Kennebunkport, Maine

On a ruggedly beautiful stretch of rocky shoreline, the settlement first known as Cape Porpus, now the town of Kennebunkport, Maine, became home to English settlers around the same time as the founding of the Plymouth colony. The new residents had everything they needed in order to thrive in the New World: fertile soil, great fishing, plentiful lumber, and natural river falls for mills. And thrive they did; unfortunately, the increasing competition for resources caused friction with the native population. The “Indian depredations,” as they were called, began around 1675 and the attacks and killings continued for nearly a century, ending just in time for the area to gear up for another battle, the War of Independence. By the 1800s, though, the area began to prosper in earnest. Well-to-do shipyard owners, sea captains, and merchants built large, beautiful shingle-style homes in town, many of them along elegant Summer Street. The town’s tourist industry took off in the latter part of the 19th century and continues to this day with one added attraction: the summer home of George H. W. Bush.