Brewer, Maine is located in Penobscot County. It is part of the Bangor, Maine Metropolitan Statistical Area. The city is named after its first settler, Colonel John Brewer.[1]   Brewer is the birthplace of Joshua Chamberlain.

Brewer is on the opposite side of the Penobscot River than Bangor.  They are connected by three bridges.

Brewer was as famous for brick-making in the 19th century as Bangor was for lumber. By the 1850s there were 12-15 brickyards in Brewer making 12 million bricks annually. Most of these were shipped to Boston and vicinity. It is said that most of the Back Bay and South End neighborhoods of Boston are built of Brewer brick. Frank O. Farrington of Brewer patented a machine for edging and turning bricks in 1859.

Ship-building was also a major Brewer industry, as was saw-milling. Brewer’s sawmills tended to be steam-powered, unlike those farther up the Penobscot River, which were powered by waterfalls. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the city also had a significant ice industry, which survives today in the form of the Getchell Brothers company.

The Eastern Manufacturing Company opened a pulp and paper mill in South Brewer in 1889 that became the city’s largest employer. The mill closed in 2004, and the site has now been re-developed by the Cianbro Corporation. Development of the waterfront has taken place with the addition of the beautiful Brewer Riverwalk, Children’s Gardens and a micro-brewery. See Video Below 👇 of the Brewer Riverwalk.

Today Brewer is home of the EMMC Lafayette Family Cancer Center a state-of-the-art-facility.

To learn more about Brewer, Maine

[1] Some information was sourced from Wikipedia

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