Millinocket is a former mill town

Mill town

A mill town, also known as factory town or mill village, is typically a settlement that developed around one or more mills or factories .- United Kingdom:...

 in Penobscot County

Penobscot County, Maine

Penobscot County is a county located in the U.S. state of Maine. For U.S. Census statistical purposes, it is part of the Bangor, Maine, New England County Metropolitan Area . As of 2010, the population was 153,923...

, Maine

Maine

Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...

, United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. The population was 5,203 at the 2000 census. Millinocket is both a forest product

Forest product

A forest product is any material derived from a forest for commercial use, such as lumber, paper, or forage for livestock. Wood, by far the dominant commercial forest product, is used for many industrial purposes, such as the finished structural materials used for the construction of buildings, or...

s and recreational area.
It was first settled in 1829 by Thomas Fowler and his family, who cleared land for a farm

Farm

A farm is an area of land, or, for aquaculture, lake, river or sea, including various structures, devoted primarily to the practice of producing and managing food , fibres and, increasingly, fuel. It is the basic production facility in food production. Farms may be owned and operated by a single...

. When the Bangor and Aroostook Railroad

Bangor and Aroostook Railroad

The Bangor and Aroostook Railroad is a defunct United States railroad company, that brought rail service to Aroostook County, Maine. Brightly painted BAR box cars attracted national attention in the 1950s. First-generation diesel locomotives operated on BAR until they were museum pieces...

 extended service to Houlton

Houlton, Maine

Houlton is a town in Aroostook County, Maine, on the United States – Canada border, located at . As of the 2010 census, the town population was 6,123. It is perhaps best known as being at the northern terminus of Interstate 95 and for being the birthplace of Samantha Smith...

 in 1894, the line ran through the area, opening it to development. Charles W. Mullen, an engineering

Engineering

Engineering is the discipline, art, skill and profession of acquiring and applying scientific, mathematical, economic, social, and practical knowledge, in order to design and build structures, machines, devices, systems, materials and processes that safely realize improvements to the lives of...

 graduate from the University of Maine

University of Maine

The University of Maine is a public research university located in Orono, Maine, United States. The university was established in 1865 as a land grant college and is referred to as the flagship university of the University of Maine System...

, proposed a hydroelectric dam on the Penobscot River

Penobscot River

The Penobscot River is a river in the U.S. state of Maine. Including the river's West Branch and South Branch increases the Penobscot's length to , making it the second longest river system in Maine and the longest entirely in the state. Its drainage basin contains .It arises from four branches...

.