The Federal Street Historic District of Brunswick, Maine encompasses a part of the town whose development was influenced by its 18th-century success as a shipping center, and by the presence of Bowdoin College (chartered 1794), whose historic central campus is part of the district.

[1] The town of Brunswick was chartered in 1737, and was initially powered economically by mills along the Androscoggin River, and by maritime trade.

Bowdoin College was chartered in 1794, and its first buildings constructed on the campus south of the town center in 1799 and 1808.

The college extended the idea of the Park Row mall along the western edge of its campus.

[2] The historic district encompasses the traditional heart of the Bowdoin campus, bounded by Maine and College Streets on the west and south, Silas Drive on the East, and Bath Road to the north.