93 Water Street PO Box 122
Eastport, ME 04631-0122
207-853-2400
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Eastport History
Eastport was incorporated as a Town in 1798. Despite foreign occupation and devastating fires, shipping, shipbuilding and sardines brought growth and prosperity to this island seaport throughout the 19th century.
Foreign Occupation During the War of 1812, American forces stationed at Fort Sullivan succumbed to an armada of British war ships, making Eastport one of only three American cities ever under foreign rule. During its four years of British occupation, Eastport became part of New Brunswick, Canada and was returned to the United States as part of the Treaty of Ghent.
Fort Sullivan and the Powder Magazine sites contain archeological remains and, as it was for the small band of American defenders, offer amazing views of the passage taken by the invading armada. The British Barracks now houses the aptly named Barracks Museum, which presents its own historical perspective, as do the private homes once commandeered by British officers.
Fires Three devastating fires laid the Eastport waterfront to waste, the first and second in 1839 and 1864, the last and worst in 1886, after which the Boston Globe reported, “No city in this country has ever had its business portion so completely obliterated as has Eastport.”
Under the direction of Boston architects Gridley Bryant and Henry Black, downtown Eastport was rebuilt with masonry the following year – and remarkably, looks very much the same today as it did in 1887.
With 19 of its 29 historic buildings attributed to Mr. Black, downtown Eastport is unique for its consistent design – expressed through the predominant use of Italianate style, in fashion from the late 1880s to early 1890s, and denoted by ornate brick corbelling and arched windows. Additionally, all downtown buildings are two to three stories in height with similar floor plans and storefront styles, lending the streetscape an architectural unity rarely found in small cities.
Downtown Eastport is on the National Registry of Historic Places. It is truly a national treasure, and for our tiny town, a means of recapturing the health and prosperity its 19th Century buildings represent.
Shipping, Shipbuilding and Sardines By 1833, Eastport was second only to New York as a trading port, and hundreds of ships constructed locally sailed from Eastport’s harbor to Europe, Africa, Asia and South America. Shipbuilder Caleb Huston reportedly built 100 vessels between 1844 and 1875. One of his Clipper Ships, Gray Feather, epitomizes the period in an oil painting by Walter Francis.
Eastport is also where the U.S. sardine industry was born, with the first successful American cannery opening here in 1875. Shipping and shipbuilding were already languishing, but sardines filled the void. By 1882, there were 18 canneries, and downtown Eastport bustled, its buildings full of shops, its streets thronged with people for whom Eastport was the center of commerce and entertainment.
Turning Point Population peaked in 1900 at 5,311. Shipping and shipbuilding were gone. Sardine output continued to climb, rising to $4.3 million in 1904, but its decline was imminent. Through World War II, the sardine industry sustained with about five factories, then lingered with two from about 1960, and finally succumbed when the last cannery closed in the 1980s.
What’s left are remnants of wharf pilings that once supported shoreline canneries and fading memories of how distinctive sardine-factory whistles called people to work – two blasts for processors, three for flakers and four for packers. All else is gone, except the “Woody” that once transported cannery workers to and from their jobs, and today provides island tours aboard a real piece of local history.