While the formal embassies stood in Washington, D.C, the capital city’s sweltering climate drove many American politicians and foreign diplomats out of the city during the summer months of the pre-World War I era. During this period, Bar Harbor was a popular destination for a group of European legations, including diplomats from Portugal, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, and Austria-Hungary.

Watch a fascinating lecture by Dr. Kristina Poznan, as she discussed Bar Harbor’s unlikely role as one of the most important diplomatic centers in the world. Dr. Kristina E. Poznan is a scholar of American migration and foreign relations and is an assistant professor of history at the University of Maryland. She is currently the managing editor of the Journal of Slavery and Data Preservation, the journal of Enslaved.org and is at work on a book manuscript, “Migrant Nation Builders: The Politics of Mobility from the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the United States, 1880s-1920s.”