University of Maine Foundation

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Page Farm and Home Museum

A decade ago, a celebration began at the Page Farm and Home Museum at the University of Maine to pay tribute to the state's agricultural heritage.

That celebration is still going on at the museum, which, thanks in part to a naming gift from Henry H. Page, is now home to an important Maine collection of farm tools and technologies of rural culture.

The more than 6,700 artifacts in the collection relating to the farms and farming communities of 1865–1940 range from antique kitchen utensils to a fully restored 1920 Model T Ford. Permanent exhibits highlight aspects of agricultural heritage, including animal husbandry, spinning, crops, food processing and ice harvesting.

Last year, approximately 7,000 visitors — half of whom were schoolchildren — toured the museum, curated by Patricia Henner.

The main building is a restored post-and-beam barn, built in 1863 before UMaine was founded. Thanks to a successful $1 million fund-raising campaign, an endowment fund at the University of Maine Foundation provides a base budget for the museum's operation.

With assistance from benefactors, the Winston E. Pullen Carriage House was constructed last year next to the barn. Also sited near the barn as part of the museum are a blacksmith shop, a heritage garden and the Harold & Marion Chute Schoolhouse, a restored, one-room schoolhouse from Holden, Maine.

Such resources for education and research provide much more than a window to the past. By exploring conditions and philosophies in history, the museum offers suggestions for the future.