19th Century Curran Village, Orrington & Holden, Maine

As you might know, the Village received a $45,000 Federal grant to build its’ 24″ x 72″ Community Center. This grant can only pay for materials, not labor. Additionally, a Davis Family Foundation Grant paid for the steel-reinforced building pad and an initial delivery of rough cut hemlock timbers that was subsequently used to create 24 x 32, or 4 bents, of the mortise and tenon timber frame structure. A workshop in timber frame construction began the process with six tuition paying students in May of 2022. Nate Coe continued the construction as a paid worker, and more recently under the guidance of Ed Somers of Bridgton and with the help of Nate and a group of volunteers the 32′ of the structure was assembled. Thank you also to Richard Pearson of Albion, ME who lent us his boom truck to assist in its’ assembly. We are now sheathing the roof to receive metal roofing. We will continue to work at closing up the framework with board and battens weather permitting. This is a perfect opportunity to learn building skills, especially those applicable to the more specialized style of timber framing. Contact us. We need volunteers to continue this construction. 207-205-4849.

Unfortunately, the orchard where we have been getting large quantities of delicious apples each year had no apples this season. The consensus was to cancel our annual Harvest Festival we couldn’t find a large quantity of free apples. A local resident whose family has long maintained an orchard nearby offered up approximately 8 bushels of Northern Spy, Rhode Island Greens and Cortland apples, so we organized a pressing for our volunteers. A first was using a hit and miss gas engine with a flat belt to run the Hocking Valley Mill that has long served the museum. It worked perfectly, as the Mill was always fitted with a flat belt pulley that was ignored in lieu of hand cranking. We discovered that powder post beetle holes in the legs of the portable legs had been long been active when two of the four legs completely fell apart at their ends. See the Yankee ingenuity that went into a temporary fix to use the mill. We will need to replace all the legs before next apple season, and we can always use help with that if you think you have the skills to contribute to that (207-205-4849). Photos of Cider Making October 25, 2024:

Weather Dependent ( check here for update )

Also, during Old Home Week, there will be silent movies shown on Sunday, July 14 and Sunday, July 21, 12-4PM.

Silent Movies— We will be showing silent movies from the 1910s and 1920s at the Cider Mill on Sunday, July 7 from 12Noon to 4PM. The admissions for this viewing will be free. Homemade popcorn will be available at a price of $3.00 a bag.

Movies to be shown, include:

Cecil B. Demille’s Male and Female (1919), Starring Gloria Swanson, Thomas Meighan, Lila Lee, Raymond Hatton, & Bebe Daniels (116 minutes)

United Artists’ The General (1927), Starring Buster Keaton (78 minutes)

a Charlie Chaplin short

Scott Pembroke and Joe Rock’s West of Hot Dog (1924), Starring Stan Laurel, Julie Leonard & Lew Meehan (30 minutes)

In conjunction with the new Orrington Farmers’ Market located at the Museum each Sunday, 2-6PM, some of the museum will be open (Free Admission). This will include the Letterpress Office and the Blacksmith Shop. Demonstrations will be ongoing at both. Learn about future letterpress printing workshops and blacksmithing workshops ( there is a Weekend Knifemaking Workshop coming up; see the “adult workshops” webpage on this website or consult our Facebook page “Events”. Carousel rides ($5) will be given at 2:30, 3:30, and 4:30.

There will be Museum activity in conjunction with the Orrington Farmers’ Market (2-6PM). The Letterpress Office and weather permitting some wood splitting with our recently donated Clark Foundry, Maine made splitter powered with a Fairbanks Morse “one lunger” engine. The Carousel will run at 2:30, 3:30, & 4:30.
Ticket cost ( Purchase at the Carousel Building ) is $5.

On Sunday, May 19, 2024, the Museum is offering a Coal Fired Forging: Blacksmithing Workshop with Instructor Dwight King, This will be from 2-5pm. The cost is $65. Bring a 2.5-3lb. hammer, safety eyewear, wear natural fiber clothes and footwear, gloves (optional), and earplugs (optional). Pay to register by calling: 207-205-4849. You should call by Wednesday.

The independent Orrington Farmers’ Market will be Sunday, May 19; it will consistently be every Sunday 2-6PM until the second week of October. The Market is evolving and new vendors will be added each week.

The Museum will offer Carousel Rides at 3, 4, and 5 for a ticket price of $5. The Museum will have one or more buildings open to the public depending on available volunteers. Donations welcome. We are a 501(c)3 nonprofit entirely dependent on private donations and contributions, We are currently an all volunteer organization.

Recently, we started offering a $65 Beginning Blacksmithing Class on Friday Nights, but we plan to start offering this same 3-Hour Class on Sundays during the Orrington Farmers’ Market ( an independent entity).

This Sunday, May 12, 2-6PM the Museum will have several of its building open and hopefully active with volunteers sharing the past. The Letterpress Office will be open, and you might participate in operating a proof press. The Carousel will be operating (2:30, 3, 3:30, 4, 4:30 & 5) and we will be charging a $5 fee for a ride, although the other Museum activities will be free to the public. One great pastime for the kids might be our huge Victorian dollhouse in the Country Store; we have seen many kids get lost in play with this new offering.

