Who Belongs in Maine? The MAINER Project Mural in Lewiston, Maine

Introduction

In March 2023, six large portraits appeared on the exterior of the former Camden Yarns Mill at 1 Beech Street in Lewiston, Maine. Created by the street artist Pigeon, also known as Orson Horchler, the portraits formed part of the MAINER Project, an ongoing public-art series examining immigration, identity, discrimination, and the meaning of belonging in Maine. Developed in collaboration with the Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor (Maine MILL), the Lewiston installation brought the project's central question into a city whose history has been profoundly shaped by industrial labor and successive generations of migration: Who gets to call themselves a Mainer?¹

The mural's six subjects—Araksan, Djamal, Abijah, Lawton, Assasi, and Ruby—represent different personal histories, cultural backgrounds, and relationships with the state. Some were born in Maine, while others arrived after living in other parts of the United States or abroad. Their experiences demonstrate that belonging is not necessarily determined by birthplace, ancestry, or length of residence. Instead, it develops through work, family, cultural expression, community participation, and the complicated experience of being accepted—or rejected—by others.²

The mural also connects contemporary questions of identity with Lewiston's industrial past. Positioned on a historic mill building near the Androscoggin River and the city's former power canals, the portraits occupy a landscape shaped by manufacturing, migration, and working-class life. Their presence gives new meaning to a building associated with industrial production, transforming its exterior into a public statement about the people who make a community and the histories that deserve recognition.

The Origins of the MAINER Project

The MAINER Project began in Portland in 2015. Pigeon developed the series to explore the assumptions surrounding the word Mainer and to examine how people come to be regarded as legitimate members of a community. The project portrays actual residents of Maine, including immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers, and people born in the state. A defining feature of the series is that its subjects have experienced being explicitly told that they do not belong in Maine.³

Rather than presenting immigration as an abstract political issue, Pigeon places individual people at the center of the discussion. Large portraits make the subjects visible in shared public spaces, while their accompanying stories invite viewers to consider experiences that might otherwise remain unfamiliar or overlooked. The portraits therefore function as more than decorative public art. They challenge viewers to examine the relationship between appearance, identity, social acceptance, and the power to decide who belongs.

The project also encourages conversation. Its purpose extends beyond the creation of images to include sustained engagement with communities and the social questions raised by the portraits. Maine MILL's announcement of the Lewiston installation emphasized this conversational dimension, inviting residents to view the artwork and participate in a community discussion with the artist.⁴

The project consequently combines portraiture, biography, and public dialogue. Each face represents a particular life, but together the portraits raise a broader question about the social boundaries through which communities define themselves. The title MAINER becomes both an identity and a question: Is being a Mainer a matter of origin, or can it also be defined by the life a person builds in Maine?

The Artist: Pigeon (Orson Horchler)

Pigeon, whose given name is Orson Horchler, is a Maine-based street artist whose work addresses social identity, immigration, and belonging. His artistic practice uses public-facing portraits to bring individual lives into spaces where people encounter them outside the conventional settings of museums and galleries. By placing portraits on buildings and other visible surfaces, he invites a broad audience to confront the faces and experiences of people who may be marginalized or misunderstood.⁵

The MAINER Project emerged from an interest in the social meanings attached to the idea of a “real Mainer.” The question is significant because regional identities can function as expressions of shared history and community pride, but they can also become boundaries used to exclude people considered different. Pigeon's work investigates that tension without reducing the subjects to a single immigration narrative.

His approach also has a historical dimension. In 2016, the Maine Historical Society presented an exhibition titled Pigeon's Mainer Project: Street Art Meets History. The exhibition combined Horchler's original artwork with historical photographs, manuscripts, newspapers, and contemporary news material from the society's collections. Its purpose was to place current debates about immigration and social justice in conversation with Maine's past.⁶

This connection between art and history is particularly important in Lewiston. The city has experienced substantial demographic change over time, and each generation has encountered its own questions about labor, ethnicity, cultural difference, and acceptance. Pigeon's portraits bring these issues into the present by focusing on people whose lives reflect different paths to belonging.

The Lewiston installation was the artist's first MAINER Project commission in the Lewiston–Auburn area. Commissioned in collaboration with Maine MILL, it extended the series into a city whose industrial history makes questions of migration and community identity especially relevant.⁷

Lewiston's Industrial Landscape and the Meaning of Place

The mural stands on the former Camden Yarns Mill building at 1 Beech Street, close to the Androscoggin River and the historic canal system that helped transform Lewiston into a major textile-manufacturing center. Its setting connects the contemporary artwork with a landscape shaped by waterpower, factories, workers' housing, and successive waves of migration.

Lewiston's industrial development accelerated during the nineteenth century as entrepreneurs and investors developed dams, canals, and mills along the river. Textile manufacturing attracted workers from surrounding rural communities as well as immigrants from abroad. Irish laborers participated in the construction of the canal system, while French Canadians arrived in large numbers during the later nineteenth century to work in the mills. Many settled near the factories in the neighborhood commonly known as Little Canada.⁸

These developments reshaped the city's population and physical environment. Mills required workers, and workers required housing, shops, churches, schools, and community institutions. Industrial growth therefore influenced not only employment but also the formation of neighborhoods and cultural identities.

The Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District, recognized for its historical significance, encompasses industrial buildings and infrastructure associated with the city's development between 1850 and 1950. The district's significance includes industrial production, engineering, community planning, and ethnic and social history. Its buildings preserve evidence of the economic forces and human migrations that helped shape Lewiston.⁹

The former Camden Yarns Mill provides a particularly meaningful setting for the MAINER Project because the building belongs to this larger industrial landscape. The mill's earlier function involved the production of goods; its exterior now carries portraits that direct attention toward people and their experiences. The change in use does not erase the building's industrial history. Instead, the mural invites a broader understanding of that history by emphasizing the people who inhabit and sustain Maine communities.

The connection should not be understood as a claim that the six portrait subjects were themselves mill workers or descendants of a particular group of textile employees. Rather, the historical relationship lies in the larger themes shared by the building and the artwork: migration, labor, community formation, cultural difference, and the continuing negotiation of belonging.

The Six People Portrayed

The six Lewiston–Auburn portraits are central to the mural's meaning. Each person brings a distinct biography to the project, demonstrating that the question of who belongs in Maine cannot be answered through a single story. The biographies below draw on Maine MILL's announcement of the installation, published when the portraits were unveiled in 2023.¹⁰

Araksan: Community Service and Belonging

Araksan is an educator and community health worker who had been active in Lewiston since arriving in 2016. Her work involves supporting people across differences of age, color, and gender. Through education and community health, she participates in the everyday activities that help a city function and its residents care for one another.

Her biography illustrates an important dimension of belonging: participation. A person becomes part of a community not only through family origins or birthplace but also through relationships, service, and sustained engagement with neighbors. Araksan's work places her within the social life of Lewiston, where she contributes to the well-being of people across the community.

Maine MILL's biography notes that Araksan is proud to call herself a Mainer.¹¹ That declaration directly addresses the question underlying the mural. Her identity is not presented as something she must prove through ancestry or a particular place of birth. Instead, her sense of belonging is expressed through her own identification with Maine and her involvement in the lives of its residents.

