AUGUSTA — The Maine State Museum in Augusta will open its Maine bicentennial exhibition, “Regional Struggle – National Story: Maine’s Path to Statehood” on Saturday, March 14.
The museum will be open free of charge from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. both March 14 and March 15, when a special commemoration of Maine Statehood Day will be held.
“Our new exhibition provides a remarkable look at the events and people, woven together over centuries, that led to Maine’s independent statehood. Through artifacts and documents, the exhibition reveals the world of Maine’s Wabanaki people before and after Europeans came to Maine’s shores,” said museum Director Bernard Fishman. “The exhibition uncovers conflicts between elite landowners and farmers in the late 1700s. It also shows how the War of 1812, along with political and economic disagreements with Massaschusetts, set the stage for debates over Maine’s separation. The exhibition takes a fascinating look at Maine’s part in the slave trade and shows the dilemmas faced by Maine people who, because of the Missouri Compromise, were forced to choose between independent statehood and the expansion of slavery in the United States.”
“Through the museum’s own collections, as well as pieces on loan, we are featuring many objects never or rarely seen by the public,” said Angela Goebel-Bain, the exhibition’s curator. “These include stunning portraits of Maine’s first governor and his wife by famed artist Gilbert Stuart, an early frock coat worn by a Maine farmer, the oldest known ballot box used in Maine, a colorful uniform worn by a soldier in the new state of Maine’s first militia, a watercolor showing Maine’s first State House in Portland, and an important 1815 Moses Greenleaf map with notations from an 1820 expedition into Maine’s northland.”
“Regional Struggle – National Story: Maine’s Path to Statehood” has been funded in part by a grant from the Maine Bicentennial Commission. The exhibition will be on view at the Maine State Museum through March 2021. Related educational materials for use by teachers will also be available on the museum’s website by late March 2020, and several museum-sponsored or co-sponsored special events will take place throughout the bicentennial year.
The Maine State Museum is in the Cultural Building, 230 State St., adjacent to the Maine State House. For more information, visit www.mainestatemuseum.org.
PHOTO: Congress Street in Portland, 1822-1825, with Maine’s first State House the white wooden building on the right. (Maine State Museum and Maine Historical Society photo)
