Lillian Ames Stevens

The Maine Industrial School for Girls or the State School for Girls in Hallowell became commonly called the Stevens School after Lillian Ames Stevens who was a staunch supporter of the school and one of the first 5 trustees in 1885. The school functioned from 1875 to 1920.

While by today’s standards the treatment of the girls might be considered harsh, at the time of its creation the school was considered progressive in its kindness to “wayward girls”.

The stated purpose of the school:

“. . .designed as a refuge for girls between the ages of seven and fifteen years, who, by force of circumstances or associations, are in manifest danger of becoming outcasts of society. It is not a place of punishment, to which its inmates are sent as criminals by criminal process– but a home for the friendless, neglected and vagrant children of the State, where under the genial influences of kind treatment and physical and moral training, they may be won back to ways of virtue and respectability, and fitted for positions of honorable self support and lives of usefulness.”

the little bronze “water girl” as she is know was originally given in honor of Lillian Ames Stevens. I visually quote it here as a way to remember Stevens part in what we now call Stevens Commons in Hallowell.

artist, Chris Cart

Stevens Commons

The various brick buildings of Stevens Commons were once part of the Maine Industrial School for Girls or Stevens School and the entire campus is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The old brick buildings of the original campus have now been beautifully restored by Mastway Development, LLC of Winthrop, Maine and are currently used by local business and dormitories for students of University of Maine, Augusta.