Brian Armstrong - A History Lover’s Guide to Bar Harbor

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The key person to acknowledge for this book is my mother, Constance Connie Ells Armstrong, who created the seed for my historical research. Her wonderful stories that she told me as a child provided an inspiration for this book about Bar Harbor that goes deeper than the usual historical overview.

My father, Quentin Armstrong, fostered my love of buildings, which helped me understand the landscape of Bar Harbor during the last 150 years. These surviving structures provide a window to the past. He also stimulated my interest in history from a young age with trips to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, dinnertime discussions about lost empires like the Hittites and Rome and his history magazines and books.

Debbie Dyer was my frequent collaborator and friend over the last thirty years through her work with the Bar Harbor Historical Society. She has always been there to answer the tough questions, point me in the right direction for research and provide that local connection to the people that my mother mentioned in her stories. She provided me the forum to present articles through the Bar Harbor Historical Society newsletter for many years. Without her encouragement and help, I would not have had the opportunity to develop my historical writing and expand my knowledge of nineteenth-and twentieth-century Bar Harbor.

Other local Bar Harbor residents who have helped me with this book were Anna Burns, John Clark, Dickie Cough, Richard Duperey, Dick and Barbara Fox, Sheldon and John Goldthwait, Terese Miller, Paul Richardson, Kim Swan and Tom Testa. Jennifer L. McWain, former assistant clerk of Bar Harbor, provided so much valuable information about my family.