FARMINGTON – On Monday night, March 26 at 7 p.m., First-Year Experience at the University of Maine at Farmington will present The Home Road documentary film at the Lincoln Auditorium at Roberts Learning Center. The event is free and open to the public and includes a post-screening discussion with Maine filmmaker, Tonya Shevenell and her father, Ray Shevenell, who stars in the film.
In 1845, 19-year-old Israel Shevenell left his home in Canada and walked nearly 200 miles to Biddeford, Maine. He found work as a brick maker and is recognized as the city’s first permanent French-Canadian settler and French voter. In 2015, his 74-year-old great-great-grandson, Ray Shevenell, retraced the pioneering journey, walking from Compton, Quebec to Biddeford.
Tonya Shevenell tells their stories in her first documentary film, The Home Road. Ray Shevenell’s ancestral trek shapes the 75-minute film. Layered over the adventure are interviews, archive photos, narrations, stories and an original soundtrack by Maine filmmaker and composer, Sumner McKane. For more information about the film, see the website at www.thehomeroad.com or watch the official film trailer at the link here.