Djamal: Education, Entrepreneurship, and Cultural Identity

Originally from Chad, Djamal moved to Auburn in 2014. At the time of the mural's unveiling, he was studying Building Construction Technology at Central Maine Community College while developing two businesses: Jamal's Art Boutique and Chateau des Parfums, a cologne business. He speaks Arabic, French, and English.¹²

Djamal's biography brings together migration, education, multilingualism, artistic expression, and entrepreneurship. His life in Maine includes both formal study and efforts to establish independent businesses. These activities demonstrate how newcomers contribute to a community through skills, creativity, commerce, and personal ambition.

His use of three languages also reflects the cultural knowledge that people carry across borders. Multilingualism is not simply a marker of difference; it can be a practical resource and an expression of a person's history. Djamal's experience challenges any narrow definition of a Mainer that assumes a single cultural or linguistic background.

His story also connects contemporary migration with Lewiston's longer history as a place where people have moved in search of opportunities. The circumstances of migration have changed, but the relationship between movement, work, education, and community-building remains significant.

Abijah: Movement, Change, and Community Commitment

Abijah was born in Orlando, Florida, and spent part of her youth moving between places. At thirteen, she and her family left California to travel across the country in a recreational vehicle. She arrived in Lewiston at the beginning of 2022. In the biography published by Maine MILL, she expressed a desire to become a source of change and support for Lewiston and communities beyond it.¹³

Abijah's story complicates the assumption that a person's identity can be defined by a single place of origin. Her childhood involved travel and movement, and her arrival in Lewiston represented another stage in a life shaped by geographic change. Although born in Florida, she came to Maine with aspirations connected to the future of her new community.

Her biography emphasizes intention as well as location. She hopes to contribute to positive change rather than simply reside in a particular place. This aspiration echoes the mural's broader argument that belonging is connected to the relationships people form and the contributions they make.

Abijah's experience also demonstrates that migration is not exclusively an international phenomenon. Movement within the United States can shape identity and a person's relationship to place just as profoundly as movement across national borders. Her portrait therefore expands the meaning of the project beyond a simple distinction between immigrants and native-born residents.

Lawton: Indigenous Identity and the Complexity of Being Native

Lawton is a musician, painter, occasional lobsterman, and caregiver to his sister and nephew. He is Mohawk and was born in Maine. His grandfather had moved from New York. Maine MILL's biography explains that when people learn that Lawton is Indigenous and from Maine, they sometimes assume that he must be Passamaquoddy. Lawton describes himself as a “non-native Native.”¹⁴

His story introduces a different dimension to the mural's exploration of belonging. Lawton was born in Maine, yet other people's assumptions about Indigenous identity can lead them to question or misidentify his relationship to the state. His experience shows that even birthplace does not necessarily protect someone from being treated as an outsider.

The distinction between Mohawk and Passamaquoddy is important. Indigenous peoples have distinct histories, communities, and identities; they should not be treated as interchangeable simply because they share Indigenous status or connections to the region. Lawton's biography illustrates how assumptions about Indigenous identity can obscure those distinctions.

His occupations also show the many forms that community participation can take. Music, painting, seasonal work, and caregiving are different activities, but together they describe a life rooted in creative practice, labor, and family responsibility.

Lawton's portrait therefore broadens the mural's central question. Belonging is not only an issue for recent immigrants or refugees. It also concerns Indigenous people whose identities may be misunderstood through stereotypes or through outsiders' expectations about who should live in a particular place.

Assasi: Refuge, Migration, and Cultural Adaptation

Assasi is a rapper and co-founder of the Bilad El Sham movement in Syria. His wife is from Millinocket, Maine, and the two met in Lebanon, where she was teaching and he was living as a refugee. Before arriving in Maine in 2017, Assasi had also been a refugee in Nepal, India, and Malaysia. He described his arrival in Maine, after living in several other countries, as the greatest culture shock he had experienced.¹⁵

His biography illustrates the complexity of refugee experience. Forced or difficult displacement can involve multiple countries, unfamiliar languages, new social systems, and prolonged uncertainty about the future. Arrival in a new place does not necessarily end the challenges associated with displacement; it begins another stage of adjustment.

Assasi's story also complicates the idea that cultural adaptation moves in only one direction. His experiences across countries shaped his perspective before he arrived in Maine, while his relationship with a woman from Millinocket connected his life to a Maine community. His biography therefore combines international displacement with personal relationships that cross national and cultural boundaries.

Music is another important part of his identity. As a rapper and co-founder of a cultural movement, Assasi participates in artistic expression that connects him with a wider social world. His portrait encourages viewers to recognize refugees as people with creative practices, personal histories, and ambitions—not simply as recipients of assistance or subjects of public debate.

Within the MAINER Project, Assasi's experience gives particular weight to the question of belonging. Having lived in several countries as a refugee, he encountered the challenges of entering new societies repeatedly. His story asks viewers to consider what it means to build a home after displacement and how a receiving community can make that process more welcoming.

Ruby: Cultural Heritage, Food, and Dance

Ruby is from Oaxaca, Mexico. Maine MILL's biography describes her as an accomplished cook of traditional cuisine and an enthusiastic dancer.¹⁶ Although the published biography provides fewer details about her personal history than those of some of the other subjects, it identifies cultural expression as an important part of her story.

Food and dance are powerful forms of cultural continuity. Recipes can preserve family knowledge and regional traditions across generations, while dance gives physical expression to cultural memory and communal celebration. When people share these practices in a new place, they create opportunities for others to encounter and appreciate traditions that may be unfamiliar to them.

Ruby's inclusion in the mural demonstrates that the story of migration is not solely a story of hardship or exclusion. It is also a story of the cultural knowledge and creative practices that people bring with them. These practices can enrich community life and create connections among people whose backgrounds differ.

Her portrait also reminds viewers that a person's life cannot be fully summarized by the fact of migration. Ruby is represented through her skills and interests, not merely through her country of origin. The mural thus presents cultural difference as part of a broader human identity rather than as a defining boundary between insiders and outsiders.

The Mural as Public History

The MAINER Project mural can be understood as a form of public history because it brings historical questions into a space encountered in everyday life. Rather than presenting an exhibit confined to a gallery, the portraits occupy the exterior of a former industrial building. They invite residents, workers, visitors, and passersby to encounter the subjects as part of the city's visible landscape.

The mural's location also creates a dialogue between industrial heritage and contemporary community life. Lewiston's factories depended on generations of workers who came from different places and formed new communities around employment and family. The city later experienced additional waves of immigration and refugee resettlement, which contributed to its changing social and cultural character.¹⁷ The portraits do not suggest that these histories are identical. Instead, they invite comparison between different experiences of migration and the recurring questions of acceptance and exclusion that accompany them.

The work also complements Maine MILL's broader interest in preserving the history of labor and community life. The museum's oral-history collection includes accounts from people connected with many industries, nationalities, and social experiences. These accounts demonstrate the value of preserving individual voices alongside institutional records and accounts of industrial development.¹⁸

In this context, the MAINER Project makes an important interpretive contribution. Industrial history can sometimes focus primarily on buildings, machinery, companies, production, and economic change. The mural shifts attention toward individual lives and the social meanings of membership in a community. It encourages viewers to consider who is visible in public spaces, whose experiences are acknowledged, and how historical narratives can include people whose lives do not fit a single dominant story.

