Maine Humanities Council

Liam Riordan

The MHC is pleased to announce that Dr. Liam Riordan, early Americanist scholar, MHC Board Member, and Associate Professor of History at the University of Maine, Orono, will be doing archival research and teaching at the University of Glasgow in spring 2012 as a Fulbright Scholar. His honours level undergraduate course will focus on the early American republic, and he will be pursuing two main research projects. The first is to locate material about the Loyalist Elizabeth Lichtenstein Johnston, who lived in Scotland with her family in the mid-1780s before moving on to Jamaica and then Nova Scotia. Second, he is starting a new research project about outmigration from Glasgow throughout the Atlantic World, and especially to Virginia, the British West Indies, and the Canadian Maritimes, from 1760 to 1820. He will be joined in Glasgow by his wife Susan Thibedeau (on leave from the English Department at Bangor High School) and their sons Cormac and Declan.

Liam has many publications to his credit, including the forthcoming collection The Loyal Atlantic: Remaking the British Atlantic in the Revolutionary Era and Many Identities, One Nation: The Revolution and Its Legacy in the Mid-Atlantic.

View of St. John River from Edmundston, New Brunswick toward Frenchville, ME (credit: Daniel Picard)

The St. John Valley in Aroostook County is an area rich in history and culture. When I visited it two years ago for the second time in my life, I saw rural lawns mowed in straight rows, houses painted perfectly, and window boxes full of flowers. Fields of grass, clover, potatoes, and broccoli were everywhere. The landscape spoke of an idyllic life with a shared pride in community, and the people I met reflected this, too.

The MHC has always had programming in the St. John Valley, from a children’s literature seminar last year in Fort Kent to many New Books, New Readers adult literacy groups to several grants awarded to, among other projects, the development of a cultural tour (“Voici the Valley”). And recently, we’ve had Let’s Talk About It library-based reading and discussion groups.

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Welcome to Anne Schlitt, Teacher Program Officer, who joined the MHC in September as a staff member for the Born to Read and Teaching American History programs. Born and raised in Michigan, Anne studied history at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, VA. After graduation, she moved to Japan, where she taught English to high school students for three years on the Japan Exchange and Teaching Programme. Being overseas allowed Anne to enjoy travel adventures in Indonesia, Australia, and Egypt as well as in Japan. She then went on to receive a Master’s degree in medieval history at St. Peter’s College, Oxford before returning to the U.S. to work as a writer, editor, and web producer for various companies such as Britannica (Chicago), Kaplan University (New York City), and Tom’s of Maine. Anne also holds a Masters in Library Science from Syracuse University and enjoys dabbling in archival work whenever she can. Anne, her partner Erick, and their daughter Willow enjoy hiking, photography, cooking, and, of course, reading. We are delighted to have her among the staff.