Role of maritime history topic of Maine Heritage Lecture

The important role of 19th-century maritime history in shaping Maine will be the focus of the Maine Heritage Lecture Oct. 24 at the University of Maine.

Stephen Hornsby, director of the Canadian-American Center and professor of anthropology and Canadian studies, will speak on “Industry’s Ocean: What Built Antebellum Maine.” The free public lecture, sponsored by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, begins with a reception at 4:30 p.m. in the McIntire Room, Buchanan Alumni House. For more information or to request a disability accommodation, contact Tonya Corriveau, 581.1954.

Inspired by several plates in the “Historical Atlas of Maine” and drawing on more recent research, this presentation will discuss national narratives, maritime history, and the development of coastal Maine between 1815 and the outbreak of the Civil War.

Hornsby is the author and co-editor of several prize-winning books, including “Surveyors of Empire: Samuel Holland, J.F.W. Des Barres, and the Making of the Atlantic Neptune,” as well as the “Historical Atlas of Maine,” which he co-edited with professor Richard Judd. Hornsby’s latest book, “Picturing America: The Golden Age of Pictorial Maps,” will be published by the University of Chicago Press with the Library of Congress in spring 2017.