Radio Script #257
Little Talks On Common Things
March 13, 1955
More than once on this program we have pointed to the fact that moral and religious spokesmanship in our nation is not restricted to the clergy. Laymen ra ise proml nent voi ces in support of the nora I foundati ons of the Repub Ii c. Among these men are some of the leaders of America’s great Industries. On this program we have mentioned executives of U. S. steel # General Electric, Beneral Motors# and DuPont as such spokesmen. The professions also have such men# and it is to one of those I want to cal I your attention tonight.
Judge Harold R. Medina gai ned natl on-w i de prai sa by his sound judgment, his high principles# and his inexhaustible patience when he presided at the long trial of Communist leaders in 1949. Speaking not long ago at the cenTennial convocation of the Rhode Island College of Education# Judge Medina said: “From the earl iest times that I can remember # I have had unquestioning faith in the religious principles that form the basis of doctrine of my Church.” (Judge Medina is an Episcopalian.) “After months of turmoil and disorder duri n9 wh i ch I had suffered abuse after abuse from the Communi st attorneys# there came a time in the trial when I was physically and mentally exhausted# and I had to leave the bench one afternoon to lie down, and it seemed TO me that I shou I d never be ab Ie to return to the courtroom. As I I ay there in the I ittle room behind the courtroom, I prayed as I think I have never prayed before or since. After a time my strength was renewed and I went back to the bench and continued on to the end.”
On another~ occasion Judge Medina referred to our American slogan !!Equal justice for all”. He said: liThe very cornerstone and foundation of every aspect of American democracy is the spirit of pure, impartial, equal justice.
But far more important than justice in the courts is the spirit of justice In our hearts, and that spirit arises out of nora I conviction and religious fa ith • It
In “Kennebec Yesterdays”, In the chapter on Frozen Gold, I say of Kennebec Ice, “perhaps loads of it went even to Ca I cutta”. made the statement cautiously because I had never seen any authentic record of trans-oceanic shipment of Kennebec ice. I was delighted, therefore, to receive recently from the art dealer, Wi Ills Ballard of Southwest Harbor, a post card repro.,duction of a painting of the famous clipper ship “Eclipse”. I had heard of I that grand vessel many times, and had seen her picture in a collection owned by Mrs. Wallace Parsons, who is one of Waterville’s best informed persons on Maine maritime history. I knew the big ship had been bui It at Sath in 1878 and that she was rigged for sea at Wiscasset. ‘What I did not know is the tmportant information now added by Mr. Bal lard. He writes:
“Among other ships’ logs, I have that of the maiden voyage of the Eclipse. When she had been rigged at Wiscasset, she was then loaded with a cargo of ice. From Wiscasset she sailed across the South Atlantic, around the Cape of Good Hope, and on to Madras, India– a voyage of 107 days. She lay at Madras 17 days, but the log makes no mention of discharging cargo. She then cleared for Calcutta, and 22 days later tied up at the Ice-house buoy.” She discharged her cargo. If Wiscasset Ice went to Calcutta, no doubt the more plentiful Kennebec Ice went there too.
Forgotten except by a few of our older citizens Is the Blake Road, which at one ti me was the regu lar route from Watervi lie to the western and northern sections of the Belgrade Lakes. An article published about 20 years ago In the Watervi lie Senti ne I referred to th I s 01 d road, once a Iso known as the Tibbetts Road, and stated that it began at Marston Bridge and extended to Tyler’s Corner on the road to Smithfield.
Mr. Herbert Sturtevant of Ten Lots, past whose farm the road used to run, insists that the whole extent was never truly known as the Blake Road. He says the road from Marston Bri dge to Ten Lots was always ca lied the Marston Road, and that the Blake Road was the stretch from Ten Lots to Tyler’s Corner.
Before the days of the automobile Waterville peop Ie trave lied that road extensively, especially on weekends and holidays, as it provided a direct, short route to East Pond, and in fact was the shortest route to’Smithfield.
The road passed through dense woods before It carne out at Ty ler’s Corner. It was a cool, shaded ri de on a hot summer day.
One of the favorite buggy rides for’ Watervi lie citizens at the turn of the century was to go by the Blake Road to Ty ler ‘s Corner, conti nue to Smi thfield, stopping at North Pond, where was a tavern that featured fine foods.
From Sm’ithfield the riders would return by way of the Salmon Lake Road, stopping at Gleason’s Inn.
Lest some of our II steners toni ght do not recogn i ze these 0 I d names, let me explain a little. By Marston Bridge is meant the bridge oyer the Mes~alonskee on what we usua Ily ca II the County Road, by wh i ch one woul d natura Ily go to Ten Lots from Watervl Ilej that is out past the Thayer Hospital, across the Cedar Brl dge, then I nstead of goi ng through the underpass up to Col by Co liege, keep to the rl ght para lie I with the rai I road track. Just beyond the Holmes farm — the only large bui Idlngs on the right — you go down a grade to a valley where you cross the Messalonskee again. That crossing Is the Marston Bridge. A few rods farther along the road crosses the Oakland-Fairfield Center highway, and comes out at the Ten Lots corner where the WI II I ams Mamorl a I Bui Idlng stands. There the Marston Road stops, with no longer a continuation into the B lake Road. The I atter was long ago abandoned and has grown up to bushes.
