Remarks of the President of the Maine Historical Society at the Annual Meeting held in 1972

Maine Historical Society

English

University of Maine

Maine History Volume 12 Number 1 Article 2 7-1-1972 Remarks of the President: Annual Meeting June 24, 1972 Maine Historical Society Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/mainehistoryjournal  Part of the United States History Commons Recommended Citation Maine Historical Society, . "Remarks of the President: Annual Meeting June 24, 1972." Maine History 12, 1 (1974): 1-2. https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/mainehistoryjournal/vol12/iss1/2 This Reports, News, Announcements is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@UMaine. It has been accepted for inclusion in Maine History by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@UMaine. For more information, please contact um.library.technical.services@maine.edu. MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY NEWSLETTERSpecial Edition_______________________________Summer, 1972Remarks of the President Annua I Mee ting June 24^ 1972Members and Guests:This is our 150th Annual Meeting. It is also the 50th year since we last held our annual meeting in Brunswick. For many years prior to 1922, our annual meeting was part of the Commencement calendar of Bow- doin College. We are indeed grateful to our co-hosts: the Pejepscot Historical Society and Bowdoin College.On this important occasion we are focussing on an equally important problem in Maine history. The prob­lem is that the standard state, county and town his­tories have given scant attention to many groups of non-English heritage Maine people. If we are to know the history of Maine we must know much more about the history of those people left out of the books. For the history of Maine includes all its people, those of English, French, Italian, Swedish, Polish, Slavic and Russion heritage, of whites and of blacks, of Protes­tant, Jewish, Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic people.Perhaps the Civil Rights Act of 1957 serves as a bench mark to the awakening throughout the nation that a diversity of cultures has long existed and that all the cultures which have come to America did not melt in a pre-selected English pot. And this Act of 1957 sharply brought home the fact that these diverse cultures have equal status with English culture. Now, fifteen years later there is a growing inquiry in Maine about the historically neglected people.At the Maine Historical Society we are strongly encouraging this interest. We endeavor to make perti­nent material known. We hope to stimulate study of available material that from the study more shall be written.The interest of Maine’s Franco-Americans in their history and genealogy is evident. Because of this and because we can, today, focus on only one non-English Maine culture we have asked the man to speak here who can shed light on the place they, the Franco-Americans, hold in Maine history. We are indeed fortunate that our speaker is Dr. Gerard J. Brault.2

Remarks of the President: Annual Meeting June 24, 1972

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Remarks of the President: Annual Meeting June 24, 1972

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