Meeting the Boat: Steam Travel Along Maine Waters

For over a century, steamboats transformed life along Maine coastal and inland waters, enabling commerce, travel, and recreation to flourish in radically new ways. Whether returning world-weary mariners to their Maine hometowns, carrying the mail to hitherto remote peninsulas and islands, ferrying lumberjacks north to the spring log-drive, or running excursions from resort hotels, the steamers connected Maine to the world and established social and economic patterns that still echo today.

Drawing on Maine Maritime Museum’s extensive steamboat-related collections, MEETING the BOAT will harken back to the technology, life-style, and bravado of a time when Maine ran on steam.