Abby Epplett, Historian

After a hiatus from the blog due to lots of traveling and photo editing, I’m back with an overview of quick history stops in southern Maine, where I visited back in August.

On my sixth and final stop of my tour of Maine, I visited Marrett House in Standish, operated by our favorite old house tour organization, Historic New England (HNE). This sprawling home, now on the National Register of Historic Places , is named for its second set of residents, the Marrett family. The father, Daniel Marrett , became the underpaid minister of the local church in 1796 and had better luck managing an apple orchard. When he was not giving sermons or grafting trees, Daniel raised six children with his first wife, Mary . After she died young, he remarried to Dorcas Hastings and had another eight children. The house must have been incredibly crowded.   Remarkably, considering the number of people involved, the house passed smoothly from one generation to the next. Daniel and Dorcas’ third son, Avery , inherited the house and orchard, turning the operation into a profitable business. The orchard’s specialty was Bal...

For stop five on my trip through Maine, I went back to Wiscasset to visit another Historic New England (HNE) property and National Historic Landmark . Built by shipping investor  William Nickels and his wife Jane in 1807, Nickels-Sortwell House is a federal-style mansion with a ridiculous number of windows. Like many owners of grand houses in Maine and New Hampshire, the Nickels family was a victim to President Thomas Jefferson’s disastrous Embargo of 1807 and the subsequent War of 1812 . Both William and Jane had died by 1815, so the debt saddled children rented out the house. This started a tradition of renting at Nickels-Sortwell House, which continues to this day. The back portion of the house can be rented through Vacasa if you have the budget for it.

My fourth stop on my Maine adventure was Bowman House , an 18 th century Historic New England (HSE)  property in Dresden, Maine. The home was commissioned in 1762 by wealthy and well-connected Jonathan Bowman . He was the cousin of John Hancock and a Harvard classmate of President John Adams and Governor John Wentworth of New Hampshire . The architect was Gershom Flagg , an expert from Boston who also designed the nearby Pownalborough Courthouse , where Bowman served as a judge. The family made much of their money through the shipping industry and Transatlantic trade .

Stop three on my two-day tour of Maine was Castle Tucker , a property of Historic New England in Wiscasset, Maine. This charming tourist town has a history as a busy port along the Sheepscot River stretching back to the early colonial era. Many residents in the 18 th and early 19 th century made their fortunes through the shipping industry’s Transatlantic trade routes.

My second stop on my adventure in Maine was Hamilton House , located in South Berwick just down the road from Sarah Orne Jewett House Museum & Visitor Center . These Georgian style homes were built around the same time, with Hamilton House constructed around 1785 by wealthy privateer Jonathan Hamilton. He copied and enlarged the architectural features seen at Jewett House. Notable similarities include the layout of the houses, three-story buildings with four rooms on the main floor, a grand central staircase, and a wooden arch in the atrium, reminiscent of a ship’s hull. Hamilton House is more traditionally decorated than its counterpart across town, with Neoclassical wallpaper and white trim. The owner of this opulent manor paid double the taxes of the next best house in town. Due to the high price in upkeep and the economic downturn surrounding the Jefferson Embargo of 1807 and the War of 1812, the Hamilton family was forced to sell the house during the second generation....

In mid August of 2022, I took a trip to southern Maine, visiting six properties owned by Historic New England houses over the course of two days. The first of these houses was Sarah Orne Jewett House Museum & Visitor Center , once home to a local romance novelist. Compared to Willa Cather for her use of “local color”, or using dialectical spellings for speech alongside detailed descriptions of the landscape and the people in it, Jewett’s books shared the stories of Maine characters familiar to her and her neighbors.

Are you a fan of visiting multiple historic houses or museums in one day? Waltham, Massachusetts is an excellent city for this kind of adventure. With a rich history and a walkable downtown, not to mention plenty of free and inexpensive parking, a trip to this bustling Boston suburb is well worth the trip. I visited Stonehurst, Lyman Estate & Greenhouses, and Gore Place on my whirlwind tour of Waltham.

