1909 Rummell View of the University of Maine, Orono Campus

A rare 1909 Richard Rummell sepia-toned bird's-eye view of the University of Maine, founded in 1865. This is one of the rarest Rummell views, here in its original sepia 'Littig' photogravure edition.

A Closer Look

The view is a sepia-toned photogravure. It looks north on the campus, which is bucolically in Orono, Maine, just north of Bangor, on a bend of the Stillwater River. The grandiose neoclassical Carnegie Library, built in 1906 shortly before this view was drawn, dominates the center field - with its gracious lawns. Behind is Winslow Hall, with its distinctive curved gable, completed in 1909 when this view was drawn, as the 'Hall of Agriculture'. To the left of Winslow Hall, beyond the Observatory and the Victorian President's House, we recognize the large curved foyer of Coburn Hall, built in 1887-88 for the departments of Agriculture and Natural History.

Morrill Land-Grant College Act

The University of Maine is one of the land grant institutions that emerged from the Morrill Land-Grant College Act, approved in 1862 by President Lincoln. The act called for the sale of federal land to states to finance new schools of agriculture and mechanic arts, called 'A and M' colleges. The University of Maine matriculated its first class of twelve students in 1868. When opened it was called The State College of Agriculture and the Mechanical Arts, but the name changed to University of Maine in 1897. Notably, from 1872 the University became one of the first in the United States to admit women to all areas of the curriculum.

Rummell University Views

Rummell was an American landscape artist known for his drawings of American universities. At the turn of the century, Littig and Company commissioned Rummell to prepare watercolors of some of the nation's most prestigious colleges. From these watercolors, copperplates were engraved, and a limited number of engravings were issued. Most of Rummell's university views are strikingly similar in style, revealing the entire campus in panoramic splendor. The views are uniformly issued from an altitude of about 300 feet, suggesting the Rummell most likely worked from a balloon.

Publication History and Census

This is one of the rarest Rummell views. We note only one other example, held at the University of Maine. The view was however reproduced in the 1960s, and examples of that issue, with hand color, do occasionally appear on the market.