The portraits also create a relationship between representation and recognition. To be depicted on a prominent building is to become part of a community's public image. By placing these six people on a historic mill, the project gives their stories a visible presence in a landscape already associated with generations of work and migration.

Conclusion

The MAINER Project mural at the former Camden Yarns Mill in Lewiston is both a work of public art and an invitation to reconsider the meaning of belonging. Created by Pigeon and unveiled in March 2023, the installation brings together six individual biographies that resist a single definition of what it means to be a Mainer.

Araksan's community service, Djamal's education and entrepreneurship, Abijah's commitment to positive change, Lawton's Indigenous identity, Assasi's experience of refuge and displacement, and Ruby's cultural expression each provide a different perspective on life in Maine. Their stories are distinct, and the available biographies do not provide the same level of detail for every subject. Together, however, they show that belonging may be shaped by work, family, culture, personal history, community participation, and self-identification.

The mural's placement on a former mill building adds a historical dimension to this message. Lewiston's industrial landscape was created through the interaction of waterpower, manufacturing, labor, and migration. The city's history includes generations of people who moved to the area and established new lives, while its present continues to be shaped by residents with varied backgrounds and experiences. The mural links that longer history of movement and community formation with contemporary questions about identity and acceptance.

Ultimately, the project asks viewers to look beyond assumptions based on birthplace, ancestry, appearance, or national origin. Its six portraits make the question personal rather than abstract: each face belongs to someone with a life, a history, and a relationship to Maine. By giving those lives a prominent place in Lewiston's industrial landscape, the MAINER Project challenges viewers to consider belonging not as a privilege reserved for a narrowly defined group, but as a question that communities continually negotiate through recognition, participation, and respect.

Footnotes

The online institutional sources cited below do not have numbered pages. Their notes therefore identify the relevant webpage or article without inventing page numbers. The published article in Amjambo Africa! is cited to page 6, the page identified in the library's catalog record.

1. Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor (Maine MILL), “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” March 2023.

2. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.”

3. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home”; Maine Memory Network, “Pigeon's Mainer Project: Who Decides Who Belongs?”

4. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.”

5. Jean Noel Mugabo, “Pigeon's Mainer Project Adorns Lewiston Museum,” Amjambo Africa! 6, no. 1 (April 2023): 6.

6. Maine Historical Society, “Pigeon's Mainer Project: Street Art Meets History,” exhibition, March 4–May 1, 2016.

7. Mugabo, “Pigeon's Mainer Project Adorns Lewiston Museum,” 6; Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.”

8. City of Lewiston, “History of Lewiston,” official municipal history.

9. Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District, Lewiston, Androscoggin County, 1850–1950,” National Register of Historic Places, April 1, 2015.

10. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.”

11. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Araksan.

12. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Djamal.

13. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Abijah.

14. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Lawton.

15. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Assasi.

16. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Ruby.

17. City of Lewiston, “History of Lewiston”; Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District.”

18. Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor, “Oral Histories,” museum collection and exhibit resource.

Bibliography

City of Lewiston. “History of Lewiston.” Official municipal history. Lewiston, Maine.

Maine Historical Society. “Pigeon's Mainer Project: Street Art Meets History.” Exhibition, March 4–May 1, 2016. Portland, Maine.

Maine Memory Network. “Pigeon's Mainer Project: Who Decides Who Belongs?” Online historical exhibit.

Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor (Maine MILL). “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.” March 2023. Lewiston, Maine.

Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor (Maine MILL). “Oral Histories.” Museum collection and exhibit resource. Lewiston, Maine.

Maine Historic Preservation Commission. “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District, Lewiston, Androscoggin County, 1850–1950.” National Register of Historic Places listing. April 1, 2015.

Mugabo, Jean Noel. “Pigeon's Mainer Project Adorns Lewiston Museum.” Amjambo Africa! 6, no. 1 (April 2023): 6.

Research and citation note

This essay uses the available institutional descriptions and published reporting to construct a historical narrative. The six individual biographies are based principally on Maine MILL's original announcement of the 2023 installation. The historical context is supported by the City of Lewiston and the Maine Historic Preservation Commission, while the project's artistic and interpretive background draws on Maine Historical Society and Maine Memory Network materials. The Amjambo Africa! citation is included as supplementary contemporary reporting.

For a publication-ready scholarly version, the next step would be to consult the original exhibition materials and the full text of Mugabo's article, confirm the artist's preferred name and biographical details, and add page-specific citations wherever printed sources provide them. The online sources listed above are unpaginated, so assigning page numbers to them would be misleading.

From Bagging Company to Textile Mill: The History of the Lewiston Bagging Company and Lewiston Mill, 1858–c. 1950

Introduction

During the second half of the nineteenth century, Lewiston, Maine, underwent a profound transformation from a predominantly agricultural community into one of New England’s important textile-manufacturing centers. This development depended on the industrial exploitation of the Androscoggin River, the construction of an extensive canal and waterpower system, investment by regional entrepreneurs, and the growth of a large manufacturing workforce. Among the enterprises established during this period was the Lewiston Bagging Company, incorporated in 1858, which subsequently became known as the Lewiston Mill. Situated in the industrial district associated with the Lower Canal and Oxford Street, the mill illustrates the relationship between specialized textile production, industrial expansion, labor, and the eventual contraction of New England’s traditional textile economy.¹

The history of the Lewiston Mill extended beyond the construction of its original buildings. The company expanded its manufacturing capacity during the Civil War era, employed hundreds of workers, produced a diverse range of cotton fabrics, and experienced a major interruption in operations in 1886. Its subsequent reorganization and reported return to production demonstrate that the history of industrial decline was not always a straightforward progression from prosperity to permanent closure. By the early twentieth century, however, the wider New England textile industry faced increasingly difficult economic conditions. Competition from southern and overseas manufacturers contributed to the contraction of Lewiston’s textile economy, a transformation reflected in the recognized historical period of the Lewiston Mills and Water Power System, which extends from 1850 to 1950.²

The Establishment of the Lewiston Bagging Company, 1858–1863

The origins of the Lewiston Mill can be traced to February 8, 1858, when the Lewiston Bagging Company was incorporated with a capital of $50,000. The incorporators were Albert H. Kelsey, George L. Ward, Edward A. Raymond, and Marshall French. The company entered business at a time when investors were developing Lewiston’s natural waterpower resources to support large-scale manufacturing. Rather than immediately constructing an independent factory, the company initially leased manufacturing space in the Cowan Woolen Mill and later occupied rooms in the Continental Mill. These arrangements allowed the enterprise to establish itself before investing in its own industrial buildings.³

In 1860, the company began constructing its first mill. The building was completed and placed in operation in 1861. The original structure measured approximately 72 by 164 feet and stood four stories high, with a four-story wing measuring approximately 50 by 121 feet. Its size reflected the capital-intensive character of nineteenth-century textile manufacturing, in which large buildings accommodated interconnected production processes and extensive mechanical equipment. The location also placed the enterprise within Lewiston’s developing canal-based industrial landscape, where waterpower supported the operation of factory machinery.⁴