Saturday, April 20, 10AM-3PM, Earth Day Event. Lots of food choices, including Vegetarian baked beans, Pork & Beans, Chili, Hot Dogs, with Coney Island Sauce, if you like, Kraut Kuchen ( Volga German bacon & cabbage pastry), Strudels, Ice Cream with our own maple syrup, Newly donated wood splitters, Live steam wooden burning traction engine, hit and miss gas engines (a 1919 Fairbank-Morse 5 HP), A Cord Saw with a circa 1905 Economy gas engine performs, Blacksmithing ongoing ( we have frequent classes and this demo is with former students ), our 1917 Ford Model T Depot Hack will be running, a team of Belgian draft horses will be giving wagon rides, try one of our proof presses at the Whig & Courier Letterpress Office ( Meet Jeff Buxton whose family ran the Bucksport [Maine] Free Press for several generations; we were given both type, cuts, etc., and a Chandler & Price Letterpress from the establishment), Crank a vintage Ice Cream Maker, Learn to graft apple tree scions with Nate Coe ( last year we grafted 60 apple trees with heritage varieties [ Oxford Black, Gray Pearlmain, Gravenstein, Spitzenburg, and more,..). We have 95 trees started for Curran’s own orchard to complement its’ 1870s cider mill. Fencing is key to survival (Please volunteer to help build more deer-proof fencing for the apple orchard). There will be wax paper stained glass-esque book marker and window hangers making going on with dried flowers from the Curran Farm, a scavenger hunt for kids, There’s a lot more going on… Admission is an all-included price; $12 Adults, Ages 12-18: $6, and 11 and Under: Free.

If you haven’t been in the blacksmithing shop at 19th Century Curran Village you might be surprised to see this newly installed coal forge seen here. This forge came up from the former Willowbrook Museum (in Newfield, ME) in recent years and has been sitting unused in the relocated Tom Flagg Smithy, the small 1935 smithy that Tom Flagg built when he was 17 years old on the Davenport Farm (later the Flagg Farm) in Lincolnville Beach, ME. Tom also built this forge from scratch cutting out plates of heavy steel with an acetylene torch and then welding them together. The hand crank bellows was purchased used by Tom and always leaked oil like a sieve according to Jane Flagg, one of Tom’s three daughters who donated the smithy and its contents to Willowbrook ( it was initially offered to Curran but we had already built the new blacksmith shop in 2009). According to Jane one of her childhood chores was to put the oil to that bellows when her father was forging otherwise it would become a real chore to crank. We will be setting up as large Buffalo Forge in the Flagg Smithy that belonged to the late Larry Cook of Meriden, CT, who was a armorer producing Civil War replica swords, rifles and cannons. Cook’s Machine Shop forms the core of equipment in our Machine Shop that awaits volunteer help to get into working order to use it. How about volunteer some time to this project?

We have two blacksmithing classes scheduled.

Friday Night, April 12, 2024, 6-9PM, Coal Fired Forging (Blacksmithing) Learn the foundational skills of coal fired forging including making a coal fire, safety, and hammering techniques. You will complete several projects including J and S hooks. If you decide to the following Saturday and Sunday knife making class we will deduct $15 from the fee for this class ( the Two Day Weekend Knifemaking Workshop is $325). The cost of this 3 hour class is $65. Ages 15 and older. To register, call: 207-205-4849.

Saturday & Sunday, April 13 & 14, 2024, 9AM-4PM, Two Day Weekend Knifemaking Workshop ( Blacksmithing). This a start to finish knife making class. You will begin with a billet of 1095 steel and shape a blade and handle tang through the use of a propane burning forge. You will further shape and refine your blade sanding it to perfection. You will reheat your blade and quench it in peanut oil as the first part of the tempering process. The blade will be heated again in an oven tom complete the temper. Day 2 will include work on completing a handle comprised on brass rivets, hardwood scales and fast drying epoxy. You can put a finish on your knife. You need to bring a bag lunch. You need natural fiber clothing and footwear, safety glasses with side shields, gloves and earplugs (optional), and a 2.5 lb. or 3 lb. pein or drilling style hammer. Cost: $325 Call to register: (207) 205-4849.

was the greatest attendance in a single day event in the history of the museum. More than 450 visitors experienced our sugaring off activities in the old Sugar Shack. There was lots of food choices in the Curran farmhouse including homemade waffles with our own maple syrup drizzled over them. At the Country Store visitors participated in ice cream making; the product was also served maple syrup. We had a coal fired blacksmithing workshop underway in the Smithy with Dwight King, our resident blacksmith. There was a demonstration of old machinery including a 1906 Economy gas engine running a cord saw mounted to a steel wheel carriage. Our newest acquisition is a pair of Clark Foundry of Rumford, Maine wood splitters dating from the 1920s. One of these was demonstrated much of the day with a 1919 Fairbanks Morse gas engine. At the Letterpress Office, we had guest printer Mark Matteau of the Dunstan Press in Scarborough, ME operate a proof press sharing a prints from a newly donated collection of illustration cuts from the former Bucksport Printing Shop & Free Press owned by the Buxton family for several generations. Jeff Buxton was on hand to share stories about growing up in his family’s letterpress office in the 1970s. Jeff has donated a press, type and other equipment from the former business. Pattie Jones and son Simon shared information about our developing pottery program. Last year the museum was gifted a wood burning kiln from the former Antiquity Tile Works in Hampden, ME. The gift from the new owners of the property included the kiln comprised of nearly 10,000 bricks as well as clay and a lifetime of glazes. We are still in process of moving the mortar-less brick kiln to the museum and need additional volunteer assistance. We plan on a volunteer work day this Saturday, March 23, 10AM. If you are interested in helping, give us a call. We should complete the relocation by the Spring. We have a building that will house potters’ wheels and drying shelves. Our Utility Shed includes an electric kiln.

The museum underwent a major infrastructure development project from 2020-2023 with the addition of 15 new structures. In 2023 we opened our doors to large public school field trips at the Orrington/Holden site for the first time unveiling a program that focuses on hands-on history programming using a working collection. We were open more than 100 days in 2023. Certainly COVID has effected donations in recent years, but we are optimistic, especially after Saturday’s gathering, about the future. We plan on an Earth Day Celebration on Saturday, April 20, 10-3; details will soon be posted.