Our Maine Ancestors

CHILDREN’S BOOKS
Day, Michael E. and Carol Whitmore. Berry Ripe Moon. Peaks Island, Maine: Tide Grass Press, 1977. Story of a young Penobscot boy in pre-contact times in Maine. Line drawing illustrations and too much text for independent reading by younger children, but could be read aloud.

Favour, Edith. First Families: Woodland People of Maine and the Canadian Maritimes. State of Maine Department of Educational and Cultural Services, Division of Curriculum, 1975. A typescript format, with hand-drawn illustrations, contains lots of basic information about Native American life.

Gagnon, Nathalie and Donald Soctomah. Tihtiyas and Jean. Moncton, Canada: Bouton d’or Acadie, 2004. This story tells of the friendship between a young Passamaquoddy girl and a boy who is part of an early French settlement on an island near the mouth of the Schoodic River. The book is written in French, English, and Passamaquoddy. Young elementary ages, although older students will find the languages interesting. Not available through MaineCat. Available for purchase from the Abbe Museum.

Gold, Susan Dudley. Indian Treaties. New York: Twenty-First Century Books, 1997. First two chapters address Maine and New England, including King Phillip’s War and the French and Indian Wars. Remainder of the book is general to the United States, explaining treaties, resettlement, and laws. Upper Elementary, MS.

Perron, Judith, Helen Sylliboy, and Allison Mitcham. A Little Boy Catches a Whale. Moncton, Canada: Bouton d’or Acadie, 2002. An adaptation in French, English, and Mi’kmaq of a Mi’kmaq fable published by Silas T. Rand in 1894. Young elementary ages, although older students will find the languages interesting. Not available through MaineCat. Available for purchase from the Abbe Museum.

Plourde, Lynn. The First Feud between the Mountain and the Sea. Camden, Maine: Down East Books, 2003. A Native American fable. Elementary age level.

Smith, Marion Jaques. On the Way North: A Mother Bear’s Troubled Trip. Freeport, Maine: Bond Wheelwright Company, 1967. Early Maine settlement and Native Americans, as told through the eyes of forest animals. This book is hand-written and may be too difficult for independent reading by students, but might be interesting for reading aloud to elementary age students.

Sockabasin, Allen. Thanks to the Animals. Gardiner, Maine: Tilbury House, 2005. A little Native American boy is cared for by wild animals in the forest. Has glossary of Passamaquoddy animal names. Early   elementary age.

 
Wheeler, Bernelda. I Can’t Have Bannock but the Beaver Has a Dam. Winnipeg, Canada:  Protage & Maine Press, 1993. This is a story of a contemporary Native American child and his request for his mother to make bannock. Bannock is traditional bread, and a recipe is included. Early elementary age.

Wheeler, Bernelda. Where Did You Get Your Moccasins? Winnipeg, Canada: Peguis Publishers, 1992. Contemporary Native American child explains to his classmates the process of making moccasins. Early elementary age.

HIGH SCHOOL/ADULT BOOKS
Baker, Emerson et al. (eds.) American Beginnings. London and Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994. Includes chapters by different historians on early exploration, maps, and Native people.

Brereton, John. Discoverie of the North Part of Virginia. New York: Da Capo Press, 1973. An exact copy, in Old English, of John Brereton’s account of his voyage to the New World in 1602.

Bourque, Bruce J. Diversity and Complexity in Prehistoric Maritime Societies: A Gulf of Maine Perspective. New York: Plenum Press, 1995.

Bourque, Bruce J. Twelve Thousand Years: American Indians in Maine. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001.

Diamond, Jared M. Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. New York: W.W. Norton, 1997. Interesting and readable account of early societies, agriculture, domestic animals, and disease.

Duncan, Roger F. Coastal Maine: A Maritime History. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1992. Chapters on early exploration, settlement, and conflicts.

Eckstorm, Fannie Hardy. Indian Place Names of the Penobscot Valley and the Maine Coast. Orono, ME: University of Maine, 1974. Geographic names and local histories.

Gray, Edward G. and Norman Fiering (eds.) The Language Encounter in the Americas, 1492-1800: A Collection of Essays. New York: Bergahn Books, 2000. Papers on Indian languages from a 1996 conference at the John Carter Brown Library, Providence, RI. Includes topics relevant to our module: “Interpreters snatched from the shore,” “Use of pidgins and jargons,” and “Mi’kmaq writing.”

Judd, Richard W., Edwin A. Churchill, and Joel W. Eastman. Maine: The Pine Tree State from Prehistory to the Present.  Orono, Maine: University of Maine Press, 1995. This book is very readable and has good information on early Maine history and Native American tribal divisions.

Kevitt, Chester B. General Solomon Lovell and the Penobscot Expedition, 1779. Weymouth, MA: Kevitt, 1976. Excerpts from journals, letters, and documents about this military event.

Morey, David. The Voyage of the Archangell: James Rosier’s Account of the Waymouth Voyage of 1605. Gardiner, ME: Tilbury House, 2005. An annotated account of Waymouth’s exploration of Maine’s midcoast, his discovery of a beautiful river that generated a controversy of identification years later, and his interactions with Native people.

