Maine

D

Local Government

Each county elects three commissioners and an attorney, a sheriff, and a treasurer. Cities are governed by a manager and city council or by a mayor and city council. Most towns have a board of selectmen, a tax collector, town clerk, treasurer, assessor, a school board, and road commissioner. These officials are elected at an annual town meeting, in which all the voters participate and decide on such matters as taxes and appropriations for the year. A growing number of towns are turning to councils and town managers as more effective means of government.

E

National Representation

Maine sends two members to the U.S. House of Representatives and two members to the U.S. Senate, giving the state a total of four electoral votes.

VIII

History

A

Original Inhabitants

The first inhabitants of Maine lived there in about 10,000 bc. Archaeological evidence suggests that these peoples, called Paleo-Indians, hunted large animals such as caribou, musk ox, and probably other animals that are now extinct. After the Paleo-Indians disappeared from the region, most likely as a result of climate changes, a new culture, referred to as Archaic, emerged. During the Archaic Period (about 8000-1000 bc) changes in the climate resulted in changing plant and animal life, providing deer and fish for native diets. Evidence also suggests that Archaic people used a variety of stone tools for hunting, fishing, and woodworking.

The late Archaic Period (4000-1000 bc) produced a culture that has interested archaeologists for its burial practices. Differing from previous cultures, the so-called Red Paint people placed bright red ocher, powdered hematite, and unusual stone artifacts in burial pits, suggesting detailed funeral rituals. Archaeological remains of the Red Paint people exist throughout Maine and New Brunswick and indicate the culture disappeared about 1800 bc, for unknown reasons. The final culture during the Archaic Period developed around 1500 bc and is referred to as the Susquehanna Tradition. These people also hunted deer and fished, and they migrated farther into the interior.

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Archaeological evidence indicates that the next population to develop, people of the Ceramic Period, also fished and hunted, but the making of ceramic pottery distinguished them from their predecessors. The Ceramic period occurred from about 500 bc until contact with Europeans in the early 1500s.

When the first Europeans arrived to fish the waters off Maine’s coast, they encountered the Wabanaki, native people of the Algonquian linguistic stock. The native inhabitants hunted and farmed, lived in dwellings resembling wigwams and longhouses, and used birchbark canoes. The Wanbanaki included a number of bands of Abenaki, such as the Penobscot, the Kennebec, and the Passamaquoddy, whom the Europeans named for the rivers by which they lived. The Mi'kmaq, another Wabanaki group, were enemies of the Abenaki.

Some historians estimate that Maine’s Wabanaki population was about 20,000 at the time white settlement began. By 1620, however, more than half that number had died, from epidemics introduced by European contact and from intertribal warfare.

B

Early Exploration

Norse explorers came to North America about 1100 and settled in regions throughout Greenland and Newfoundland, but whether they ever came to the Maine coast is debatable. The only evidence for their presence, a single Norse coin discovered in Maine in 1961, probably came by way of trade among native people. The 15th-century European explorations proved to be more important in shaping the region’s history.

In 1497 King Henry VII of England sponsored an exploratory expedition to the region. Led by explorer John Cabot, the expedition might have landed on the Maine coast, although the records are unclear. It is certain, however, that the Italian explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano, sailing in 1524 for the king of France, arrived on the Maine coast and described the land and the people he found there. Also during this time, European fishing vessels arrived to work the rich fishing grounds off the coast. Early in the 17th century England sent several more explorers, including Bartholomew Gosnold in 1602, Martin Pring in 1603, and George Waymouth in 1605, all of whom provided further information on the region’s resources.

C

Early Settlement

In the 17th century, both France and England turned their interests from exploration to settlement in the region. In 1604 French explorers Samuel de Champlain and Pierre du Guast, Sieur de Monts, established a French settlement on Saint Croix Island. However, the small colony had to endure a harsh winter, and in 1605 its survivors moved to Port Royal in what is now Nova Scotia. In 1607 the Plymouth Company, influenced by Waymouth’s reports, sent George Popham and Raleigh Gilbert to found a colony at the mouth of the Kennebec River, but that settlement also failed the next year.

French and English interests soon came into conflict at Mount Desert Island, the site of a French Jesuit mission established in 1613. Word of the mission reached Sir Samuel Argall, commander of a Virginia Company fishing expedition, who sailed north, ordered the French to leave, and destroyed their settlement. This conflict set the stage for intermittent warfare between the French and the English over the next 150 years in Maine.

In 1614 English explorer Captain John Smith traveled the region and later published his observations regarding the local geography and climate. Smith’s information stirred further interest among potential English backers, particularly Sir Ferdinando Gorges. King James I and later Charles I of England granted Gorges a patent for the Council for New England, a charter company with proprietary rights to much of New England stretching to the Penobscot River. Gorges also received a monopoly on fishing rights in the region. In 1629 Gorges and a partner, John Mason, divided their land holdings. Gorges took the eastern part, which he called the province of Maine, while Mason named his area New Hampshire. During the 1620s a number of semipermanent fishing stations were established along the coast, from which evolved the first permanent settlements in Maine. Though Gorges himself never visited the region, he attempted to maintain authority through his emissaries, who were not altogether successful in gaining control.

Besides the lack of a consistently stable government, early settlement in Maine was also hampered by disputes over land titles. Titles that had originated in the royal grants given to Gorges and others included vague and overlapping boundaries and inaccurate knowledge of Maine’s geography. In addition, squatters and Native Americans made their own claims to land, which complicated sales. Settling conflicting claims usually meant lengthy court actions.

As a result of these problems, settlement in Maine was slow while neighboring Massachusetts grew rapidly in the 17th century. With a growing population and a more stable government, Massachusetts maneuvered to gain control of Maine’s potential riches. In the 1650s Massachusetts construed its charter as including title to Maine lands and annexed a number of southern Maine towns. The claims of Gorges and his heirs conflicted with the Massachusetts claims until 1677, when Massachusetts bought the Gorges title. Massachusetts assumed control of Maine until 1820.

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