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/ visitportland.com
Living TESTIMONY
By careful preservation and active stewardship, Portland’s past is vibrantly on display
for its residents and visitors to engage with—step back in time today.
Photo: Corey Templeton
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In 1876, Edward H. Elwell published
the first edition of his work
Portland
And Vicinity
, highlighting the many
attractions popular during the formative
years of Maine’s great age of tourism.
Elwell begins the history with a quote
taken from Captain John Smith’s The
True Travels, Adventures and Observa-
tions of Captaine John Smith first
published in London in 1629, which
personifies the historical relevance of
Portland, and the context of the Maine
coast within the larger history of early
New England.
“Captain John Smith, the first of
Maine’s tourists, in his account of his
famous summer trip along our shores,
in 1614, thus describes it: ‘Westward of
Kennebec is the Country of Aucocisco,
in the bottom of a deep bay full of
many great isles, which divided it into
many great harbors’ This was Casco
Bay, the present name of which is a
corruption of the Indian word
Aucocisco, which according to some
authorities signifies ‘a resting place’,
though others give it the interpretation
of crane or heron.”
The city of Portland has gone by many
names including New Casco, Falmouth
Neck, and finally Portland in 1786 when
the town separated from Falmouth as a
whole. Until 1899, Portland included only
the peninsula, running east to west until it
annexed what was then the city of Deering,
a location with its own long, rich history.
Since the 1880s, the history of Portland
has grown to include a booming tourism
industry, a world-class sea port, an impor-
tant role in civil defense, as well as periods
of urban development and revitalization.
A long history is not without its strife. The
city has suffered three great devastations
during her tenure: in 1690 at the hands
of the French and Native populations;
destruction at the hands of the British, led
by Capt. Mowatt, during the Revolution,
and again during the Great Fire of 1866.
The city rose like a phoenix and rebuilt
after the fire in 1866, spurring the first of
much rejuvenation, a great deal of which
can still be seen thanks to modern efforts
by organizations such as Greater Portland
Landmarks. Portland is also home to
the state’s historical society. Founded in
1822, the Maine Historical Society
moved to Portland in the 1880s, finding
its permanent home at the site of the
Wadsworth-Longfellow House, boyhood
home to Portland’s native literary
celebrity, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
The city of Portland, the state’s largest
city, represents Maine’s resilience,
revitalizing and re-inventing herself over
nearly four centuries to remain one of
New England’s premier destinations.
Elwell’s book
Portland And Vicinity
, as
well as a later edition of Capt. John
Smith’s work, are both available in the
Brown Research Library at the Maine
Historical Society, which along with
the Society’s museum, is open to the
public. Please visit mainehistory.org for
more information.
