A Brief History Of Maine Garage Doors

Living in a place like Portland, Maine can really cause a person to enjoy their automatic garage door. Nor’easters have brought blizzards to the Northeastern U.S. every year since 2003 with the exception of 2007. Cold weather is a norm in this part of the nation and it is nice to be able to be able to escape the frigid weather by stepping out of their cars directly into the garage. The push-button garage door opener has made all our lives just a little bit easier but, like most modern conveniences, hasn’t always been around. People used to be the garage door openers. So, lest we forget, let’s talk a bit about where garage doors come from.

Before people in Maine were able to enjoy a garage door, or even a car that went inside it, they got around with horse and buggy. The buggies were stored in what was called a carriage house, which was identical to a little barn. In the days previous to the garage door in Maine, or before gas powered automobiles for that matter, people got around in horse-drawn carriages. The late 1890′s saw the invention of the automobile, and wealthy people started to buy them. They were initially stored in the carriage houses along with the livestock. But the livestock smells that attached themselves to the cars caused a new solution to be formed.

Eventually local entrepreneurs found a way to make money off of the lack of automobile parking facilities as they began renting out spaces in small, public parking garages. These garages were appealing because they offered a clean, maintained place for a shiny car, far away from dirty animals. This method would have worked, in Maine as well as anywhere else, had the car not become so popular. Before anyone knew it, the supply of parking garage spaces couldn’t meet the demand. So, people reverted back to their carriage houses, which opened the door for the garage door evolution.

At first, barn doors were the only thing available, so that’s what people had hanging from strap hinges on their carriage houses. Then people got tired of having to shovel all the snow that Maine produces in the winter, so the sliding and folding doors were invented. This sliding door was nice but the garage had to be twice as wide as the car needed to allow space for the door from side to side. When a door that was divided into several small panels allowing it to fold was made, the need for an enlarged garage was no more. To make life easier still, the doors were made to slide up parallel to the ceiling, which got the door out of the way even further. Garage doors had almost reached their pinnacle.

The next step was to make the garage door open automatically. The industry had been successful in protecting the cars from the Maine’s Nor’easters, but now it was the people’s turn. Nobody likes to have to climb out of the car in a rain or snow storm to open up the garage, so a push-button system was made to do the job for us. This caused safety issues for little kids that thought the garage door was a magic toy. After several children were injured, laws were passed that made the pressure and motion sensors a must with garage doors. These sensors would pick up a child’s presence and send the door back up where it came from, leaving the child to scamper away safely. Where do we go from here? Where will the future of garage door evolution take us now? Time will tell.

Want to find out more about Maine garage doors, then visit the Portland Glass site on how to choose the best Maine Garage Door for your house.

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Filed under garage by Tom Richardson on Jul 5th, 2010.

A Brief History Of Maine Garage Doors

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