Below Is more information about an individual item within the TidesNet online collections. Click on the image to enlarge it. Use the “Go Back” button to return to the Folder page.
GAR Hall, 6 Green Street, Eastport, Maine | Civil War Mural
Photograph
A Civil War mural running the length of the upper walls of the second floor of a former Civil War GAR (Grand Army of the Republic) Veterans Hall building in Eastport, Maine that is owned by the Tides Institute. It is the only such Civil War mural in Maine. The original two and a half story GAR Hall building dates to the 1820s and was first used as a Baptist vestry. When the Baptist Church established a new vestry space within its own separate church building in 1881, their vestry building became available to the local GAR veterans group that was organized after the American Civil War. The second floor of the building became the meeting room for the veterans group and they had the longer north and south walls decorated with a series of four panels, making a total of eight, each with a distinctive Union Army Corp badge numbering from one to eight. The shorter end east and west walls of the room were decorated with the name of the local GAR post (Meade Post No. 40) and with American flag shields and draped flag designs. The mural was very likely painted by local decorative painter, Harry Harrington, as he painted a similar mural in an adjacent Armory building at about the same time. This building and mural did not survive. A dropped ceiling, installed in the middle of the room in the early 20th century long hid the mural from view, but in 2010, after the hall building was sold to new owners, the mural was rediscovered and the dropped ceiling removed. The mural suffered considerable water damage over the years as it was painted with a distemper water soluble paint. The Tides Institute is now having the mural restored by Tony Castro, an experienced restorer, of New Gloucester, Maine.