While I was not able to attend the Civil War reenactment at South County Museum in Narragansett, Rhode Island, which took place back on July 16 and 17, I watched a charming, fourteen-minute-long documentary about the event. Produced by the New England video company LittleFire  with support from the Rhode Island Foundation  and South County Museum, the film records the event while following a pair of reenactors, 15-year-old Jacob Bates and his father, Scott Bates. The documentary serves as a quick introduction to historical reenactment, showcasing how seriously the reenactors take their portrayals. Jacob describes his authentic replica clothing and antique rifle, along with singing a Civil War era ballad. He speaks of the reenactors’ collaboration with the National Park Service and the amount of research that must be done so the battles appear authentic to the audience. While he does smale while comparing historical reenactment to LARPing (Live Action Role Playing,...

Described as “the biggest Green Up / Clean Up in 50 years”, today’s ZAP the Blackstone event celebrated the original event on September 9, 1972. According to the official website of ZAP, at the time of the first cleanup, ecologist David Rosser found that fifty-three percent of the Blackstone River’s flow was raw sewage. The cleanliness of the river had long been in decline. Since the start of the American Industrial Revolution in 1793 with the opening of Slater Mill on the Blackstone River in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, industrial pollution as been dumped directly into the river. Dye dumping from textile mills turned the river the color of whatever clothing was dyed that day. Bernat Mill in Uxbridge, formerly known as Capron Mill and Bachman Uxbridge Worsted Company, was a longtime manufacturer of uniforms for the United States military, and company owners of the 19 th and early 20 th century were known to allow dye dumping. While I was a park ranger at Big Thicket Nat...

If you’re seeking a combination of exercise and history on the coast of Massachusetts, look no further than the Cape Cod Canal Bikeway in the Bourne Recreation Area. Managed by the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers New England District , a pair of signs describing the construction and history of the Vertical Life Railroad Bridge line the paved, two-lane path. Walking, biking, rollerblading, and other similar activities are permitted, while the banks near the bridge are a popular spot for fishing. If you travel on the northwest section of the path, plenty of parking is available at nearby Buzzards Bay Park . A matching parking lot for the southeast section is on the opposite side of the Vertical Lift Railroad Bridge.

On the same trip where I visited Canterbury Shaker Village and Castle in the Clouds , I rode a train on Winnipesaukee Scenic Railroad and saw art on the Meredith Sculpture Walk in Meredith, New Hampshire . Sitting between Lake Waukewan and Meredith Bay, the town of Meredith is a relaxing getaway, less busy than nearby towns border Lake Winnipesaukee and filled with history.

During the same trip where I visited Canterbury Shaker Village , I took a trip to Castle in the Clouds  (formerly called Lucknow ) and the nearby Brook Walk . Located in rural Moultonborough, New Hampshire, the overlooks from this area provide an unmatched view of nearby mountains, lakes, and rivers.

Do you like historic homes, woodland trails, traditional gardens, handmade furniture, and charismatic religious cults? Canterbury Shaker Village is the destination for you. The Village was by the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, also known as the Shakers. This religious organization was established by Mother Ann Lee , an English woman claiming to be the incarnation of Jesus Christ. In 1792, the Shakers constructed the Village in the rural town of Canterbury, New Hampshire, and it became one of the most successful communitarian centers on the 19 th and early 20 th century. Now a National Historic Landmark >, the Village is open for visiting from dawn to dusk and provides a unique look into a nearly vanished culture.

One of my favorite places to ride my bike in Central Massachusetts is the Upper Charles Rail Trail, which is managed in part by the Upper Charles Conservation Land Trust and winds through the towns of Milford , Hopkinton , and Holliston . Highlights of the trip include going through Phipps Hill Tunnel and over 8-Arch Bridge, along with reading about the history of the area.

Earlier today — Sunday, August 14 — I was a Volunteer-In-Parks (VIP)  at Blackstone River Valley National Historic Park (BRVNHP)  during “World War II Comes to the Valley”, an event that took place at Open Sky Community Services in the historic village of Whitinsville, Massachusetts . This park also contains Slater Mill , where I volunteered during World Ranger Day .

On the same day that I visited Frederick Law Olmsted NHS , I perused a pair of parks in Brookline, MA.