This event is hosted by the Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education.

All are invited to join the University of Southern Maine’s Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education for the opening reception of our latest exhibition, Industry, Wealth, and Labor: Mapping New England’s Textile Industry, on Thursday, November 17, from 4:00 PM - 7:30 PM, with a panel discussion from 5:30 PM - 6:30 PM. This event is free and open to the public, and refreshments will be provided.

Inspired by the map library’s recent acquisition of a collection of textile mill insurance plans and historic maps from the American Textile History Museum, this exhibition addresses the temporal, geographic, and demographic components of New England’s cotton textile industry from the early 19th century until the middle of the 20th century. While textile mills were common throughout New England, this display focuses on Lowell and Lawrence, Massachusetts, where the large integrated textile industry originated, as well as the local Maine towns of Biddeford, Saco, and Lewiston as representatives of the industry as it matured and spread throughout the region. The exhibition features a sampling of these industrial plans, which are an under appreciated type of fire insurance plan, but it also includes more common contemporary maps, such as bird’s eye views, detailed city plans, urban real estate and fire insurance plans, and thematic maps, providing a broader context for understanding the development of this foundational industry which was integral to the region’s urbanization, industrialization, population growth and diversification, and labor unionization.

For more information and to RSVP to this free event, click here.