Paine, Lincoln P. Down East: A Maritime History of Maine. Gardiner, ME: Tilbury House, 2000. A relatively brief history of Maine’s maritime past.

Platt, David (ed). One Land, Two Worlds: Proceedings of a Symposium to Celebrate the 400th Anniversary of George Waymouth’s Voyage to New England. Rockland, ME: Island Institute, 2005. Symposium held in Rockport, Maine, June 11, 2005. Contents: “A Nation Above All Others: Empire and Race in the Waymouth Celebration of 1905,” Richard D’Abate; “The World Around Waymouth,” Neil Rolde; “A Wabanaki Perspective,” Donald Soctomah; “June 1605: When the Creation of America Began,” Matt Simmons; “A Race for the American Coast: the Waymouth Voyage Revisited,” David Morey; and “Time Capsules: the Ecology of Mid-Coast Maine in 1605,” Philip Conkling. References included. Available from Penobscot Marine Museum and Island Institute.

Rolde, Neil. Maine: A Narrative History. Gardiner, ME: Harpswell Press, 1990.

Shay, Florence Nicola. History of the Penobscot Tribe of Indians. Privately printed.

Winship, George Parker. Sailors’ Narratives of Voyages along the New England Coast, 1524-1624. New York: B. Franklin, 1968. Reprint of 1905 edition.

Woods, Geraldine. Science of the Early Americas. New York: Franklin Watts, 1999. Scientific accomplishments of various Native groups.

CANOES
Adney, Edwin Tappan and Howard I. Chappelle. The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Museum of History and Technology, 1964.

Fernald, Peggy. Brief Description of Birchbark Canoe Building. Bar Harbor: Abbe Museum, 1970. Bulletin No. 9.
Gidmark, David. Birchbark Canoe: Living Among the Algonquin. Willowdale, Ontario: Firefly Books, 1997. A description of building a birchbark canoe near Quebec.

Jennings, John. Bark Canoes: The Art and Obsession of Tappan Adney. Buffalo, NY: Firefly Books, 2004.
Kent, Timothy J. Birchbark Canoes of the Fur Trade. Ossineke, MI: Silver Fox Enterprises, 1997.

McPhee, John. The Survival of the Bark Canoe. New York: Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, 1975. The construction and history of a traditional birch bark canoe; a canoe trip; and diagrams of canoe models by Adney.

Poling, Jim Sr. The Canoe: An Illustrated History. Woodstock, VT: Countryman Press, 2001.
Thoreau, Henry David. The Maine Woods. New York: Norton, 1950. Includes building of Indian canoes.

VIDEOS/DVDS
Home: The Story of Maine. Lewiston, ME: Maine Public Broadcasting, 1999-. Parts 1-3, early Maine history.
The Land of Norumbega: Maine in the Age of Exploration and Settlement. Bucksport, ME: Northeast Historic Film, 1990. 16 min., color.

Penobscot Basket Maker. The story of Barbara Francis, master of traditional Penobscot basket making. Orono, ME: Jim Sharkey, 2002.

One Land, Two Worlds. 2005. A documentary about the 1605 explorations of George Waymouth in Maine, the mystery surrounding the identity of the river he explored and praised, and the impact on Native people in Maine. Penobscot Marine Museum store or Education Department.

Wabanaki: A New Dawn. 1995, 28 min. The quest for cultural survival.

WEB PAGES

Abbe Museum, Bar Harbor: www.abbemuseum.org. Features an extensive reading list and teacher resources.

Maine’s First Ship: www.mainesfirstship.org. Background on the Popham Colony of 1607-8.

Maine Indian Land Claims Settlement, 1980. www.wabanaki.com/me_land_claim.htm

Maine Memory Network: www.mainememory.net/home.  Go to Exhibits. See:
Colonial Cartography: the Plymouth Company Maps. Scans of forty maps showing land boundaries in early Maine, from 1750s.
Liberty Threatened: Maine in 1775. Maine during the American Revolution.
Settling along the Androscoggin and Kennebec. The Pejepscot Proprietors’ maps and plans ca. 1714.
Also within the Maine Memory Network: See Schools. Images are available here to accompany Finding Katahdin, a new Maine studies textbook created by the Maine Historical Society and the University of Maine Press. The images are accessible without registering or purchasing the book. Chapters one and two deal with early history of Maine.

Native American Studies Program, University of Maine, Orono: www.umaine.edu/americannativeindianstudies

Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education, University of Southern Maine: The Cartographic Creation of New England. www.usm.maine.edu/maps/exhibit2

Wabanaki Studies Informational Website for K-12 Teachers: www.umaine.edu/ld291

Tribal Websites
Aroostook Band of Micmacs: www.micmac-nsn.gov
Houlton Band of Maliseets: www.maliseets.com
Penobscot Nation: www.penobscotnation.org
Passamaquoddy Tribe of Maine, Indian Township: www.passamaquoddy.com
Passamaquoddy Tribe at Pleasant Point, Sipayak: www.wabanaki.com