History in Maine

Discover 21 places to experience unusual history in Maine.

Paul Bunyan & Babe the Blue Ox

A larger-than-life dedication to the famous lumberjack and his loyal ox.

Ellsworth, Maine

Big Chicken Barn

It's a repurposed treasure trove of history, located just an hour away from Acadia National Park.

Camp Etna

A major spiritual gathering place in central Maine since the mid-1800s.

Double Eagle II Balloon Site

Presque Isle, Maine

Double Eagle II Balloon Site

A small park commemorates the departure of the first-ever successful transatlantic balloon voyage.

Birch bark canoe handmade by the Wabanaki.

Bar Harbor, Maine

Reis Education Canoe

The first handmade canoe built by members of the Passamaquoddy in over a century.

An evocation of the schooner Wyoming.

Wyoming Sculpture

One of the largest wooden ships ever built is honored by a steel sculpture evoking her once-superlative scale.

Saint Croix Island National Historic Site

A shoreline exhibit describing the disastrous first attempt by the French to colonize North America.

Replica of the Sheepscot Station

Wiscasset, Waterville and Farmington Railway Museum

Preserving the memory of the narrow railroads that once crisscrossed the state of Maine.

Bangor Police Museum

Bangor Police Museum

This museum explores the history of policing and is also home to a very popular taxidermied duck.

Biddeford, Maine

Palace Diner

Maine's oldest diner also happens to win acclaim for its elevated comfort food.

Blast Furnace

Brownville, Maine

Katahdin Iron Works

The remains of a large iron mill that once stood in the remote woods of northern Maine.

West Quoddy Head Lighthouse.

West Quoddy Head Lighthouse

This candy-striped tower is the farthest east you can go in the United States.

Portions of the Smokehouse Complex are now a museum.

McCurdy Smokehouse

This waterfront museum in Maine is dedicated to the history of the smoked-herring trade.

The memorial stone and bridge.

Jonesport, Maine

Nellie Chapin Day Memorial

A memorial to an ill-fated Holy Land mission once described by Mark Twain as “a complete fiasco.”

North to Freedom.

Chamberlain Freedom Park

Maine’s only official memorial to the Underground Railroad.

The couch where Hannibal Hamlin died.

Hannibal Hamlin Death Couch

Abraham Lincoln's vice president took his last breath here on July 4, 1891.