The Maine Art Gallery is housed in the red brick school house built in 1807 during Thomas Jefferson's Presidency. The Old Academy is a historic building that was used as a school into the 1950's.
In 1957, Mildred Burrage, artist and patron of the arts, founded the gallery in this building for artists living and working in Maine.

Today it is a non-profit self-sustaining gallery dependent on devoted volunteers and memberships.