Colonel Patrick R. Guiney, leader of Boston's Fighting Irish Ninth, also hailed from Portland? Hundreds of Irishmen and boys from Portland fought in the war, and more than 90 were killed or died from their wounds or disease. Fascinating facts like these are being unearthed by historian and genealogist Matthew Jude Barker as he works on his second book.

Speaker: Lee Webb; Recorded November 18, 2014 - A PhD candidate in the Department of History at the University of Maine, Webb has been researching and writing extensively about Maine politics and culture during the war. He shared his research in this talk relating to the traveling exhibition, Lincoln: The Constitution & the Civil War , which was on display in the Brown Library from November 12 to December 20.

Speaker: Jared Peatman; Recorded November 14, 2014 - Historian Jared Peatman, author of The Long Shadow of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address (2013), spoke at the opening reception of the traveling exhibition, Lincoln: The Constitution & the Civil War . His talk revealed the interconnected history between the United States Constitution, the Gettysburg Address, and constitutional theory around the world.

Earle Shettleworth, Vin Verioneau; Recorded September 30, 2014 - Each year MHS recognizes an individual in Maine who has made significant contributions to the community through the Maine History Maker Award . This award honors contemporary citizens who are shaping Maine today. In 2014 we honored Vin Veroneau of J.B. Brown & Sons. Listen to the presentation and the history of the Brown family in Portland presented by Earle Shettleworth.

Speaker: Nicholson Baker, Author; Recorded March 15, 2012 - In 2001, writer Nicholson Baker published Double Fold , a book about libraries, paper science, and lost history. In it he documented his efforts to save a large collection of beautiful and exceptionally rare newspaper volumes, which were being scrapped in favor of microfilmed replacements. Baker's forceful case served as a seeming coda to the era of print, and presaged issues and arguments that organizations like MHS face in the digital age. Why, we are asked, do we need to keep all this ephemeral stuff now that it can be digitized? Baker revisits the intellectual underpinnings of his newspaper crusade, shares tales of research recently done in the MHS library, and reminds us of the essentialness of real, physical things.