1. Maine achieved statehood on November 5, 1820. It was the 23rd state to join the Union, and its admission was part of the Missouri Compromise, which aimed to maintain the balance of slave and free states in the new United States.

2. The first woman to be elected governor in the United States, Margaret Chase Smith, was born in Maine on November 5, 1897. Smith served as a U.S. Senator from Maine from 1949 to 1973 and ran unsuccessfully for the Republican presidential nomination in 1964.

3. On November 5, 1944, the Maine Maritime Academy’s training ship, the State of Maine, was torpedoed and sunk by a German U-boat off the coast of Newfoundland. Nine crew members died in the attack, but the remaining 119 were rescued by nearby vessels.

4. November 5, 1922 marked the beginning of the Great Fire of 1922, which destroyed much of the city of Portland, Maine. The fire started in a commercial building downtown and quickly spread, ultimately burning over 1,700 buildings and causing $15 million in damages.

5. Maine’s first Native American representative to the state legislature, Donna Loring, took office on November 5, 1998. Loring, who is Penobscot, served in the Maine House of Representatives until 2004, advocating for Native American rights and issues during her tenure.