American Revolution, ‘Loyalism’ Series Planned
Contact: Liam Riordan, 581-1913; Betsy Arntzen, 581-4225
ORONO — The University of Maine’s Department of History and Canadian-American Center are presenting a series of public lectures and teacher workshops on the American Revolution, in Bangor, Belfast and Portland, to draw attention to and provide Maine teachers with educational material about the American Revolution, loyalism and Maine.
In a program created by Liam Riordan, associate professor of history, the lectures and teacher workshops will precede a special four-day conference in June with a broader focus, “Loyalism and the Revolutionary Atlantic World. The conference June 4-7, is co-sponsored by the UMaine Canadian-American Center, the Maine Humanities Council, the UMaine College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the University of New Brunswick, the Castine Historical Society and the Maine Historical Society.
Lectures, “Loyalism and the Revolution in Maine,” are being presented on three Friday evenings on Feb. 5 and March 12 at 6 p.m. and April 9 at 7 p.m. at no cost to the public, at the Bangor Public Library lecture hall, the UMaine Hutchinson Center in Belfast and the Maine Historical Society in Portland, respectively.
Daylong workshops for registered K-12 teachers are offered on three Fridays, 9 a.m.-2:30 p.m., on Feb. 6, March 13 and April 10, in the same locations as above, except for the Bangor workshop, which will be held in the library board room. Workshop titles also are “Loyalism and the Revolution in Maine.”
“This series combines a free lecture open to the general public and a daylong workshop,” says Riordan, who will lead the workshops and deliver the lectures. “Special attention will be paid to the role of Loyalists who opposed the Patriot movement.”
The public lectures will be illustrated and will reconsider three famed Revolutionary events in Maine: the naval engagement with the British war vessel, the Margaretta, off Machias, the burning of Falmouth, and the creation of a British military base and Loyalist refugee center in Castine on Penobscot Bay, according to Riordan. “The significance of maritime connections and the ambiguities of local allegiance should play a central role in our understanding of these major events of the American Revolution in Maine,” he says.
The daylong teacher workshops will be organized around four activities designed to develop specific classroom applications. They include discussion of the Thursday night lecture; use of a detailed memoir by a Revolutionary soldier; and use of selected portions of the HBO-series on John Adams.
For more information about the workshops, contact Liam Riordan at 581-1913, or Betsy Arntzen at the Canadian-American Center at 581-4225.
Workshop participants must register in advance and are expected to attend the Thursday night lectures. A registration fee of $75 will defray the cost of pre-circulated reading material, a coffee break and lunch. To register for a teacher workshop, please visit the www.umaine.edu/teachingcanada/professional-development/.
Continuing education credit is available for participants.
The June conference, being held at UMaine in Orono and in Castine, will feature three main speakers: Robert Calhoon of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Philip Gould of Brown University and Maya Jasanoff of Harvard University.
The conference brings together specialists “who employ trans-national perspectives to better understand opposition to the American Revolution and its broader significance throughout the Atlantic world,” according to Riordan. Scholarly papers to be presented will stem from a range of disciplines, exploring loyalism beyond a U.S. national framework and will include faculty and graduate students from British, Canadian and American universities.
The general public is invited to attend the conference, which will include a nominal fee to cover meal and coffee break expenses, in addition to the option of staying in a UMaine residence hall. Most of the conference will be held on the UMaine Orono campus and will include an afternoon in Castine, formerly a prominent British military site and loyalist refuge on Penobscot Bay.
In conjunction with the conference, the UMaine History Department will offer a graduate-level course on loyalism. Riordan can be contacted for additional course details.