Selected articles from The Courier,
a publication of the Bethel Historical Society

The Bethel Historical Society began issuing a newsletter in 1976.  Originally called The Bethel Courier, in honor of the town's first newspaper, the name was shortened in 1999 to "The Courier," to better reflect the Society's long-standing interest in the history of western Maine and the White Mountain region of Maine and New Hampshire.  In response to a desire to transform The Courier into a journal of local and regional history, The Broad Street Herald was inaugurated as the Society's newsletter in the summer of 2008.  Beginning with Vol. 33 (2009), The Courier will be sent to Society members and selected libraries only.

Members of the Bethel Historical Society receive The Courier, a journal of local and regional history.
For more information, please visit our Membership page.


Bethel and Its Past

Memories of Broad Street
1796: A Special Year in Bethel's Past
Life on the Home Front: Bethel During the Civil War
Maine Music Festival Note
Bethel Doctors, 1900-1950
Barn Redux: Bethel's Most Modern Barn in 1950
The Bethel Agricultural Fair and Riverside Park
Bethel's Hall House: The "Artistic Bungalow"
Bethel's First Meetinghouse Re-discovered
Bethel's Civil War Soldier's Monument Dedicated 100 Years Ago

Historical Society History
Society Marks First Decade
Twenty-five Years of the Courier: A Personal Memoir


Native Americans
Well-Known Indians of the Bethel Area
Indians of the Androscoggin Valley
Metallak


Western Maine and the White Mountain Region
The Irish Neighborhood
Gilead Memories
Mountain Days
Grafton, Maine: A Historical Sketch
Lost in the Woods of Shadagee
Harriet Beecher Stowe Finds "Intellectual Activity" in Western Maine
Western Maine Saints (Mormons)


Personalities
Bethel's Robert A. Chapman and Frances C. Chapman

Guy Coffin and His Family
Enoch Foster, Jr.: Third Owner of the O'Neil Robinson House
Atherton Bernard Furlong: Artist, Singer, Poet
Lafayette Grover: Would-Be President Maker
General Oliver Otis Howard Speaks at Bethel
William B. Lapham: Local Historian and Genealogist
Lucy Larcom's Bethel
Edward Sylvester Morse: Dr. True's Star Pupil
The Diary of Edgar Harvey Powers
O'Neil Watson Robinson: First Owner of the Robinson House
Ernest M. Skinner
Dr. Nathaniel T. True
In His Home: Memories of Dr. N. T. True
Dr. True as Historian
Addison Emery Verrill

Transportation
Bethel's Elusive Androscoggin Steamboat
Crossing by Ferry on the Androscoggin
The Railroad Comes to Bethel
Bowler versus Chisholm, and the Ill-fated Bethel-Rumford Electric Railway


Online exhibits:
Bethel: A Historic Town
Molly Ockett and Her World
A River's Journey: The Story of the Androscoggin



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