Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
rapids on a river raft, spend the night in an old sea captain's home-turned-B&B, or camp
among the moose on a backwoods lake.
History
It's estimated that 20,000 Native Americans from tribes known collectively as Wabanaki
('People of the Dawn') inhabited Maine when the first Europeans arrived. The French
and English vied to establish colonies in Maine during the 1600s but, deterred by the
harsh winters, these settlements failed.
In 1652 Massachusetts annexed the territory of Maine to provide a front line of de-
fense against potential attacks during the French and Indian War. And Maine at times did
indeed become a battlefield between English colonists in New England and French
forces in Canada. In the early 19th century, in an attempt to settle sparsely populated
Maine, 100-acre homesteads were offered free to settlers willing to farm the land. In
1820 Maine broke from Massachusetts and entered the Union as a state.
In 1851 Maine became the first state to ban the sale of alcoholic beverages, the start of
a temperance movement that eventually took hold throughout the United States. It wasn't
until 1934 that Prohibition was finally lifted.
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