I have a belief that every local should do the touristy things in their own city every once in a while, so I decided to practice what I preach and recently took a Portland By the Foot walking tour.

Our guide, Duncan, casually dropped a fact that completely threw me: Portland helped pioneer canned corn, and Maine eventually became the country's biggest canned-corn producer!

I associate Maine with a lot of things. Lobster? Definitely. Potatoes? Sure. But corn is definitely not one of them.

Around 1870, J. Winslow Jones built a factory right on the bank of the Presumpscot for his “World Renowned Green Corn.” There’s an old photograph of it: a tall building on the river, long factory wings stretching off it and smokestacks rising behind the whole thing. When it opened, it was reportedly the world's largest canning factory. And corn wasn’t the only thing Jones was selling. His company was also canning lobster and mackerel.

So naturally I started looking into what else Portland used to make, and there was so much more.

I knew Portland had been an industrial city, but I don’t think I ever really pictured what that meant. We weren’t just making things here. We got weirdly good at making very specific things, then shipped them all over the country.

E.T. Burrowes & Co. claimed to have the largest screen factory in the world, and Portland-made window screens ended up all over the country. Thomas Edison had them. So did P.T. Barnum, George Westinghouse and Grover Cleveland. An 1899 state report said the company’s market was basically anywhere “flies and other pests abound”.

Then there’s Portland Stone Ware. They made everything from crocks and jugs to firebrick and sewer pipe, and eventually became one of the biggest clay-pipe manufacturers on the East Coast. I actually still run into their pipes when I’m at home inspections in the East End and West End of Portland. Some of them have been in these houses for well over a century and are still going strong.

The factory itself was huge. It sat near Back Cove with 24 kilns, rail lines running into the property, and its own wharf, and at one point they were apparently making about a mile of pipe a day. Then in 1970, the property was taken to make way for I-295. The factory closed, and the highway runs through the site today.

Then there was sugar. J.B. Brown ran one of the largest sugar refineries in the country right on Portland’s waterfront. By 1860, we were processing about 20 percent of all the molasses coming into the United States, more than any other city in the country.

A lot of that molasses came from Caribbean plantations worked by enslaved people, so there’s a much darker side to that success too.

Then there’s B&M. For years, people driving past East Deering could smell the beans from the factory. Inside, they still used huge iron pots that weighed around 200 pounds empty and close to 900 pounds when full. Workers moved them along rails through the building, and the whole system was designed to let the beans work their way down, floor by floor, until they ended up in cans.

B&M kept making beans in East Deering until 2021, and for much of that time they were still baking them the old-fashioned way in brick ovens.

When people say Portland used to be an industrial city, I always understood it in theory. But this is what it actually looked like: canned corn and lobster coming off a line by the Presumpscot, sewer pipes stacked near Back Cove, window screens getting shipped all over the country, and the smell of baked beans coming out of East Deering.

Of everything we stopped making, though, I keep coming back to the tinned fish. Portland Packing Company was especially known for its canned lobster, and by 1876 they were winning awards for their canned lobster and mackerel.

And it wasn’t just Portland. Maine eventually became a huge sardine producer too. At one point, two out of every three sardines sold in the country were packed here.

Which makes it kind of funny that beautiful little tins of sardines, mussels, and mackerel are everywhere again, and so many of the ones I see are coming from Spain or Portugal.

Portland used to make things the rest of the country actually wanted.

I’d like to see us do a little more of that again.

Someone, please bring back Portland tinned fish.

I know I just sent you to Franciska, but somehow I already have another restaurant I need to tell you about. This time, though, I really don’t want to write another boring restaurant review, so I figured I’d test you instead. You read the Logbook, so I’m already assuming you’re one of the smarter people in the room. I believe in you.

Can you guess where I had one of the best meals I’ve had in months?

Bread and butter came first. Not free, but definitely worth the $8. A crisp baguette with soft, creamy French-style butter. Simple, but really, really good.

Then leeks vinaigrette. Beef tartare. Steak frites.

The leeks were soft and sweet with enough acid to keep you going back. The tartare was cold, rich, and exactly what I wanted it to be. Then came the steak frites with peppercorn sauce and a pile of fries we kept dragging through the plate long after we should have stopped.

And I’ll say it: it’s the best steak frites I’ve had in Portland.

What I liked most was that none of it was trying to be anything other than what it was. Bread and butter. Leeks. Tartare. Steak frites.

You already know what all of those things are supposed to taste like, so there’s not really anywhere to hide. If the bread is bad, you know. If the fries are bad, you definitely know.

Okay, a few more clues.

It’s small. Only about 20 seats inside. The menu leans very French, obviously, and the two people behind it met while working at one of New York's better-known French restaurants.

One of them also helped start the bread program there, which probably explains why I’m still talking about an $8 baguette.

Any guesses yet?

Mr Sun Album Release Show @ One Longfellow Square | 8 pm | 🎟️ $30

The Dream Eaters @ Portland House of Music | 8 pm | 🎟️ $18

Dylan Earl @ Oxbow Blending & Bottling | 7:30 pm | 🎟️ $20

Art for Opportunity: Maine Needs Auction @ Halo at the Point | 5 pm | Free

PMA Films: Filipiñana @ Portland Museum of Art | 4 pm | 🎟️ $7

Bess Jacques & The Strays @ Blue | 7 pm | 🎟️ $10.25

Monument Square Third Thursday Concerts @ Monument Square | 4:30 pm | Free

Lecture: The History That Inspired Homer @ Portland Museum of Art | 5:30 pm | Free

Portland Jazz Orchestra @ One Longfellow Square | 8 pm | 🎟️ $15

Joe Uehlein: Three Roads Book & Music Tour @ SPACE | 6 pm | Free

Luis J. Gomez @ Empire Comedy Club | 7 pm | 🎟️ $30

Krull w/ Martial Law, Black Box Recovery, Sythe @ Portland House of Music | 8 pm | 🎟️ $15

Sierra Hull @ State Theatre | 8 pm | 🎟️ $25

Criminal Presents: An Evening with Phoebe Judge @ Aura | 8 pm | 🎟️ $45

Stroudwater Bridge Ribbon Cutting @ Owls Nest Road Trailhead | 1:30 pm | Free

Chali 2na & Chris Karns @ Portland House of Music | 8 pm | 🎟️ $32

Esther Rose w/ Emily Hines and Small Sur @ SPACE | 8 pm | 🎟️ $22

Until next week,
— Jake Newman