In 1863, the corporation received authorization to change its name to the Lewiston Mill and increase its capital to $300,000. This change marked an important stage in the company’s institutional development. The original name emphasized its association with bag manufacture, while the new name reflected the identity of an established mill enterprise. The company nevertheless retained its specialized manufacturing origins even as its product range expanded.⁵

Expansion and the Development of Production, 1861–1886

The mill expanded its physical facilities in 1866, when a second building was completed. This structure measured approximately 72 by 108 feet and included a four-story wing measuring 43 by 95 feet. Together, the buildings provided space for a substantial manufacturing operation. Their construction coincided with the wider growth of Lewiston’s cotton industry, which benefited from investment in canals, transportation infrastructure, and increasingly organized factory production.⁶

The Lewiston Mill manufactured a variety of cotton textiles, including tickings, cottonades, osnaburgs, fancy fabrics, plaid and striped cloth, plain fabrics, colored duck, and cotton bags. Tickings were commonly used for bedding, while cottonades and osnaburgs served practical clothing and utility markets. Duck was a relatively heavy cotton fabric suited to durable applications. The company's product range therefore extended beyond a single type of textile, allowing it to serve several branches of the fabric market. The historical account also records annual yarn production, indicating that spinning was an important component of its operations.⁷

The mill’s original association with bag manufacture was particularly significant. Seamless cotton bags were among the specialized products made within Lewiston’s textile economy. The later expansion into multiple types of cloth demonstrates that the company’s industrial identity was not limited to its original product. Its subsequent production of additional patterned and colored textiles suggests an operation combining spinning, weaving, and finishing rather than one devoted exclusively to bag manufacture.⁸

The scale of production was considerable. The 1891 History of Androscoggin County, Maine reported that an earlier operating period involved 18,792 spindles, annual cotton consumption of 4.2 million pounds, and annual yarn production of 800,000 pounds. It also recorded a workforce of 800 operatives. These figures demonstrate that the Lewiston Mill had become a substantial manufacturing establishment by the late nineteenth century. They should be understood as historical operating statistics, however, rather than as proof that the same output or employment level continued uninterrupted throughout the period.⁹

The Workforce: Men, Women, and Industrial Employment

The Lewiston Mill’s workforce provides insight into the human dimensions of industrial development. The 1891 county history reported 800 operatives during an earlier operating period, of whom 520 were female. Women therefore constituted 65 percent of the recorded workforce. This substantial proportion reflected the employment patterns of nineteenth-century textile manufacturing, in which women commonly worked in production departments such as spinning and weaving. The remaining 280 workers were not separately classified in the source by adult male and child status, so they cannot all be identified conclusively as adult men.¹⁰

The later operating figures describe a workforce of 700 employees, comprising 300 males and 400 females. Women thus remained the majority, representing approximately 57 percent of the reported workforce. The figures demonstrate both the continuing importance of female labor and a change in the recorded size and composition of employment between the two reported operating periods. They do not, however, establish whether the difference resulted from changes in machinery, working hours, product mix, or production efficiency.¹¹

The manufacturing processes involved several occupational categories. Textile workers generally prepared raw cotton, operated carding and spinning equipment, tended looms, handled yarn and bobbins, and inspected or finished cloth. Dyers and finishing workers were also necessary where colored and specially treated fabrics were produced. Mechanics, machinists, millwrights, supervisors, clerks, and shipping employees supported the operation. These categories help explain the kinds of work likely required by the Lewiston Mill, although the available company account does not supply a complete occupational roster or department-by-department employment breakdown.

Children also worked in nineteenth-century textile manufacturing, and child labor formed part of the wider industrial history of New England. Nevertheless, the surviving figures cited for the Lewiston Mill do not give a separate child-worker total. Any claim about the number, ages, wages, or specific duties of children employed at this factory would require additional evidence from census schedules, labor investigations, payrolls, or contemporary newspapers.

The factory workforce existed within a larger industrial community shaped by migration and employment. Lewiston’s mills attracted workers from surrounding communities and, increasingly during the nineteenth century, French-Canadian migrants from Quebec. The growth of this population contributed to the development of residential neighborhoods, commercial establishments, churches, and social institutions associated with the textile industry. The Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District recognizes these relationships between industrial employment, community development, and ethnic history.¹²

Machinery, Production Capacity, and Specialized Manufacturing

The mill’s machinery figures reveal the scale of its industrial operations. The earlier operating period was associated with 18,792 spindles. Following the company’s reorganization and return to production, the county history reported 23,140 spindles and 593 looms. The later spindle total represented an increase of approximately 23 percent over the earlier figure. Spindles and looms served different functions: spindles were spinning positions used to produce yarn, while looms interlaced yarn to manufacture woven fabric. The figures therefore indicate the capacity of two interconnected stages of textile production.¹³

The production sequence began with the preparation of raw cotton. In a typical nineteenth-century cotton mill, fibers were opened, cleaned, and carded before being drawn into a more uniform form for spinning. Spinning frames twisted the fibers into yarn, which could then be wound and prepared for weaving. Power looms converted the yarn into cloth. The finished material might subsequently undergo dyeing, inspection, and other finishing operations, depending on the intended product.

These processes provide a general explanation of the technology associated with a mill of this kind; they should not be mistaken for a complete inventory of the Lewiston Mill’s equipment. The available company history records spindle and loom totals but does not enumerate its carding machines, spinning frames, winding machines, dye vats, or individual loom types. It also does not establish the precise arrangement of the mill’s internal drive shafts and belts.

The range of products manufactured after the company’s return to operation demonstrates the importance of specialized finishing. In addition to tickings, cottonades, osnaburgs, plaid and striped fabrics, plain cloth, and colored duck, the company produced turkey-red damasks, domett flannels, horse-netting, and fly-cloths. The county history further records that the company continued to manufacture cotton bags until January 1891. These products required different combinations of yarn preparation, weaving, coloring, and finishing.¹⁴

The later operating account reported annual consumption of 4.2 million pounds of cotton and annual dyeing of 800,000 pounds of goods. Expenditure on dyes was reported at approximately $80,000, while monthly payroll and other local disbursements totaled $16,000. These figures illustrate the relationship between manufacturing output, the purchase of materials, employment, and local economic activity. They do not provide a complete measure of the mill’s profits, sales revenue, or annual production value.¹⁵

The Lower Canal and Lewiston’s Waterpower System

The Lewiston Mill’s industrial development depended on the larger waterpower system constructed along the Androscoggin River. Development of this system began in earnest around 1850, when the Lewiston Water-Power Company undertook the construction of canals to harness the river’s energy. The first section of the main canal, extending as far as the Bates Mills, was completed in May 1851. The county history described the canal as approximately 62 feet wide and 14 feet deep, with subsequent extensions bringing its length to roughly three-quarters of a mile. Shorter cross canals connected the main canal with the river.¹⁶

The canal system formed part of a deliberate strategy to establish Lewiston as a major manufacturing center. The Franklin Company succeeded the earlier waterpower enterprise and controlled substantial industrial property in the area. In 1878, the Union Water-Power Company was organized and acquired canal and water privileges, renting waterpower to the various manufacturing corporations. This arrangement linked the operation of individual factories to a shared infrastructure of dams, canals, and water rights.¹⁷

In a typical water-powered mill system, controlled water flow drove water wheels or turbines, converting the energy of falling water into mechanical motion. Shafts, pulleys, and belts could then transmit that motion to factory machinery. This arrangement provided a power source capable of supporting large-scale production before electric motors became widespread in industrial facilities.

The precise horsepower allocated to the Lewiston Mill, its particular turbines or water wheels, and the exact configuration of its mechanical power transmission have not been established by the company statistics consulted here. It is therefore more accurate to describe the mill as part of the Lower Canal industrial system than to assign it a specific power rating derived from another factory.

The waterpower system also shaped the physical geography of Lewiston. Industrial buildings, transportation routes, worker housing, and commercial establishments developed around the mills and canals. The historic district later recognized by the Maine Historic Preservation Commission encompasses the remaining mill complexes and associated infrastructure as evidence of the city’s industrial engineering and planned development.¹⁸

The Suspension of Operations in 1886

The Lewiston Mill’s history was interrupted in July 1886, when the company suspended operations. According to the 1891 county history, the mill remained idle until May 1, 1899, when a new company was formed and the plant purchased. This interruption is an important feature of the company’s history because it demonstrates that the expansion of nineteenth-century manufacturing did not guarantee uninterrupted operation.¹⁹

The source contains an unresolved chronological inconsistency. It states that the plant was purchased and a new company formed in May 1899, but also reports that the new company was incorporated in 1889. These dates cannot both describe the same sequence of events as written. The incorporation date therefore requires verification against corporate records before a definitive account of the reorganization can be given.

Despite this discrepancy, the source clearly distinguishes the earlier operation from the later enterprise. The reorganized company was reported to have 23,140 spindles, 593 looms, and 700 employees. It continued to manufacture a range of cotton fabrics and specialized goods. The record of renewed operations means that the 1886 suspension should not be treated as the mill’s final closure.²⁰

Reorganization and Renewed Production at the Turn of the Century

The reported reorganization illustrates the persistence of industrial investment in Lewiston during a period of change. The reorganized company’s capital was listed at $300,000, and the stock was described as largely owned within the local community. C. I. Barker was identified as the company’s agent. The combination of local investment, a substantial workforce, and renewed manufacturing capacity indicates that the plant continued to possess economic importance after its prolonged interruption.²¹

The range of products recorded for the reorganized enterprise was broader than its original emphasis on cotton bags. Tickings, cottonades, osnaburgs, fancy and patterned fabrics, colored duck, turkey-red damasks, domett flannels, horse-netting, and fly-cloths were all listed. Cotton-bag manufacture, however, reportedly continued only until January 1891. Because the account combines dates that appear inconsistent, the precise chronology of each product line and its relationship to the reorganization must be treated cautiously.²²

The company's recorded annual consumption of 4.2 million pounds of cotton indicates that raw-material procurement remained central to its operations. Its dyeing expenditure also suggests that the production of colored and finished goods represented a substantial component of its manufacturing activity. The monthly payroll and local disbursements indicate that the enterprise continued to distribute money through wages and other expenses within Lewiston. Nevertheless, the available source does not identify individual customers, wholesale contracts, export destinations, or the precise routes by which the company's products reached markets.²³

Rail transportation was an important part of Lewiston’s wider industrial development. The Androscoggin and Kennebec Railroad reached Lewiston in 1849, helping connect the city with regional and national commercial networks. Such connections enabled manufacturers to receive raw materials and ship finished products beyond the immediate locality. However, without company shipping records, it is not possible to determine the destinations, freight arrangements, or specific buyers associated with the Lewiston Mill.²⁴

The Early Twentieth Century: Industrial Change and Growing Pressure

By the early twentieth century, Lewiston’s industrial identity remained closely associated with textile manufacturing. The mill district included factories, canals, dyeing and bleaching facilities, machine shops, transportation infrastructure, and housing associated with the workforce. This concentration of industrial resources supported manufacturing on a scale that shaped the city’s employment patterns and physical development.²⁵

The economic conditions sustaining New England’s textile industry nevertheless began to change. Textile manufacturers faced competition from southern states, where operating and labor costs could be lower, as well as from overseas producers. Changes in technology, investment, markets, and industrial organization further altered the competitive environment. These pressures affected the regional industry as a whole, but the evidence consulted here does not establish the precise financial condition, annual output, ownership changes, or employment trajectory of the Oxford Street Lewiston Mill during each decade of the twentieth century.

It is therefore necessary to distinguish the mill’s documented nineteenth-century operating statistics from the wider history of industrial contraction. The existence of a major textile district does not, by itself, prove that every individual mill remained continuously operational or retained its former workforce. Establishing the Lewiston Mill’s particular trajectory after the late nineteenth century would require additional corporate records, industrial directories, maps, and contemporary newspaper reports.

The Depression Era and the Decline of Lewiston’s Textile Economy, 1930s–1950

The Great Depression of the 1930s placed severe pressure on American manufacturing, including the textile industry. Weak demand, financial difficulties, and competition contributed to the problems faced by many established manufacturers. Lewiston’s older industrial economy was vulnerable to these developments because of its reliance on large mill complexes and the employment associated with textile production.

The city’s longer-term history records that competition from southern and overseas manufacturers led to the closure of most of its textile mills. The Maine Historic Preservation Commission similarly identifies 1950 as the end of the period of significance for the Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District, describing this date as the point by which the industry was contracting and facilities were closing.²⁶

The year 1950 should not, however, be interpreted as a verified final operating date for the Lewiston Mill itself. It marks the endpoint of the historic district’s designated period of significance, not necessarily the date on which every factory within the district stopped production. The available evidence does not establish the exact year in which the Oxford Street mill ceased manufacturing, the identity of its final operator, or whether the buildings continued in other industrial or commercial uses after textile production ended.

The decline of the wider industry nevertheless changed the economic role of Lewiston’s mill district. Buildings and infrastructure originally developed to support large-scale textile production became physical records of a manufacturing system that had shaped the city for approximately a century. Their subsequent historical recognition reflects the importance of preserving not only the factories themselves but also the canals, dams, transportation features, and worker-related resources that made the industrial system possible.²⁷

Conclusion

The history of the Lewiston Bagging Company and Lewiston Mill demonstrates the opportunities and vulnerabilities associated with nineteenth-century industrial development. Incorporated in 1858, the company began constructing its own factory in 1860 and entered production in 1861. Its change of name in 1863 and construction of a second mill in 1866 reflected its development into a substantial textile manufacturer. Over time, the company produced a broad range of cotton goods, employed hundreds of workers, and operated thousands of spindles and hundreds of looms.

The workforce figures reveal the importance of women’s employment, while the missing child-worker statistics and incomplete occupational records demonstrate the limitations of the surviving evidence. The mill’s dependence on the Lower Canal illustrates how shared waterpower infrastructure supported manufacturing, while its varied products show the importance of spinning, weaving, dyeing, and finishing within the industrial process.

