Around the Kennebec Valley: The Herman Bryant Collection, by Gay M. Grant, August 29, 2022, Arcadia Publishing, Charleston, South Carolina.

Fans of Grant’s first book will enjoy these more than 200 newly released images taken by gifted South Gardiner photographer Herman Bryant (1858–1937). Now part of the collections of the Maine State Museum, Bryant’s work documents late-19th and early-20th-century life in the Kennebec River region during its industrial heyday. New information about Bryant and his family reveals fascinating stories about the people and places captured in his photographs. From Augusta downriver to Bath and the coastal islands, Bryant’s lens captured the mills, factories, icehouses, and other ventures that once lined the river’s banks. Vessels of all types that once made the river the artery of the region’s life and economy can be seen along with images of the railroads that revolutionized travel. Bryant’s poignant portraits, photographs of homes, and even images of beloved pets bring to life the industrious Maine people who built thriving communities.

Along the Kennebec can be purchased at Arcadia Publishing for $23.99

Destination Unknown, by Gay M. Grant.

Destination Unknown: An Evacuee’s Story, As an eight-year-old growing up in the heavily bombed city of Portsmouth, England, Patricia North was taken from her family and placed with strangers in the countryside so she would be “safe.” She told no one of the traumatic events that engulfed her then. A lifetime later, when a young friend from Maine began to research the experiences of English child evacuees during World War Two, North allowed herself to revisit what had transpired and gradually – haltingly – shared those events. The publication of Destination Unknown allowed deep wounds to heal. North’s courage and resilience have since inspired readers on two continents.

Grant, that young friend, interviewed former evacuees, visited places critical to the narrative, and conducted research at London’s Imperial War Museum, the Royal Marines Museum, and the City Library of Portsmouth.

Destination Unknown can be purchased here for $23.95 each, including tax and shipping.

And from these fine retailers:
RD Allen Freeport Jewelers, 13 Middle Street, Freeport, Maine 04032 www.rdallen.com
Gardiner Public Library, Gardiner, Maine

Along the Kennebec: The Herman Bryant Collection, by Gay M. Grant.

Along the Kennebec: the Herman Bryant Collection, takes us back in time to visit the rural communities that thrived along the banks of the Kennebec River at the turn of the last century. Grant interviewed long-time residents whose personal stories, combined with local and state archival research, provide an engaging narrative to accompany images by a gifted artist from the early days of photography. Bryant’s photos capture vanished industries that were once the lifeblood of Central Maine – lumber, ice, paper and shipbuilding – and the homes and faces of the people who built the communities along the Kennebec. Though Pauline “Polly” Nute did not live to see the book’s publication, she provided Grant with the inspiration, the photographs, left to her by Bryant’s daughter, Minnie, and entrée to most of the folks interviewed for the book.

Along the Kennebec can be purchased at Arcadia Publishing for $21.99.

At most Maine bookstores, and the Gardiner Co-Op on Water Street in Gardiner.