Buxton-Hollis Historical Society

Preserving our towns’ history since 1970 for generations to come.

We will be open for public hours Thursdays from 4-8 PM at 100 Main Street. Buxton, April to October. See you there! We are also open by special appointment. For all inquiries, leave a message at 929-1684 or our email at bhhs@buxtonhollishistorical.org.

Our Next Program

May 19, 2026, 7 PM at 100 Main St, Bar Mills– “Shoulder to Shoulder: Uncovering Free and Enslaved Blacks from Maine Who Served in the American Revolution.“

As we commemorate 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, we are exploring the roles people of color played in the American Revolution. Both free and enslaved blacks, as well as indigenous people, served on both sides of the conflict. Many were from Maine.

Join us as Vana Carmona and Kathy Ostrander Roberts share with us the fascinating results of their years of research.

• Vana Carmona is the founder of The Prince Project, a database of more than 2,000 people of color who lived in Maine before 1800. She is descended from several early European settlers, with the first arriving in New England in 1620 and moving into Maine in 1633. Many, she discovered, were enslavers and complicit in the slave trade.

• Kathy Ostrander Roberts is the appointed Town Historian of Kennebunk, Maine, and the author of three books on local history, including the recently published Unmarked Graves and Forgotten Lives, The Enslaved Persons of Color in Kennebunk, Kennebunkport, Arundel, and Wells, Maine. She also led the discovery and documentation of the site known as the “Freed Slave Community” of Kennebunk, aka “The Ridge.” The site has been the subject of six archaeological surveys and has yielded hundreds of artifacts relating to the former residents of The Ridge.