The suspension of operations in 1886, followed by a reported reorganization and return to production, complicates any simple account of continuous growth followed by permanent closure. By the twentieth century, the broader textile industry faced mounting competitive pressures, and Lewiston’s industrial economy contracted substantially between the Depression era and the middle of the century. The mill’s exact final closing date remains unverified, but its documented history forms part of the larger transformation of Lewiston from a water-powered textile center into a city whose historic industrial landscape preserves the physical evidence of its manufacturing past.

Footnotes

The notes below correspond to the superscript references in the essay. The 1891 county history is the principal source for the mill’s company-specific statistics. Its online transcription does not display the original printed page numbers alongside the mill entry, so I have identified the chapter and subsection rather than inventing page numbers. The National Register nomination has numbered pages that can be cited directly.

1. Georgia Drew Merrill, ed., History of Androscoggin County, Maine (Boston: W. A. Fergusson & Co., 1891), chap. XVIII, “Saw and Grist Mills,” subsection “Lewiston Mill.”

2. Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District, Lewiston, Androscoggin County, 1850–1950,” National Register of Historic Places nomination, listed April 1, 2015, statement of significance, pp. 56–69.

3. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

4. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

5. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

6. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

7. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

8. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

9. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

10. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

11. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

12. Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District,” statement of significance, pp. 56–69.

13. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

14. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

15. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

16. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, subsection “Lewiston Water-Power Company.”

17. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, subsections “Franklin Company” and “Union Water-Power Company.”

18. Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District,” statement of significance, pp. 56–69.

19. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

20. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

21. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

22. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

23. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

24. Merrill, History of Androscoggin County, chap. XVI, “Lewiston the Town,” discussion of railroad development; chap. XVIII, “Lewiston Mill.”

25. Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District,” statement of significance, pp. 56–69.

26. Douglas I. Hodgkin, “History of Lewiston,” City of Lewiston, discussion of industrial development and textile-mill closures; Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District,” statement of significance, pp. 56–69.

27. Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District,” statement of significance, pp. 56–69.

Bibliography

Hodgkin, Douglas I. “History of Lewiston.” City of Lewiston, Maine. Municipal history of the city’s industrial development and economic transition.

Maine Historic Preservation Commission. “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District, Lewiston, Androscoggin County, 1850–1950.” National Register of Historic Places registration and nomination materials. Listed April 1, 2015.

Merrill, Georgia Drew, editor. History of Androscoggin County, Maine. Boston: W. A. Fergusson & Co., 1891. Chapter XVIII, “Saw and Grist Mills,” including the subsections “Lewiston Water-Power Company,” “Franklin Company,” “Union Water-Power Company,” and “Lewiston Mill.”

Who Belongs in Maine? The MAINER Project Mural in Lewiston, Maine

Introduction

In March 2023, six large portraits appeared on the exterior of the former Camden Yarns Mill at 1 Beech Street in Lewiston, Maine. Created by street artist Pigeon, also known as Orson Horchler, the portraits formed part of the MAINER Project, an ongoing public-art series examining immigration, identity, discrimination, and the meaning of belonging in Maine. Developed in collaboration with the Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor (Maine MILL), the Lewiston installation brought the project's central question into a city whose history has been profoundly shaped by industrial labor and successive generations of migration: Who gets to call themselves a Mainer?¹

The mural's six subjects—Araksan, Djamal, Abijah, Lawton, Assasi, and Ruby—represent different personal histories, cultural backgrounds, and relationships with the state. Some were born in Maine, while others arrived after living in other parts of the United States or abroad. Their experiences demonstrate that belonging is not necessarily determined by birthplace, ancestry, or length of residence. Instead, it develops through work, family, cultural expression, community participation, and the complicated experience of being accepted—or rejected—by others.²

The mural also connects contemporary questions of identity with Lewiston's industrial past. Positioned on a historic mill building near the Androscoggin River and the city's former power canals, the portraits occupy a landscape shaped by manufacturing, migration, and working-class life. Their presence gives new meaning to a building associated with industrial production, transforming its exterior into a public statement about the people who make a community and the histories that deserve recognition.

The Origins of the MAINER Project

The MAINER Project began in Portland in 2015. Pigeon developed the series to explore the assumptions surrounding the word Mainer and to examine how people come to be regarded as legitimate members of a community. The project portrays actual residents of Maine, including immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers, and people born in the state. A defining feature of the series is that its subjects have experienced being explicitly told that they do not belong in Maine.³

Rather than presenting immigration as an abstract political issue, Pigeon places individual people at the center of the discussion. Large portraits make the subjects visible in shared public spaces, while their accompanying stories invite viewers to consider experiences that might otherwise remain unfamiliar or overlooked. The portraits therefore function as more than decorative public art. They challenge viewers to examine the relationship between appearance, identity, social acceptance, and the power to decide who belongs.

The project also encourages conversation. Its purpose extends beyond the creation of images to include sustained engagement with communities and the social questions raised by the portraits. Maine MILL's announcement of the Lewiston installation emphasized this conversational dimension, inviting residents to view the artwork and participate in a community discussion with the artist.⁴

The project consequently combines portraiture, biography, and public dialogue. Each face represents a particular life, but together the portraits raise a broader question about the social boundaries through which communities define themselves. The title MAINER becomes both an identity and a question: Is being a Mainer a matter of origin, or can it also be defined by the life a person builds in Maine?

The Artist: Pigeon (Orson Horchler)

Pigeon, whose given name is Orson Horchler, is a Maine-based street artist whose work addresses social identity, immigration, and belonging. His artistic practice uses public-facing portraits to bring individual lives into spaces where people encounter them outside the conventional settings of museums and galleries. By placing portraits on buildings and other visible surfaces, he invites a broad audience to confront the faces and experiences of people who may be marginalized or misunderstood.⁵

The MAINER Project emerged from an interest in the social meanings attached to the idea of a “real Mainer.” The question is significant because regional identities can function as expressions of shared history and community pride, but they can also become boundaries used to exclude people considered different. Pigeon's work investigates that tension without reducing the subjects to a single immigration narrative.

His approach also has a historical dimension. In 2016, the Maine Historical Society presented an exhibition titled Pigeon's Mainer Project: Street Art Meets History. The exhibition combined Horchler's original artwork with historical photographs, manuscripts, newspapers, and contemporary news material from the society's collections. Its purpose was to place current debates about immigration and social justice in conversation with Maine's past.⁶

This connection between art and history is particularly important in Lewiston. The city has experienced substantial demographic change over time, and each generation has encountered its own questions about labor, ethnicity, cultural difference, and acceptance. Pigeon's portraits bring these issues into the present by focusing on people whose lives reflect different paths to belonging.

The Lewiston installation was commissioned in collaboration with Maine MILL, extending the series into a city whose industrial history makes questions of migration and community identity especially relevant.⁷

Lewiston's Industrial Landscape and the Meaning of Place

The mural stands on the former Camden Yarns Mill building at 1 Beech Street, close to the Androscoggin River and the historic canal system that helped transform Lewiston into a major textile-manufacturing center. Its setting connects the contemporary artwork with a landscape shaped by waterpower, factories, workers' housing, and successive waves of migration.

