Maine · Nonprofit
MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY
MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY (Maine) receives grants from 58 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,125,524 to it, the largest being Maine Community Foundation Inc ($922,015). 39 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $1.9M
- Funders on record
- 58
- Grants received
- $3.1M
- Net assets
- $13M
What Maine Historical Society does
Mission
Maine Historical Society, founded in 1822, is a private non-profit whose mission is to preserve and share Maine's story. Based in Portland, we work closely with communities and partners throughout the state, and serve a statewide and global audience, reaching people interested in Maine throughout the world. Our core program areas include the Brown Research Library, the MHS Museum which includes the Wadsworth-Longfellow House (1785-6), and the Maine Memory Network (www.mainememory.net), our nationally recognized digital platform. Through these activities, MHS serves approximately 500,000 people each year on our campus, through outreach programs, and online.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
The Brown Research Library provides access to the most comprehensive collection of archival material related to Maine history and serves researchers, scholars, educators, students, genealogists, the general public, and professionals from many fields. Major recent acquisitions include the archives of the Central Maine Power Company, Bangor Theological Seminary, the Merrill Companies, Maine Medical Center, landscape architect Patrick Chasse, and architect Carol Wilson. We recently completed major collections initiatives related to our early Maine photography, Portland Press Herald, Glass Plate Negative, clothing, architecture, and Proprietors and Northeast Boundary collections. MHS also supports extensive scholarly and collections activities. We publish the scholarly journal Maine History with the History Department at the University of Maine and regularly host fellowships and scholarly forums. We also partner with and provide archival, curatorial, storage, and other services to individuals, institutions, and businesses
$1,060,297 spent$39,133 earned by the program51% of program spendingThe MHS Museum offers tours of the Wadsworth-Longfellow House, changing exhibitions, and public programs that use Maine history to provide information, context, and perspective for issues of contemporary interest and concern. Recent major initiatives explored immigration, veterans' issues, Maine's food heritage and economy, Maine's evolving paper industry, and 13,000 years of Wabanaki presence in and stewardship of Maine. Each includes an exhibition, digital resources, extensive public programs delivered via Zoom, and educational resources that support remote learning. All are available online. Last year's exhibition, Notorious: Maine Crime in the Public Eye, 1690-1940, explored Maine's fascination with true crime.
$1,020,898 spent$157,149 earned by the program49% of program spending
The 2 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $2,081,195.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2021 to 2022, from $13M to $15M (+17%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2017 32% · 2018 12% · 2019 7% · 2020 12% · 2021 13% · 2022 6% · 2023 7% · 2024 20% · 2025 6%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
61% of MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (63% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 7 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Chief executive
Stephen Bromage
Executive Director
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 15 funders to 26 funders, grant income rose $126k → $866k.
10 of 58 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 43% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 58 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 29% of grant income, and it takes 4 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 4 funders to its left
47% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 40% · 2018 32% · 2019 34% · 2020 18% · 2021 18% · 2022 28% · 2023 49% — growing more concentrated.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
53% of MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 67% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
64% of MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY's grant income comes from Maine funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $1.3M arriving through sponsors registered in 10 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY's funding base is broadening — from 15 funders to 26 as grant income climbed.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 3,230 arts & culture nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Government funding MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $976k on record.
- National Endowment for the Humanities$842k
- Institute of Museum and Library Services$134k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In Maine
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
69% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
83%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Part of a family of 1 related entity
- Mhs Inc · exempt
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY?
- MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY (Maine) receives grants from 58 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,125,524 to it, the largest being Maine Community Foundation Inc ($922,015). 39 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY have?
- IRS filings report 58 organizations giving $3,125,524 in grants to MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY, 39 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY?
- Maine Community Foundation Inc is the largest funder on record, with $922,015 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like MAINE HISTORICAL SOCIETY find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Maine. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds Maine Historical Society →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 58 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing