Thursday, March 11, 6:00 – 7:00 pm

MHS MEMBERS EXCLUSIVE! Maine at 200 Series: A Conversation with Colin Woodard
Maine's Bicentennial: Looking Backward and Forward

Colin Woodard

SPECIAL ACCESS FOR MHS MEMBERS!

Join us for a conversation between award-winning author and journalist Colin Woodard and our Executive Director Steve Bromage as they look back on Maine’s commemoration of the Bicentennial and the profound ways in which history shapes the state and its people today.

About the speaker: Colin Woodard is currently the State and National Affairs Writer for the Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram, where he was a 2016 Pulitzer Prize finalist and received a 2012 George Polk Award for his investigative reporting. He is also a contributing editor at Politico and reviews books for The Washington Post. He is author of The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators, and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier (Viking Press, 2004); American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America (Viking, 2011); American Character: A History of the Epic Struggle Between Individual Liberty and the Common Good (Viking, 2016); and Union: The Struggle to Forge the Story of United States Nationhood (Viking, 2020.) He lives in midcoast Maine.

Cost: MHS Members Only - Registration is required. NOT A MEMBER? IT'S EASY TO JOIN!

Location: online via Zoom. Limited to 500 attendees.
Registration ends at 4pm on March 10th.

Register Here!

Thursday, March 25, 6:00 – 7:00 pm

A Talk with Steve Pinkham
Off to Maine: Early Sportsmen in the Maine Woods

Oak Point Camps, Portage Lake, ca. 1900

Before the advent of railroads, only a few sportsmen went to Maine to hunt and fish. After the coming of the railways, thousands of hunters and fishermen came to Maine each season, creating a need for hotels, sporting camps and guides to accommodate them. Learn how they got here and how the Rangeley Lakes and Moosehead Lake became the favored sporting resorts of Maine.

About the speaker: Steve Pinkham grew up in western Maine, hearing old stories of hunting and fishing, and has spent much of his life hiking, paddling and discovering the many wonderful places in the backwoods of Maine. Having spent the past ten years searching for articles and books, following up on clues, and spending a vast amount of hours in libraries and historical societies, he published his first book, Mountains of Maine: Intriguing Stories Behind Their Names in 2009. Selecting from his vast collection for this book, he now spends his time writing and publishing articles and books about the Maine Woods from his home in Quincy, Massachusetts. He is also author of Old Tales of the Maine Woods and More Old Tales of the Maine Woods.

Cost: Free and open to the public, limited to 500 attendees.

Location: online via Zoom. REGISTER HERE.

Thursday, April 1, 6:00 – 7:00 pm

A Talk with Ron Romano
Mortality and Memorialization in Portland at the Time of Statehood

Ron Romano

While many of MHS’s programs provide a wide range of perspectives on what life was like in 1820, this presentation will take a different view: examining how people dealt with death, burial, and the memorialization of lives lost at the time of Statehood.

Local cemetery historian and author Ron Romano will bring us back to 1820 to share the burial practices, gravestone symbols, and monument types in common use at the time, and introduce us to the local stonecutters who were an integral part of the community.

About the Speaker: Portland, Maine native Ron Romano currently serves on two non-profit volunteer boards. He manages the walking tours program for Spirits Alive, the "Friends of Portland's Eastern Cemetery" organization, and serves as an officer on the national Association for Gravestone Studies board. A frequent lecturer on early gravestones and Maine's gravestone makers, he is the author of Portland’s Eastern Cemetery, Early Gravestones in Southern Maine, and Billboard Monuments of Maine, as well as numerous articles.


Cost: Free and open to the public, registration required.

Location: online via Zoom, limited to 500 attendees. REGISTER HERE.

Monday, April 12, 6:00 – 7:00 pm

A Talk with Isaac Knapper and Amy Banks
Fighting Time

Isaac Knapper and Amy Banks

Hosted by Steve Bromage
On April 12, 1979, Ronald F. Banks, University of Maine professor and author of Maine Becomes a State: The Movement to Separate Maine from Massachusetts, was shot and killed outside the Hyatt Regency Hotel in New Orleans, Louisiana. Sixteen-year-old Isaac Knapper was arrested, tried as an adult, and wrongly convicted of the murder. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, Angola.

In 1992, Isaac’s conviction was overturned and in 2015 he met Dr. Bank’s daughter, Amy Banks . It was an emotional meeting, and in the years since, Isaac and Amy have maintained a strong friendship and healing connection and have worked to educate people about the impact that wrongful convictions can have on both those convicted and the families of murdered victims.

Their book, Fighting Time, will be available in the Fall of 2021. Join us for a discussion hosted by MHS Executive Director Steve Bromage with Isaac and Amy about their story, their friendship, their work, and where Maine fits in the national dialogue of confronting systemic racism and justice.


About the speakers:

Isaac Knapper is the head trainer of the Crescent City Boxing Gym in New Orleans, Louisiana. Isaac has a deep passion to help young kids avoid the psychological beat down and suffering that he experienced in the Department of Corrections. To that end, he volunteers to mentor and coach young boxers helping to keep them off the streets and away from violence. Isaac was a Golden Gloves Champion in Louisiana at age 15 and held the Louisiana Department of Corrections boxing title for eleven years while in the State Penitentiary, Angola. After leaving Angola in 1991, he restarted his amateur boxing career, just missing by one bout a spot on the USA team that competed in the Barcelona Olympics. From 1992 until 1998 he boxed professionally, traveling around the country and the world. Isaac is the father of four children and lives with his wife, Denise, in New Orleans.

Dr. Amy Banks is a psychiatrist, speaker, writer and educator. She is the author of numerous articles as well as the co-author of Wired to Connect: The Surprising Link Between Brain Science and Strong Healthy Relationships (2016), the co-editor of A Complete Guide to Mental Health for Women (2004), and the author of PTSD: Relationships and Brain Chemistry (2001). Amy is a founding member of Relationships First, an intimate group of prestigious scientists and cultural leaders who are promoting the idea that “healthy relationships are non-negotiable in a healthy society”. Previously she worked as the Psychiatrist–in-Charge of the Women’s Treatment Program at Mclean Hospital; a psychiatrist for the Victims of Violence Program at Cambridge Health Alliance; and as Medical Director for Mental Health at the Fenway Community Health Center. She currently has a clinical practice as a therapist and psychopharmacologist and holds a position on the clinical advisory board for the Renfrew Centers for Eating Disorders in Philadelphia, PA.

Cost: Free and open to the public. Registration required.

Location: online via Zoom, limited to 500 attendees. REGISTER HERE.