Monday, February 26, 2024 

On this day in 1919, Acadia National Park was created for the first time. It has a size of approximately 50,000 acres.

Acadia National Park provides proof that a park doesn’t need vast wilderness to offer gorgeous scenery and the chance for immersion in the natural world. Small for a national park, composed of a patchwork of public land surrounded by towns and villages, Acadia preserves a glacier-carved landscape of rugged mountains, pristine lakes, lush forests, and long stretches of Maine’s famous rocky shore. It ranks among America’s most visited national parks. No one who sees it wonders why.

Most of Acadia is located on Mount Desert, just off the central Maine coast. Separate areas of the park lie on the Schoodic Peninsula, on the mainland to the east, and on Isle au Haut, a small island to the southwest. The Wabanaki Indians called Mount Desert Pemetic, “the sloping land,” and it’s true that flat places are scarce here. Glaciers, which retreated around 17,000 years ago, cut narrow valleys now filled with lakes and arms of the Atlantic Ocean and carved steep cliffs.

Glaciers also scoured granite mountaintops, leaving little soil to support forest. The lack of trees caused French explorer Samuel de Champlain, who sailed past in 1604, to call the island Monts Desert (barren mountains).

In the 19th century, Mount Desert Island’s beauty and remoteness began attracting wealthy visitors looking for a retreat from bustling cities. Vanderbilts, Astors, Carnegies, and other illustrious families built magnificent mansions (which they called “cottages”) on the island’s northwest coast. The area became known as Millionaire’s Row.

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