AUBURN — Androscoggin Historical Society will host an educational program with local collector, educator and businessman Lew Alessio entitled “Passing Fancy.” The talk will take place at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 17, at the Society’s museum on the third floor of the County Building.

This program describes “ephemera,” as written or printed material not meant to be retained or preserved. However, much has survived and is the subject of collections of all kinds. The program will use many colorful and fascinating examples of local ephemeral history.

Using vintage images and objects, the evening’s highly visual presentation will explore the role of ephemera in Central Maine from the late 1800s to World War II — Lewiston’s own “Golden Age.”

For more than half a century, the city of Lewiston was unique in its development as a center of commercial and social activity in Maine. As a result, its disparate immigrant populations were united in their creation of a community whose day-to-day interactions depended on printed paper goods.

Alessio looks at paper from the city’s past — catalogs to greeting cards, trade cards to advertising, postcards, programs, billboards and broadsides, with some familiar names and faces, and more than a few surprises. Those who have family accumulations of such materials and collectors of such paper goods are welcome to an engaging evening.

Alessio has collected examples of ephemera since childhood with a deep interest in paper goods that affected the everyday lives of rural folk. Born and raised in New York City, Alessio has lived for 43 years in the 1791 Bachelder Stetson homestead in Greene, which he shares with his husband, Jim Shaffer, four cats, and the spirits of generations of the quite remarkable Stetson family. 

Admission for this program is free, although donations are gratefully accepted. Those attending should enter the County Building at the side door on Court Street and proceed to the third floor. An elevator is available.

FMI: 207-784-0586.