Northeast Historic Film (NHF) is a moving image archives, incorporated as a non-profit organization in 1986. We are located in the Alamo Theatre, a 1916 cinema building, in Bucksport, Maine.
Our mission is to collect and preserve the film and video record of northern New England (Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Massachusetts), and to provide public access to the history and culture of the region embodied in it.
Our collections contain ten million feet of film and more than 8,000 hours of video; most of these materials are unique and irreplaceable. NHF cares for film from hundreds of northern New England places in a three-story temperature and humidity controlled vault building, which also provides state-of-the-art storage for institutions from throughout the east coast. Collectively our holdings constitute a record of 20th century regional culture seen from countless angles: the factory floor and the farm, in the woods and at sea, at home with our families and on the streets of our hometowns.
We opened the restored Alamo Theatre auditorium in 1999 as a contemporary 125 seat auditorium with outstanding projection facilities and a small stage for live events. Our objective for the cinema and the Alamo as a whole is to play a role in the town of Bucksport consonant with the building’s history as a gathering place, linking moving images to the town’s cultural legacy and future. Over 15,000 people attend events at the Alamo each year. We present public exhibits, screenings, documentaries, symposia, film festivals, teachers workshops and workshops for the public on preservation, regional culture, and other topics.
