"View of Munjoy Hill," Artist Unidentified

Artist Unidentified, View of Munjoy Hill, Portland, oil on board, 7 15/16 x 11 3/4 inches. Gift of Charles D. Childs, 1967.5. Image courtesy of Luc Demers

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This painting depicts the Portland neighborhood of Munjoy Hill as it might have looked in the 1840s, with a smattering of homes and businesses nestled within pastureland and the Portland Observatory at the crest of the hill. The work was likely painted in the 1890s as an imagined rendering of the city before the great Portland fire of 1866. The painting bears much resemblance to a pencil drawing by Charles Quincy Goodhue, a late-19th-century artist who sketched many views of 1840s Portland. Goodhue himself may have produced this work based on his drawing, or another artist may have used his sketch as a reference to fashion this view of Portland in an earlier age.