Once a farm purchased by the William Tuttle family in 1797, the Desert of Maine in Freeport consists of 40 acres of silt deposits left in the wake of a glacier that slid through the area about 10,000 years ago.

When the Tuttle family farmed the land, a layer of topsoil fostered crop production. However, poor agricultural practices led to creeping erosion and exposed the silt, which overtook the land and rendered the soil barren. Around 1936, a sign posted in the midst of a plant reads: "Buried Alive - This Cherry Tree will soon be completely submerged."

The Tuttle family sold the property in 1919 to the entrepreneurial Henry Goldrup, who then opened the site as a tourist attraction in 1925.