Temple, Maine
| Temple, Maine | |
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| Town | |
Temple Historical Society, formerly the historic No. 5 Schoolhouse
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 Temple
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| Coordinates: 44°40′53″N 70°15′35″W / 44.68139°N 70.25972°W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | Maine |
| County | Franklin |
| Area | |
| • Total | 35.76 sq mi (92.62 km2) |
| • Land | 35.53 sq mi (92.02 km2) |
| • Water | 0.23 sq mi (0.60 km2) |
| Elevation | 1,230 ft (375 m) |
| Population (2010) | |
| • Total | 528 |
| • Estimate (2012) | 535 |
| • Density | 14.9/sq mi (5.8/km2) |
| Time zone | Eastern (EST) (UTC-5) |
| • Summer (DST) | EDT (UTC-4) |
| ZIP code | 04984 |
| Area code(s) | 207 |
| FIPS code | 23-75980 |
| GNIS feature ID | 0582761 |
Temple is a town in Franklin County, Maine, United States. The town was named after Temple, New Hampshire. It is located at the end of Maine State Route 43 (Temple Road), and is said to be one of only two towns in Maine to be situated at the end of a public highway. The population was 528 at the 2010 census.
Hill-farmers from Temple, New Hampshire, Old North Yarmouth, Maine, and nearby Farmington settled the town beginning in 1796. It incorporated in 1803. Commercial sawmills operated on Temple Stream in the village for many years in the 1800s and 1900s, providing the town a robust local economy. Logging is still vibrant in Temple, but its timber is now trucked to mills in nearby towns. The town contains a town hall (formerly an elementary school), a post office in the former general store, a theater (formerly the Congregational Church), a fire station, and a youth baseball field, established in 1957, commemorating the life of Larry Boyce, the former Temple Townies player and manager for whom the field is named.
What is now Maple Street was once called Cowturd Lane, due to "the smell of manure, fresh from cows walking in the road on their way to (pasture) and back, hanging in the air like swamp gas."
Temple is a sanctuary for writers, poets, artists, and crafters, and the setting for several novels, biographies, and memoirs: Shawno (George Dennison), Temple (Dennison), Temple Stream: A Rural Odyssey (Bill Roorbach), Upcountry: Reflections from a Rural Life (Robert Kimber), A Soldier's Son: An American Boyhood During World War II (John E. Hodgkins), and The Town that Ends the Road (Theodore Enslin).
Besides the above, a number of well-known writers either lived or summered in Temple, including Denise Levertov, Mitchell Goodman, and C. J. Stevens.
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Wikipedia