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Introduction
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Fort Kent Block House
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Fort Kent Railroad Station
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Acadian Landing
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Saint David Church
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Mont-Carmel
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Acadian Village
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Maison Héritage
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Michaud House

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Acadian Village

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This site, located in Keegan, a village a few miles west of Van Buren, Maine, opened to the public in February 1976 as an American Bicentennial project. It is owned and operated by the local volunteer historical society, Notre HÈritage Vivant/Our Living Heritage. On the National Register nomination form the site is described as a "multiple resource site" consisting of seven buildings that form a "folk museum complex." Today it comprises over a dozen buildings that have been moved to the Acadian Village or built at the site. A number of these dwellings are significant in terms of their distinct Maine Acadian construction.

Some of the historic buildings at the Acadian Village, an open-air museum in Van Buren, Maine. The Morneault House, built in the mid-19th century, is in the center.The Levasseur-Ouellette House (built in Cyr Plantation, Maine, 1859) and the Morneault House are typical of homes built during the mid-19th-century by financially successful Maine Acadians. In form they are characteristic of the "Georgian massing" style popular on both sides of the North Atlantic by the early 19th century. The walls of both these one-and-a-half-story dwellings are built of square-hewn logs (piËce sur piËce) covered by clapboard siding.

The Morneault House, built in Grand Isle, Maine the mid-1800s, is typical of the type of homes built by well-to-do residents of the Upper St. John Valley.The Morneault House is believed to have been built in 1857 by Charles Morneault (Michaud 1974), a French-Canadian immigrant, on River Lot 197 in Grand Isle, Maine. He settled in the Upper St. John Valley in 1856, and the next year married Flavie Thibodeau. Morneault purchased Lot 197 in Township 18, Range 3 on November 3, 1857. He received the 433-acre parcel from Jean Baptiste Souci, age 74, and Rose Thibodeau Souci, age 55, for $240 and a deed of maintenance. A merchant trader, Morneault provided space for a post office in his home when members of his family served as postmaster. Mrs. Normande BeauprÈ, a Morneault descendant, donated the house to Notre HÈritage Vivant/Our Living Heritage in 1973, and it was subsequently moved to the Acadian Village.

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Ray Morin of St. David shows how a barrel is assembled. American Folklife Center photograph by David Whitman, 1991.


The fireplace in the Roy house has been reconstructed with a hemlock beam lintel, a typical feature in many eary fireplaces. The lintel, which held up the stones over the fireplace opening, was high enough to escape direct flames and was first soaked in brine to render it fire resistant. The Roy House, a log structure moved to the Village from a location near Hamlin, Maine, is another example of 19th-century Maine Acadian house construction. Its hewn log walls (piËce sur piËce) have been corner-joined with trunnels in the "stacked and pegged" style also seen at Maison HÈritage (see next section on Maison HÈritage). It is a form that has apparently never been documented in the field. Although the Roy House was damaged considerably during disassembly and reconstruction, it provides an opportunity to examine this method of wall construction.

Two other 19th-century structures in the Acadian Village collection include the Hammond-LaPlante Building, a workerís quarters from the William Hammond farm in Hamlin Plantation, Maine; and a Maine Acadian barn (grange acadienne) from the Hamlin area. The following are also located at the museum: the Willie Sirois House, the Morin House, the Saint Amand School, a blacksmith shop, a shoe shop, a barber shop and general store, and a railroad car house. For the most part, these are interpretations of razed historic structures. All of the structures house a large quantity and variety of artifacts.

Apart from its primary museum functions, the Village is an important staging ground for local cultural events. For example, during the 1991 Festival de La Grande RiviËre, it hosted "Acadian Day," "Multicultural Day," and "Native American Day" celebrations. Four modern buildings are used for temporary art exhibits, a gift shop, a meeting hall, and a chapel.

 
Ray Morin of St. David shows how a barrel is assembled. American Folklife Center photograph by David Whitman, 1991.
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