Sept. 29, 1888: The city unveils a monument to poet and Portland native Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882). A dedication ceremony is held beside the monument in State Street Square, which was later renamed Longfellow Square. The event features a band, a succession of speakers, and 100 schoolchildren singing Longfellow’s 1838 poem “Psalm of Life.” Several […]

Sept. 28, 2017: Bath Iron Works and Maine’s congressional delegation announce that the Maine shipyard has won a contract to build two more Arleigh Burke-class destroyers for the U.S. Navy. The Navy does not release the contract price, saying it plans to issue more such contracts, and it wants to keep bidding competitive. BIW, owned […]

Sept. 27, 1962: The publisher Houghton Mifflin releases aquatic biologist, nature writer and conservationist Rachel Carson’s seminal book “Silent Spring.” Carson (1907-1964) was a summer resident of Maine’s Southport Island, where she owned a cottage overlooking Sheepscot Bay. Born and raised in western Pennsylvania, she began writing as a child. Her academic career suffered because […]

Sept. 26, 1775: Col. Benedict Arnold, about to leave Fort Western on the Kennebec River for his ill-fated trek through the wilderness on the way to attack the British at Quebec, pauses to deal with a soldier convicted of murder. The incident occurs on the night of Sept. 23 when several of the men in […]

Sept. 20, 1883: John Appleton (1804-1891) of Bangor, chief justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, retires after serving 20 years and 11 months in that role, longer than any other chief justice in Maine history. A New Hampshire native, the Bowdoin College graduate was admitted to the bar in that state, then moved back […]