Chris O’Brien, Ph.D., was named Director of the Margaret Chase Smith Library in September 2024. Previously, he was Director of the Theodore Roosevelt Center in Dickinson, ND; professor of History at the University of Maine at Farmington; Visiting Professor at Beijing University of Technology; and Visiting Lecturer at the University of Kansas. He chaired the Division of Social Science and Business at UMF; served for nearly a decade on the Maine Historical Records Advisory Board; and was a grant-reviewer for the National Historic Records Preservation Commission. A historian of the cultural Cold War, O’Brien is the author of several articles and book chapters on the subject. He earned his doctorate at the University of Kansas and his certificate in Higher Education Management from Harvard. He can be reached at cobrien@mcslibrary.org

John Taylor joined the library staff in 2013. He earned his B.S. in History and Political Science from Indiana State University and holds a M.A. in American History from Indiana University Indianapolis. John is the state coordinator for National History Day (NHD) in Maine and represents New England on the NHD Executive Council of Coordinators. He also assists in educational programming, emergency planning, and the creation, installation, and maintenance of museum exhibits. Previously, John served as a docent at the James Whitcomb Riley Museum Home in Indianapolis and worked both at the Indiana Historical Society and Indiana Historical Bureau. His area of specialty is the Cold War with a particular interest in pop culture of the 1950s and 60s. John may be reached at jtaylor@mcslibrary.org.

Kim served as an intern in 2015 before earning her B.S. in Information and Library Services from the University of Maine at Augusta. She joined the staff in 2019. She worked at Canaan Public Library and Skowhegan Free Public Library. She was an educator at Corbin Academy and Mr. Paperback before earning her degree. Kim is also a board member of the Brown Girl Brown Boy Literacy Foundation. Her email address is kimn@mcslibrary.org.

Nicole Potter joined the staff in 2021. She earned her B.A. in English Literature and Religious Studies from St. Lawrence University and her M.S. in Library and Information Science from Syracuse University School of Information Studies. Nicole’s specialization is cultural heritage preservation. Previously she worked at cultural institutions in New York, New Mexico, and Alaska, including ones preserving the legacies of other noteworthy Americans such as artist Georgia O'Keefe and author Ernest Hemingway. Immediately prior to starting at the Margaret Chase Smith Library, she was the Regional History Museum Librarian at The Community Library in Ketchum, Idaho. Nicole’s email is npotter@mcslibrary.org

Amos Reid came aboard on a part-time basis in 2011 to take care of facilities maintenance duties. He is a graduate of Thomas College. In his off-duty hours, he umpires youth baseball games and manages family real estate holdings. He may be reached at amosr@mcslibrary.org.

David Richards joined the Margaret Chase Smith Library staff as assistant director in 1996 and became director in 2012. Prior to his appointment at the Library, David served as executive secretary of the Androscoggin Historical Society in Auburn, Maine, and curator of collections at the United Society of Shakers in New Gloucester, Maine. David earned his B.A. in History from Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, his M.A. in New England Studies from the University of Southern Maine, and his Ph.D. in History from the University of New Hampshire. He is the author of Poland Spring: A Tale of the Gilded Age.

Gregory Gallant began coming to the Margaret Chase Smith Library soon after the facility opened in 1982 to research his University of Maine dissertation, "Margaret Chase Smith, McCarthyism, and the Drive for Political Purification." His work so impressed Library director Dr. James C. MacCampbell that he hired Greg as an assistant in 1984. Three years later, Greg became the new director of the Library, a position that he held until 2011. Dr. Gallant recently published a biography of Senator Smith, which is also a cultural history of the United States during the Cold War,  Hope and Fear in Margaret Chase Smith’s America: A Continuous Tangle.