Zoom History Happy Hour: Seth Eastman

Seth Eastman: A Celebrated 19th Century Artist of the American West from Brunswick Seth Eastman was born in Brunswick in 1808, the oldest of thirteen children. When he was sixteen, he joined the Army. During a career on the US frontier, he became an accomplished mapmaker and artist, recording many scenes of American Indian life. He married the daughter of a Dakotah chief, but later abandoned his family. Eventually, he returned to the Minnesota frontier and completed hundreds of illustrations for a monumental study of Native Americans. The story came full circle to Brunswick in 1852 when his second wife, Mary Henderson Eastman, in response to HBS’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, published the most widely read defense of Southern slaveholding. Citizen historian Jym St. Pierre has assembled a slide talk about this story. In the process Jym discovered that he and Seth Eastman have a common ancestor from the 16th century. Presenter: Jym St. Pierre. Jym has delivered several programs, led walking tours, and curated three exhibits for PHC. He earned BA and MPS degrees at the University of Maine and has held senior positions in Maine in the Department of Conservation, The Wilderness Society, and Sierra Club. Jym has been involved in many organizations and was founding director or chair of several, including Citizens to Protect the Allagash, Maine Conservation Voters, Maine Forest Biodiversity Project, Kennebec Land Trust, and Capital Area Camera Club. He was a founding member of Friends of Baxter State Park and has been on the board since 2009. For nearly three decades, he was Maine Director of RESTORE: The North Woods. For his longtime conservation work he was awarded the Walter H. “Doc” Phillips Award by the Brunswick Rotary Club in 2025. A Maine native, Jym is a published author, an award-winning photographer, and a poet.   FREE BUT PLEASE REGISTER