ORONO – Sometimes we learn as much about history by looking at details of the personal lives of historical characters as we do from cold, hard facts about historic events.

The University of Maine History Department’s 11th conference for Maine middle and high school teachers on Friday, Oct. 28, will explore that concept as part of its daylong program, “Biography and the Past: Interdisciplinary Approaches and Teaching Strategies.”

The annual event is expanding its scope to include disciplines beyond social studies, the traditional focus. Conference presenters include specialists in American studies, English and literature, folklore, fine art, American Indian studies and history, said Liam Riordan, associate professor of history and conference organizer.

The conference draws roughly 100 teachers to campus to participate in presentations about how to use recent scholarship in the classroom. The conference will be in the Wells Conference Center on the UMaine campus.

Registration is $30, which includes morning coffee, tea and refreshments and a buffet lunch at noon. Participants may receive 0.6 Continuing Education Unit credits for attending the conference by filling out a form the day of the conference and paying a $5 fee.

On-site registration begins at 8:30 a.m. The first formal event will be a keynote lecture starting at 9 a.m. by scholar Daniel Horowitz, professor of American studies and history at Smith College, on “The Historian’s Craft and the Writing of Biography.”

Three concurrent morning panels will address different issues related to how to use biographies in the classroom: “Literary Biography in the Internet Age: Bringing Dickinson, Longfellow and Mary Ellen Chase into the Classroom”; “Good and Bad Political Biography: The Pulitzer Prize, Vietnam and Japan”; and “Maine People as Living Archives: Oral Interviews and Biographical Evidence.”

The luncheon speaker is James E. Francis, the Penobscot Nation tribal historian.

For information, call professor Liam Riordan at 581-1913 or

e-mail: riordan@umit.maine.

edu.