Wells, Maine
Near Old Orchard Beach, Maine
Wells was settled in the early sixteen forties, making it one of the oldest English communities in Maine. John Wheelwright, the Puritan minister banished from Massachusetts Bay for backing Anne Hutchinson, obtained a deed from the Abenaki sachems and planted this coastal village on the Webhannet River. The name Wells carried over from the town of Wells in Somerset, England.
Through King Philip's War and the colonial frontier conflicts of the sixteen eighties and nineties, the settlement was repeatedly attacked and burned, yet survivors rebuilt each time. Today Wells is best known for its seven miles of sandy beach and the Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge, which protects the salt marshes Carson wrote about in the nineteen fifties.
