ALFRED — When Sandra Howe began thinking about a mural she’d been commissioned to paint at the Alfred Shaker Museum, she looked to some historical sketches that showed details of where buildings stood in the once-thriving United Society of Believers community in about 1875.

She looked at engravings by Phares Goist, an artist who specialized in “bird’s eye views,” and colored drawings by Elder Joshua Bussell, an Alfred Shaker mapmaker for 40 years.

That mural, painted this past August, will be unveiled for the first time at a 1 p.m. ceremony today at the museum at 118 Shaker Hill, to which the public is invited.

“There’s a lot of detail about the way (the community) looked on a midsummer day in 1875,” said Howe, of Cornish.

The piece is historically accurate ”“ a feature Friends of the Alfred Shaker Museum was looking for when it applied and won a grant for the creation of the work from the Maine Arts Commission and Maine Humanities Council, said Mary Lee Dunn Maguire, president of FASM. It’s not only visually pleasing, but will be used as an educational tool for schoolchildren, informing youngsters of how life used to be on Shaker Hill.

The United Society of Believers lived, farmed and worshiped here during the early beginnings of the community in 1793 until 1931, when the dwindling community consolidated with the Shaker community at Sabbathday Lake. The property was sold that year to the Brothers of Christian Instruction, who continue to live at Shaker Hill.

“Alfred’s local history has both local and national significance,” said Maguire. “We are working to collect it, explain it and present it. All are welcome to help and to enjoy. The mural project has been planned for two years, and we are very pleased now that we can feast our gaze on what we pictured in our mind’s eye.”

Also debuting at the unveiling is a new choral group called the Alfred Shaker Museum Singers, organized by Barbara Berry.

Brother Arnold Hadd of Sabbathday Lake Shakers is guest speaker.

More than 50 buildings are featured in the mural. The artwork graces a two-story wall in the first-floor Morrison Community Room, named for Earl and Elizabeth Morrison of Alfred, who have been two of the prime movers in the museum project in the former Shaker Carriage House, according to a museum news release.

Under blue skies, the mural shows what the Shaker community in Alfred looked like more than 100 years after the community was established and 56 years before its demise. It shows farmers haying the fields, sheep and cattle grazing, and meticulously maintained vegetable gardens and an orchard. A pristine white fence lines the roadway. Buildings sport white, deep red and buttery yellow paint. A careful look shows peddler Elder Henry Green, driving out of town in his wagon.

Maguire said the idea for a mural came from the volunteer building crew, which has been meeting each Tuesday for years to restore the museum building. Despite the ongoing work, the museum has been opened to the public on Wednesday and Saturday afternoons from 1-4 p.m. or by appointment between May and October.

During this afternoon’s event, prints and notecards of the mural will be available.

Howe, who is also a nurse, teaches mural painting in the Rufus Porter style in a museum named for him in Bridgton. Murals in the Porter style are of an earlier time period. Howe noted the mural of Alfred Shaker village contains more detail than is typical of a Porter mural.

“It was a fun project and different from what I’ve done before,” she said.

The museum ”“ and now the mural that graces it ”“ is a way for people to “step back in time for a minute,” said Howe.

— Senior Staff Writer Tammy Wells can be contacted at twells@journaltribune.com or 324-4444.