As I have told you before, the fact that “Kennebec Yesterdays” reached people who are out of hearing range of this program has brought me many letters that contain rich contributions that I want from time to time to share with you. Natura II y “Kennebec Yesterdays” rai ses many unanswered questi ons about which I, as well as you, welcome more Information. One of those questions is what really happened to Watervi J Ie’s convicted murderer, Dr. Valorus Coolidge. Did he die naturally in prison? Did he die there by violence?
Oi d he escape?
About th i rty years ago, when I was trave II i ng over Mai ne for an educational publ isher, used to sell textbooks to Mr. F. L. S. ~10rse, then superintendent of School Union 72, comprising the towns of South Thomaston, St. George, Cushing, Friendship and Owls Head. I think I have not seen him since 1923. He is now retired, living in Thomaston, and last week wrote me a long letter. In it he has an interesting statement about the Coolidge case:
“Honorable E. K. O’Brien, a prominent man in the business and politics of Knox County I was associated with my father in several business enterprises. As a young man, Mr. O’Brien worked as a clerk at the State Prison in Thomaston. He told my father that he knew and could swear that the man who was brought to the prison as V. P. Coolidge died there a natural death, or so it seemed to him, and that it was the body of this man that was shipped to his home in Canton, Maine. Mr. O’Brien said that if the body was not that of Coolidge, then Coolidge was not the man who was brought to the prison. Mr. O’Brien was a man of honor. My father knew him intimately, and the two owned property togethe r • ”
Mr. Morse also gives some information about Hezekiah Prince, whose horse- back journey from Maine to Virginia in 1793 I recount in “Kennebec Yesterdays”.
I have often wondered what happened to Pri nce after he returned to Tlnomaston in the spring of 1794. Mr. Morse points out that when Prince first came to Thomaston, in the last decade of the eighteenth century, the town included al I of what are now Rockland, Owls Head and South Thomaston, in addition to the part sti II called Thomaston. At first Hezekiah I ived in the part that is now Rockland, and then at West Meadows with the Tolman fami Iy. By trade Pri nce was a carpenter, and one of his first Jobs was to bui I d a house for the Tolmans. When that was soon destroyed by fire, he immediately bui It another, which Mr. Morse believes is sti II standing.
After a few years Pri nce moved to South Thomaston, where he married I sabella Coombs, then made a third move to St. George, where he was a prominent town off i cer. About 1810 he bought a house at the Creek Hi I I — a house that sti II stands. His sons, Hezekiah Jr. and Christopher, became prominent citizens, the latter being a bank president and school agent in the 1890’s.
According to rv1r. Morse, Prince was a man who was always giving a helping hand to neighbors and to the community welfare. When the old minister had to reti re and turn over the parsonage to a younger successor, Hezek i ah Pri nee bui It a home for the old man and gave it to him with full title. He set up his nephew, Hezekiah Prince Coembs, as editor and publisher of the Thomaston Register in 1825, and he was always ready with help when trouble or sorrow hit a fami Iy. He organized a corporation which made and maintained the Elm Grove Cemetery.
Now all this is very interesting, but to me it is chiefly evi dence of how false one’s assumptions can be, Fortunately I do not say directly inrmy chapter called “Gittin’ Round” that Hezekiah Prince left his ancestral home or his wife and chi Idren when he made that long horseback journey in 1793. But I do say that he was 22 years old — old enough to have started a fami Iy. \’/hat was my assumption? Not that Hezekiah was then married, but that close relatives had thei r home in Thomaston and that he was leaving that home for his memorab Ie journey.
Mr. Morse makes it clear that my assumption was not true at all. Having reached the age of 21 and now his own man, so far as rights and wages were concerned, Hezekiah Prince went to Thomaston on his own, lived with the Tolman fami Iy unti I he set up housekeeping with his bride at South Thomaston several years after his return from that long horseback jaunt to Virginia.
Several I isteners have asked for some more interesting epitaphs; so let us close tonight’s program with a few of those old tombstone inscriptions. In New York’s Cherry Valley is this one: “Here lies the body of Obadiah Wi Ikinson and his wife Ruth. The i r wa rfare is accomp I i shed.” InS chenectady is th i s:
“He got a f i shbone in his th rcat, and then he sang an ange I note”. I n Co 1- chester, England a stone tells us: “Here lye the bones of Arabella Young, who on the 21 st of June began to hoI d her tongue”, Of a church organi st named Thomas Meni:deth a stone at St. Mary’s W1nton College, Oxford says: “Here lies one blown all out of breath, who lived a merry life and died a Merideth”. Over the grave of a Liverpool brewer are the words: “Poor John Scott lies buried here; although he was both hale and stout, death stretched him on the bitter bierj in another world he hops about,”
Right here in Maine, down in Machias, is an inscription of rather dubious interpretation: “Tears cannot restore her; therefore do I weep.” In one of the old burying grounds of Boston a stone says: “View this decaying spot with gravity; a dentist is fi I ling his last cavity”. And last of ai’, here’s one I’m sure you’ve heard before. It is actually inscribed on a stone in a country cemete ry i n Oh i 0 :
“Unde r th i s sod, unde r these trees,
LI es the body of So lomon Pease.
He’s not in this hole, but only his pod,
He she lied out his sou I and went up to God.”
Year: 1955