Androscoggin Historical Society

02/03/2026

Our February Bulletin is up on our new page. Check it out and follow us over there to catch our daily history posts!

12/31/2025

Join Lin Wright for the 2nd offering in her series,
New England Genealogical Resources : Church Records
Saturday, Jan 3, 11:00 @ 93 Lisbon Street

12/23/2025

AHS will not be open on Wednesday, 12/24 or Friday 12/26. We will be back to our regular hours on Saturday, 12/27 from 9-1.

12/19/2025

Sparkle Saturday is this Saturday! Head downtown to enjoy great food and drink and find unique last-minute gifts - all while supporting downtown businesses, restaurants, and local artisans. We will have baked goods for you to purchase and enjoy as you walk around and shop downtown! See you soon!

12/09/2025

Hello all, We have had some difficulty with our the way our current page is set up and have made the difficult decision to start from scratch. Please go follow our new page to see our daily historical posts and updates. Thanks!

Since its creation in 1923, the Androscoggin Historical Society has sought to discover, preserve, and disseminate knowledge about the history of Androscoggin County and the State of Maine.

12/01/2025

11/30/2025

November 30, 2025

150 years ago
“The wind has been so furious today that few people have ventured to walk out merely for the pleasure of the thing. A sign in Phoenix Block blew down, smashing a big pane of glass in Brewster & Dingley’s store.”

100 years ago
“All the big hockey games this winter will probably be in the new arena for it is probably that not only St. Dom's will play in the steel building, but Lewiston High and Bates College as well. The St. Dom's will again play independent hockey and will not enter the proposed New England League. … With all the games in the Bartlett Street structure, it would be a real hockey center, and hockey is bound to boom. Sheltered from biting winds, rain and snow, fans are bound to pack the arena, and it seems as if nothing can prevent the season from being a financial success.”

50 years ago
“The Androscoggin County Commission will meet Tuesday in new quarters. Chairman Roland D. Landry said he expects the commissioners will meet in their new area in the basement of the addition at the county building, an area formerly occupied by the Bureau of Civil Emergency Preparedness. One partition has been erected creating a meeting room for the commission and another office for the clerk of the commissioners and the two other commissioners.”

25 years ago
“The principals of a group hoping to bring a junior hockey league franchise to Lewiston will keep their fingers crossed Thursday, hoping to receive definitive word from league officials on whether their dream will become reality. Florida businessman Dave Adams and Central Maine Civic Center owner Roger Theriault said Wednesday they remain optimistic that the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League’s board of governors will designate an expansion franchise for Lewiston in 2001 or 2002.”

11/29/2025

November 29, 2025

150 years ago
“The public schools of Lewiston will open next Monday. The superintendent of schools gives notice which will be of especial importance to those parents whose children have been accustomed to work in the mills.” A new law requires children 9 to 15 to attend at least 12 weeks of school, the Lewiston Evening Journal noted.

100 years ago
“On the way to the undertaking rooms of Poisson & Fortin to select a casket for their year-and-a-half-old child who had died an hour before, Mr. and Mrs. George St. Louis of 26 Elm St., Lewiston, were badly cut and bruised when the Nash sedan they were riding was practically wrecked in a collision with an electric car on Main Street.”

50 years ago
“The Liberty Bell Rings Again is the theme of this year’s Christmas fair at the Women’s Literary Union clubhouse at 19 Elm St. in Auburn on Dec. 2 beginning at 10 o’clock. Bells of all kinds will be ringing as the ladies display their wares. The luncheon bell will ring for the first sitting at 11:30 and will be repeated until 1 p.m.”

25 years ago
“City councilors on both sides of the river Tuesday said they were on board with a proposal to use a $6 million state bond for rail improvements on a stretch of track that passes through Auburn and runs from Portland to Quebec. The unanimous and official support is the first clear signal the Twin Cities have given … on a plan that can leverage up to $24 million in federal matching funds for improvements to the St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad. ‘When we played Monopoly as kids, my dad always said, ‘Buy all the railroads,’’ Lewiston Ward 1 Councilor Marc Gousse said.

11/28/2025

November 28, 2025

150 years ago
“More men and women fell on the slippery sidewalks Friday than we ever saw before. Our reporter counted four men and one woman on their knees at one time, on Court and Main streets.”

100 years ago
“Four East Auburn men spent the forenoon in the big woods of Turner and returned with three deer. They were: Irving Martin, who shot a buck; Philo Verrill, who shot a doe; Jack Decoster, who shot a doe; and I.J. Martin, ‘the mighty hunter’ who fired at a buck but missed him. Imagine that, ‘I.J.’ missing the buck – but he did.”

50 years ago
“A Thanksgiving morning fire virtually destroyed a 200-year-old structure at Minot Corner before being quelled by firefighters from four communities. The old Pulsifer Building, which over the years has been an inn, a store, a dance and more recently a private residence, was extensively damaged in the fire which was discovered after 4 a.m.”

25 years ago
“The problem with a chemical spill at Pioneer Plastics had less to do with the danger posed by the caustic soda leak and more to do with who wasn’t informed. ‘There was definitely no danger to the public,’ said Peter Van Gagnon, director of the Androscoggin Unified Emergency Management Agency in Lewiston. The agency received notification about two weeks after the incident, he said, when it should have been told immediately.”

11/27/2025

November 27, 2025

150 years ago
“You can’t get a blacksmith to smile upon you. He is too busy sharpening the slippery toes of the horses.”

100 years ago
“The first snow storm of the year, a lazy but steady fall, visited Lewiston on Friday. From 8 o’clock when the first flakes drifted down until 2 o’clock in the afternoon, about an inch and three quarters had fallen, and it was still coming strong, making automobile driving a rather hazardous undertaking and walking extremely disagreeable. Streetcar service was not crippled in the least although the tracks were made rather slippery by the wet snow.”

50 years ago
In response to a query about anyone who could repair an umbrella, the Lewiston Daily Sun’s “Sun Spots” column confessed it couldn’t find someone. “The repairing of umbrellas is a lost art,” it said, before suggesting sending it back to the manufacturer.

25 years ago
“For years, the Lewiston Public Library has worked to develop a 4,000-volume French fiction collection. Now it plans to add a Spanish collection, said Director Rick Speer. That’s the result of revamping the library’s policies, which makes changes in content to bring the library up to speed in several areas, Speer said.”