Tag Archives: paupers

Scarborough Town Farm Cemetery

Posted on June 30, 2025 by Don Taylor

Ron Romano’s The Graves of Scarborough’s Paupers: The Town Farm Cemetery, 1867–1891 offers a moving, thoroughly researched account of Scarborough’s 19th-century approach to caring for its poorest citizens. When the town purchased the Brackett Farm in 1867, it became a … Continue reading →

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Letting Out the Poor

Posted on June 25, 2025 by Don Taylor

Ron Romano’s Letting Out the Poor uncovers the mid-19th-century system of poor relief in Scarborough, Maine, through the logbook of Ebenezer Libby, Overseer of the Poor from 1857–1867. The paper explains how impoverished residents were “let out” to townspeople—essentially placed in homes where … Continue reading →

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FROM THE EPHEMERA. . . CARING FOR PAUPERS

Posted on March 16, 2023 by Linda Snow-McLoon

— BY LINDA SNOW MCLOON The social safety net that existed in earlier times in Scarborough was organized much differently than what we recognize today. Before Social Security and other ways of providing relief for people in need, a system … Continue reading →

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