Deering Avenue Stories: Building Portland Beyond the Peninsula

This walk of about a mile explores the development of farmlands and open spaces north of the Deering homestead now occupied by University of Southern Maine. Unlike many modern housing communities, this Back Cove hinterland took more that fifty years to fill, with important changes coming into the 1960s. The area was bordered by city transit lines on Brighton and Forest avenues, and bisected by the Main Central rail line still used by Amtrak. Filling in these residential spaces occurred in fits and starts, allowing for a diversity of housing styles that contribute to the neighborhood’s lasting charm. Sites we’ll talk about include an original farm building from the 1850s on Ashmont Street, Jewish houses of worship on Noyes and Deering, the spacious Hindscroft apartment block that recently celebrated its 100th birthday, Dr. King’s training and surgical hospital between Dartmouth and William streets, and tiny Fessenden Park where some of the area’s oldest roadways now converge at a new traffic circle. Houses along the route contain fascinating stories of individuals and families whose everyday lives on these streets held dramas, tragedies, and achievements we can recognize and appreciate in our own world of virtual realities.

Participants may wish to bring water, and expect a slight uphill climb on Ashmont Street, before we head down on Prospect to rejoin Deering Avenue and finish at Fessenden Park.