High Water

The early Maine Chinese population came exclusively from the Southeast provinces of China.  Their numbers in Maine peaked in 1920 at about 160 people.  Technological and social changes led to the decline of Chinese hand laundries resulting in many Chinese leaving Maine for larger cities.  Immigration laws changed in the 1960s and the number of Chinese coming to Maine grew quickly. Maine’s current Chinese community is significantly different from the early community featured in the Maine Memory Minute on Maine Experience.  The later arrivals are more urban and well-educated and originate from all over China.

In 1893, F.C. Whitehouse of Topsham, who owned paper mills in Topsham and Lisbon Falls, began construction of a third mill on the eastern banks of the Androscoggin River five miles north of Topsham.  But first Whitehouse had to dam Simpson's Rips in the area known as Pejepscot.  The mill was completed in 1896, when Whitehouse gave the new mill, along with existing ones in Lisbon and farther south on the Androscoggin in Topsham, the name Pejepscot Paper Co.  The new mill at Pejepscot employed some 180 men in 1898.  It was powered by the 8,500 horsepower hydro dam and a 700-horsepower steam engine.

The rocky coastline of Cape Elizabeth has sent many a vessel to a watery grave.  Historically, the shores of Cape Elizabeth were a dangerous place where ships could be wrecked with even the most experienced sailors at the helm.  The pounding waves and gusty winds of a gale could disorient a captain and crew, pummel a ship, or force it into the rocks.  Lighthouses and buoys warned of the rocky ledges that stuck haphazardly into the ocean and the reefs that lay just beneath the surface of the water but avoiding these hazards was difficult.  When combined with bad weather, the area was treacherous.  An estimated one hundred ships have gone down off the coast of Cape Elizabeth.