Even before World War II when Seabrook Farms employed more than 5,000 workers from around the globe, the mega-farm had an interesting history. Established in 1880, Seabrook Farm was the site of the first food freezing plant in the world. The process, developed by Clarence Birdseye and Charles Seabrook, turned the food industry on its ears and for a while Seabrook Farms would become one of the nation’s centers of food production. 

Seabrook Farms hit its peak during World War II when Japanese workers, many of whom were the grown children of Japanese citizens who had been sent to internment camps, Peruvian immigrants, European refugees, Caribbean newcomers and people from Appalachia in search of work all lived and worked together in a mini-international village at Seabrook. 

The Seabrook Educational and Cultural Center depicts the life and times of Seabrook’s history with changing photographic exhibitions, displays of artifacts and recorded oral histories which you can hear during your visit. There are also dozens of films that show the workers in the village that Charles Seabrook built to house them and life in the Seabrook plant. Some of the most powerful films tell the stories of the interred Japanese citizens.

Nearby you can also see some of the houses that remain from the original Seabrook village but you can’t go inside as they are private residences.