Bowdoin's most famous son may be Joshua Chamberlain, a professor of languages,who commanded 20th Maine at Little Round Top at Gettysburg. Hero of the novel "Killer Angels" and the move "Gettysburg" based on the book. Late a general, president of Bowdoin, and several times governor of Maine,..H

Commdore Perry's house is either on the Bowdoin grounds or immediately next to it. Bowdoin faculty sometimes rent it, and a friend once lived there. It was decorated with whale bone carving Eskimos made for Perry's daughter.