Brooks is a town in Waldo County, Maine. The settlement was first named Washington Plantation, after George Washington. It is generally accepted that the first permanent settler in the area was Joseph Roberts, Jr., who moved to the area from Buckfield in 1799, selecting a spot about a mile north of where the village was later to be built. He cleared the land that became known as the Thorndike Place. One of the proprietors of the region, Israel Thorndike, wanted the land for the improvements that had been made to it by Roberts, so he exchanged with him for a large tract of land about a mile west of the first farm. Here he cleared another farm, building a saw mill and a grist mill on the site where the "Page Mills" would later be constructed.
The first settlers were poor for the most part, and had no roads to their land except for bridle paths cut through the forest. As the nearest store was in Belfast, people lived off of whatever they could grow, hunt, or fish. Lumbering came slowly, as the lumber had to be transported to Belfast by oxen or horses on wagons in the summer, and by sled in the winter, and the absence of roads made this difficult. As roads were eventually cleared, the routes from Dixmont, Jackson, Troy, Thorndike, Unity, and Knox led through Washington Plantation.
In 1816, the citizens petitioned the Legislature to incorporate as the town of Brooks, in honor of Governor John Brooks, ninth governor of Massachusetts, who had played a prominent role in the Revolutionary War, then served as governor for six terms.
In 1843, the town had four stores, a tannery, two grist mills, four sawmills, eight schools, and three churches. Brooks was also home to apple canneries, creameries, and wood products manufacturing companies. Agriculture played a significant role in the history of the town up until recent years, chiefly potato growing and dairy farming. When the railroad came in the 1860s, seven large pants manufacturing plants were built in Books, employing three hundred people at one time.