Lewiston's industrial development accelerated during the nineteenth century as entrepreneurs and investors developed dams, canals, and mills along the river. Textile manufacturing attracted workers from surrounding rural communities as well as immigrants from abroad. Irish laborers participated in the construction of the canal system, while French Canadians arrived in large numbers during the later nineteenth century to work in the mills. Many settled near the factories in the neighborhood commonly known as Little Canada.⁸

These developments reshaped the city's population and physical environment. Mills required workers, and workers required housing, shops, churches, schools, and community institutions. Industrial growth therefore influenced not only employment but also the formation of neighborhoods and cultural identities.

The Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District, recognized for its historical significance, encompasses industrial buildings and infrastructure associated with the city's development between 1850 and 1950. The district's significance includes industrial production, engineering, community planning, and ethnic and social history. Its buildings preserve evidence of the economic forces and human migrations that helped shape Lewiston.⁹

The former Camden Yarns Mill provides a meaningful setting for the MAINER Project because the building belongs to this larger industrial landscape. The mill's earlier function involved the production of goods; its exterior now carries portraits that direct attention toward people and their experiences. The change in use does not erase the building's industrial history. Instead, the mural invites a broader understanding of that history by emphasizing the people who inhabit and sustain Maine communities.

The connection should not be understood as a claim that the six portrait subjects were themselves mill workers or descendants of a particular group of textile employees. Rather, the historical relationship lies in the larger themes shared by the building and the artwork: migration, labor, community formation, cultural difference, and the continuing negotiation of belonging.

Funding and Project Cost

The Lewiston installation was commissioned by Maine MILL in collaboration with Pigeon. According to the museum's public announcement, Androscoggin Bank provided funding, with additional support from Community Credit Union.¹⁰ These sponsors helped make the six-portrait installation possible, bringing the MAINER Project to the Lewiston–Auburn community and placing its themes within the city's historic industrial landscape.

The total cost of the project, however, has not been established from the public documentation cited for this essay. The museum's announcement identifies the funders but does not specify the overall budget, the artist's commission fee, production and installation expenses, or the individual contributions made by the sponsoring organizations. Accordingly, no dollar amount can be responsibly assigned to the project without additional records from Maine MILL or the funders. The distinction is important for historical documentation: the organizations credited with supporting an artwork can be identified even when the financial terms of the commission remain unavailable.

The Six People Portrayed

The six Lewiston–Auburn portraits are central to the mural's meaning. Each person brings a distinct biography to the project, demonstrating that the question of who belongs in Maine cannot be answered through a single story. The biographies below draw on Maine MILL's announcement of the installation, published when the portraits were unveiled in 2023.¹¹

Araksan: Community Service and Belonging

Araksan is an educator and community health worker who had been active in Lewiston since arriving in 2016. Her work involves supporting people across differences of age, color, and gender. Through education and community health, she participates in the everyday activities that help a city function and its residents care for one another.

Her biography illustrates an important dimension of belonging: participation. A person becomes part of a community not only through family origins or birthplace but also through relationships, service, and sustained engagement with neighbors. Araksan's work places her within the social life of Lewiston, where she contributes to the well-being of people across the community.

Maine MILL's biography notes that Araksan is proud to call herself a Mainer.¹² That declaration directly addresses the question underlying the mural. Her identity is not presented as something she must prove through ancestry or a particular place of birth. Instead, her sense of belonging is expressed through her own identification with Maine and her involvement in the lives of its residents.

Djamal: Education, Entrepreneurship, and Cultural Identity

Originally from Chad, Djamal moved to Auburn in 2014. At the time of the mural's unveiling, he was studying Building Construction Technology at Central Maine Community College while developing two businesses: Jamal's Art Boutique and Chateau des Parfums, a cologne business. He speaks Arabic, French, and English.¹³

Djamal's biography brings together migration, education, multilingualism, artistic expression, and entrepreneurship. His life in Maine includes both formal study and efforts to establish independent businesses. These activities demonstrate how newcomers contribute to a community through skills, creativity, commerce, and personal ambition.

His use of three languages also reflects the cultural knowledge that people carry across borders. Multilingualism is not simply a marker of difference; it can be a practical resource and an expression of a person's history. Djamal's experience challenges any narrow definition of a Mainer that assumes a single cultural or linguistic background.

His story also connects contemporary migration with Lewiston's longer history as a place where people have moved in search of opportunities. The circumstances of migration have changed, but the relationship between movement, work, education, and community-building remains significant.

Abijah: Movement, Change, and Community Commitment

Abijah was born in Orlando, Florida, and spent part of her youth moving between places. At thirteen, she and her family left California to travel across the country in a recreational vehicle. She arrived in Lewiston at the beginning of 2022. In the biography published by Maine MILL, she expressed a desire to become a source of change and support for Lewiston and communities beyond it.¹⁴

Abijah's story complicates the assumption that a person's identity can be defined by a single place of origin. Her childhood involved travel and movement, and her arrival in Lewiston represented another stage in a life shaped by geographic change. Although born in Florida, she came to Maine with aspirations connected to the future of her new community.

Her biography emphasizes intention as well as location. She hopes to contribute to positive change rather than simply reside in a particular place. This aspiration echoes the mural's broader argument that belonging is connected to the relationships people form and the contributions they make.

Abijah's experience also demonstrates that migration is not exclusively an international phenomenon. Movement within the United States can shape identity and a person's relationship to place just as profoundly as movement across national borders. Her portrait therefore expands the meaning of the project beyond a simple distinction between immigrants and native-born residents.

Lawton: Indigenous Identity and the Complexity of Being Native

Lawton is a musician, painter, occasional lobsterman, and caregiver to his sister and nephew. He is Mohawk and was born in Maine. His grandfather had moved from New York. Maine MILL's biography explains that when people learn that Lawton is Indigenous and from Maine, they sometimes assume that he must be Passamaquoddy. Lawton describes himself as a “non-native Native.”¹⁵

His story introduces a different dimension to the mural's exploration of belonging. Lawton was born in Maine, yet other people's assumptions about Indigenous identity can lead them to question or misidentify his relationship to the state. His experience shows that even birthplace does not necessarily protect someone from being treated as an outsider.

The distinction between Mohawk and Passamaquoddy is important. Indigenous peoples have distinct histories, communities, and identities; they should not be treated as interchangeable simply because they share Indigenous status or connections to the region. Lawton's biography illustrates how assumptions about Indigenous identity can obscure those distinctions.

His occupations also show the many forms that community participation can take. Music, painting, seasonal work, and caregiving are different activities, but together they describe a life rooted in creative practice, labor, and family responsibility.

Lawton's portrait therefore broadens the mural's central question. Belonging is not only an issue for recent immigrants or refugees. It also concerns Indigenous people whose identities may be misunderstood through stereotypes or through outsiders' expectations about who should live in a particular place.

Assasi: Refuge, Migration, and Cultural Adaptation

Assasi is a rapper and co-founder of the Bilad El Sham movement in Syria. His wife is from Millinocket, Maine, and the two met in Lebanon, where she was teaching and he was living as a refugee. Before arriving in Maine in 2017, Assasi had also been a refugee in Nepal, India, and Malaysia. He described his arrival in Maine, after living in several other countries, as the greatest culture shock he had experienced.¹⁶

His biography illustrates the complexity of refugee experience. Forced or difficult displacement can involve multiple countries, unfamiliar languages, new social systems, and prolonged uncertainty about the future. Arrival in a new place does not necessarily end the challenges associated with displacement; it begins another stage of adjustment.

