Maine

Maine is a state of the United States. It is probably named after the French province of Maine. Another possibility for the name "Maine" is that the people living on islands along the coast of Maine used to speak of going to the mainland as "going over to the Main." Its U.S. postal abbreviation is ME. Four U.S. Navy ships were named USS Maine in honor of the state. The state is generally chilly, though warm summers can bring an average of 15 days above 80 degrees F for the month of July.

Demographics

As of 2004, the state's population was estimated to be 1,317,253.

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Maine is a popular tourist destination, but it also experiences harsh winters and, consequently, the great temporary influx of visitors occurs during the warmer months. Many of these visitors establish an alternate secondary residence in Maine during some or all warm months and then depart for their primary residence in the off-season. These are the Summer People of Maine lore. Official census figures normally count a person as a resident only once, at the place of the primary home. Therefore, there are some situations in which official census figures could be misleading for Maine. For example, some communities may have a much larger seasonal retail sector than their official, small population figure would imply.

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As explained in detail under "Geography", there are large tracts of uninhabited land in some remote parts of the interior.

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Race and Ancestry

The racial makeup of the state is:

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• 96.5% White non-Hispanic
• 0.7% Hispanic
• 0.7% Asian
• 0.5% Black
• 0.6% American Indian
• 1% Mixed race

The five largest ancestries in the state are: English (21.5%), Irish (15.1%), French (14.2%), American (9.4%), French Canadian (8.6%). Maine is second only to New Hampshire in the percentage of French Canadians. It also has the largest percentage of non-Hispanic whites of any state and the highest percentage of current French-speakers. Franco-Mainers tended to settle in the industrial cities of inland Maine (especially Lewiston) whereas much of the midcoast and downeast sections remain strongly Anglo. Smaller numbers of various other groups including Germans, Irish, and Italians settled around the state.

Related Topics:
English - Irish - French - American - French Canadian - French Canadians - Germans - Irish - Italians

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As of 2000, 92.2% of Maine residents age 5 and older speak English at home and 5.3% speak French. Spanish is the third most spoken language at 0.8%, followed by German at 0.3% and Italian at 0.1%.

Related Topics:
English - French - Spanish - German - Italian

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Religion

The religious affiliations of the people of Maine are shown in the table below:

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• Christian – 82%
• Protestant – 56%
• Baptist – 16%
• Methodist – 9%
• Pentecostal – 6%
• Church of Christ – 3%
• Lutheran – 3%
• Other Protestant or general Protestant – 18%
• Roman Catholic – 25%
• Other Christian – 1%
• Other Religions – 1%
• Non-Religious – 17%