Assasi's story also complicates the idea that cultural adaptation moves in only one direction. His experiences across countries shaped his perspective before he arrived in Maine, while his relationship with a woman from Millinocket connected his life to a Maine community. His biography therefore combines international displacement with personal relationships that cross national and cultural boundaries.

Music is another important part of his identity. As a rapper and co-founder of a cultural movement, Assasi participates in artistic expression that connects him with a wider social world. His portrait encourages viewers to recognize refugees as people with creative practices, personal histories, and ambitions—not simply as recipients of assistance or subjects of public debate.

Within the MAINER Project, Assasi's experience gives particular weight to the question of belonging. Having lived in several countries as a refugee, he encountered the challenges of entering new societies repeatedly. His story asks viewers to consider what it means to build a home after displacement and how a receiving community can make that process more welcoming.

Ruby: Cultural Heritage, Food, and Dance

Ruby is from Oaxaca, Mexico. Maine MILL's biography describes her as an accomplished cook of traditional cuisine and an enthusiastic dancer.¹⁷ Although the published biography provides fewer details about her personal history than those of some of the other subjects, it identifies cultural expression as an important part of her story.

Food and dance are powerful forms of cultural continuity. Recipes can preserve family knowledge and regional traditions across generations, while dance gives physical expression to cultural memory and communal celebration. When people share these practices in a new place, they create opportunities for others to encounter and appreciate traditions that may be unfamiliar to them.

Ruby's inclusion in the mural demonstrates that the story of migration is not solely a story of hardship or exclusion. It is also a story of the cultural knowledge and creative practices that people bring with them. These practices can enrich community life and create connections among people whose backgrounds differ.

Her portrait also reminds viewers that a person's life cannot be fully summarized by the fact of migration. Ruby is represented through her skills and interests, not merely through her country of origin. The mural thus presents cultural difference as part of a broader human identity rather than as a defining boundary between insiders and outsiders.

The Mural as Public History

The MAINER Project mural can be understood as a form of public history because it brings historical questions into a space encountered in everyday life. Rather than presenting an exhibit confined to a gallery, the portraits occupy the exterior of a former industrial building. They invite residents, workers, visitors, and passersby to encounter the subjects as part of the city's visible landscape.

The mural's location also creates a dialogue between industrial heritage and contemporary community life. Lewiston's factories depended on generations of workers who came from different places and formed new communities around employment and family. The city later experienced additional waves of immigration and refugee resettlement, which contributed to its changing social and cultural character.¹⁸ The portraits do not suggest that these histories are identical. Instead, they invite comparison between different experiences of migration and the recurring questions of acceptance and exclusion that accompany them.

The work also complements Maine MILL's broader interest in preserving the history of labor and community life. The museum's oral-history collection includes accounts from people connected with many industries, nationalities, and social experiences. These accounts demonstrate the value of preserving individual voices alongside institutional records and accounts of industrial development.¹⁹

In this context, the MAINER Project makes an important interpretive contribution. Industrial history can sometimes focus primarily on buildings, machinery, companies, production, and economic change. The mural shifts attention toward individual lives and the social meanings of membership in a community. It encourages viewers to consider who is visible in public spaces, whose experiences are acknowledged, and how historical narratives can include people whose lives do not fit a single dominant story.

The portraits also create a relationship between representation and recognition. To be depicted on a prominent building is to become part of a community's public image. By placing these six people on a historic mill, the project gives their stories a visible presence in a landscape already associated with generations of work and migration.

Conclusion

The MAINER Project mural at the former Camden Yarns Mill in Lewiston is both a work of public art and an invitation to reconsider the meaning of belonging. Created by Pigeon and unveiled in March 2023, the installation brings together six individual biographies that resist a single definition of what it means to be a Mainer.

Araksan's community service, Djamal's education and entrepreneurship, Abijah's commitment to positive change, Lawton's Indigenous identity, Assasi's experience of refuge and displacement, and Ruby's cultural expression each provide a different perspective on life in Maine. Their stories are distinct, and the available biographies do not provide the same level of detail for every subject. Together, however, they show that belonging may be shaped by work, family, culture, personal history, community participation, and self-identification.

The mural's placement on a former mill building adds a historical dimension to this message. Lewiston's industrial landscape was created through the interaction of waterpower, manufacturing, labor, and migration. The city's history includes generations of people who moved to the area and established new lives, while its present continues to be shaped by residents with varied backgrounds and experiences. The mural links that longer history of movement and community formation with contemporary questions about identity and acceptance.²⁰

Footnotes

1. Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor (Maine MILL), “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” March 2023.

2. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.”

3. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home”; Maine Memory Network, “Pigeon's Mainer Project: Who Decides Who Belongs?”

4. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.”

5. Jean Noel Mugabo, “Pigeon's Mainer Project Adorns Lewiston Museum,” Amjambo Africa! 6, no. 1 (April 2023): 6.

6. Maine Historical Society, “Pigeon's Mainer Project: Street Art Meets History,” exhibition, March 4–May 1, 2016.

7. Mugabo, “Pigeon's Mainer Project Adorns Lewiston Museum,” 6; Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.”

8. City of Lewiston, “History of Lewiston,” official municipal history.

9. Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District, Lewiston, Androscoggin County, 1850–1950,” National Register of Historic Places, April 1, 2015.

10. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.”

11. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.”

12. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Araksan.

13. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Djamal.

14. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Abijah.

15. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Lawton.

16. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Assasi.

17. Maine MILL, “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home,” biography of Ruby.

18. City of Lewiston, “History of Lewiston”; Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District.”

19. Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor, “Oral Histories,” museum collection and exhibit resource.

20. City of Lewiston, “History of Lewiston”; Maine Historic Preservation Commission, “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District.”

Bibliography

City of Lewiston. “History of Lewiston.” Official municipal history. Lewiston, Maine.

Maine Historical Society. “Pigeon's Mainer Project: Street Art Meets History.” Exhibition, March 4–May 1, 2016. Portland, Maine.

Maine Historic Preservation Commission. “Lewiston Mills and Water Power System Historic District, Lewiston, Androscoggin County, 1850–1950.” National Register of Historic Places. April 1, 2015.

Maine Memory Network. “Pigeon's Mainer Project: Who Decides Who Belongs?” Online historical exhibit.

Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor (Maine MILL). “Maine MILL Unveils MAINER Project at Site of Future Home.” March 2023. Lewiston, Maine.

Maine Museum of Innovation, Learning and Labor (Maine MILL). “Oral Histories.” Museum collection and exhibit resource. Lewiston, Maine.

Mugabo, Jean Noel. “Pigeon's Mainer Project Adorns Lewiston Museum.” Amjambo Africa! 6, no. 1 (April 2023): 6.

Research Note

The exact total cost of the Lewiston mural remains unverified in the public documentation cited here. Maine MILL identifies Androscoggin Bank as the lead funder, with additional support from Community Credit Union, but does not publish the total project budget or individual contributions. The museum's original announcement and project records would be the appropriate sources for establishing the commission fee and overall cost. The institutional web pages cited in the notes are unpaginated; no page numbers have been invented for them.