Radio Script #311
Little Talks On Common Things
September 23, 1956
Almost every American who visits Nova Scotia goes to the Annapolis Valley, the land of Evangeline. So wei I known is Longfel low!s poem to every American who attended school anywhere in the United States, that many people on this side of the Canadian border identify Nova Scotia with Longfellow’s heroine of the Acadian exi Ie.
The Annapolis Val ley is much more than the historic land of the exi led French settlers. It is one of the best known and most productive apple regions in North America; it grows lucious, big strawberries, and its farms are large and abundantly ferti Ie. It has at Wolfvi I Ie one of the best of Canada’s colleges, Acadia University, and at Kentvi I Ie one of the finest, moderately priced hotels to be found anywhere, the famous Cornwal lis Inn.
But after all, Longfel low was born in Maine. So were many lesser folk like me. What could be more natural than that we Maine natives should want to see, above al I else in the Annapolis Val ley, the site of old Grand Pre on the Basin of Minas?
TlThis is the forest primeval”. Such are the opening words of Longfel-:low’s poem. If he takes them literally, the reader can get a very wron!=! impression of Grand Pre. There never was a primeval forest on the site of the old Acadian vi Ilage. The thick woods were not far away, and more than once the harassed settlers fled for refuge to its concealing growth. But a careful reading of the poem wi I I reveal that, although Longfel low never visited Nova Scotia, he knew very well what the region around Grand Pre was like.
These first French settlers had come from the lowland district of France, where for centuries they and their ancestors, like the Dutch, had kept out the sea by bui Iding dikes, and had thus been able to cultivate the marsh lands. So, unlike the English, who cut down the big trees and made clearings in the forest, these Frenchmen diked the marshes and turned the salty waste land into ferti Ie meadows, so marvelously ferti Ie that the whole level region was called Grand Pre, the Great Meadow.
From those rich farms, lush with crops and herds, the thrif.ty Canadians were expel led by the British conquerors in 1755 in the tragic dispersal that gave Longfellow the ~tory of Evangeline and her life-long search for her separated lover. The present inhabitants of the Annapolis Val ley are loyal subjects of Queen Elizabeth, just as true to the British crown as were their ancestors to the successors of the first Elizabeth, 300 and 200 years ago. So these good British folk wi I I tel I you that it was the stubbornness of those Acadian French — their determination not to cooperate with the conquerors -that made their deportation necessary. But even those apologists admit it was a brutal act.
On the site of the old Acadian church the Canadian Pacific Rai I road maintains a public park, with spacious lawns, numerous flower beds, and a series of ponds with pond Ii lies ranging in color from pure white to deep lavender. In the replica of the old church is housed a museum of historical relics. The church is a reminder of Acadian days, but the museum is disappointing. There is no order to the exhibits. Articles used in the early eighteenth century by the Acadians are jumbled together with later British relics. The visitor with a liking for historical accuracy is often baffled by the confusion. It is a pity that the articles authenticated as truly Acadian cannot be placed by themselves. For perhaps the vi I lage blacksmith who was the counterpart of Longfel low’s Basi I made some of the very tools in the Grand Pre museum — the spades, the three-tined pitch forks, the hand-wrought nails, the huge hinges, the plow shares, and the spiked harrow teeth. Many an Acadian girl like Evangel ine carded and spun and wove on the old cloth-making household implements.
The museum makes much of a letter written by LongfeJ”low to Nathaniel Hawthorne, thanki ng the I atter for g i vi ng the poet the idea for Evange line, and especially saying that Hawthorne had been very generous to give up the idea of writing on the subject himself, in prose that readers might take for a poem, only to let Longfellow write it in poetry which the reader might take for prose. In that humorous compliment, Longfel low perhaps spoke more wisely than he knew, for he wrote Evange line in dacty I i c hexamete r, a form of ve rse bad I y suited to English words, though admirable in Greek or Latin.
But anyhow, we Ma i ne fo I ks are especi ally interested in that letter, for Grand Pre boasts only a copy of it, whi Ie the original in Longfel low’s own hand reposes right here in Maine, in the library of Bowdoin College, from which both Longfel low and Hawthorne were graduates.
Not far from the church is the old vii I age wei I, appropriately cal led Evangel ine’s wei I, and on the spacious lawn in front of the church is a I ifesized statue of the girl herself. It makes no difference that Evangeline was a fictional character, the product of a poet’s imagination. Many girls quite like her actually lived and loved and lost in that tragic community 200 years ago. There she stands, carved in stone, on the flowered lawn at Grand Pre, a reminder that a man from Portland, Maine, immortalized in verse her and her stricken people, who first made habitable the great Acadian land.
In Grand Pre there is also a post-Acadian bui Iding worth a visit. It is the Church of the Covenanters, erected by Presbyterians early in the nineteenth century, who came to the region as Loyalists at the time of the American Revolution.
It is preserved in its original state, like the old church at Alna, Maine, or the old German church at Waldoboro. Its immense high pulpit, with sounding board like that in the Old South Church of Boston, dominates the sanctuary and looks down on the old box pews. Services are sti I I held here in July and August, but not in the winter, although two huge box stoves are st i I lin p I ace.
As I sTood in the Church of the Covenanters, I could not but contemplate how the hand of fate deals with communities over historic time. Here in 1755 the Acadians were driven out into exi Ie — to New Orleans, to Alabama, to our own St. John Val ley, to other parts of New England, to the then desolate, uninhabited west shore of Cape Breton Island. And here, to the same place, thirty years later in 1785, had come members of the same conquering British people, themse I ves dri ven into exi Ie from Boston and New Haven and other New England towns. Exi les come and exi les go. Such is the cruel dictate of conquest.
Patriotic loyalty is a fine thing, and one ought not to think too harshly of patriots who back a losing side. If we had not won the Revolution, it would have been the Washingtons, the Jeffersons, and the Adamses who, instead of the Grand Pre Covenanters, went into exi Ie.
The City of Hallowell, one of the oldest Kennebec settlements,above ~!1errymeeting Bay, is known today chiefly as the site of the fartPus Wooster House.
In the 1870’s and 80’s Hallowell was a noted granite center. In 1871 had been organized the Hallowell Granite Company under the presidency of Governor Joseph Bodwell. The company opened extensive quarries 2t mi les from the Hallowell wharves near the Manchester town line. The company became very prosperous and its stone was said to be the finest grade of white granite found anywhere in Maine. IT became one of the nation’s largest suppliers of ~ranite for publie bu i I dings. Of Ha flowe I I gran i te are the custom house at New Or leans, the New York StaTe Capitol at Albany, the Equitable Life Insurance Building in New York, the Pi Igrim monument at Plymouth, Mass., the Soldier’s Monument on Boston Common, and the mertPrial monuments at Gettysburg. The granite works at one time employed more than 400 men, shipped out 100,000 cubic feet of ~ranite a year, and did a yearly business of a quarter of a mi Ilion dol lars.
Of course stone was quarried around Hal lowe I I for local purposes long before 1871, but it is interesting that Emma Huntington Nason’s big history, !~Old Ha II owe lion the Kennebec”, makes no menti on of gran i te at a II. Yet, as Mrs. Nason clearly shows, Hal lowel I was a prosperous town long before the founding of its granite indusTry.
As one drives along Hallowell’s river front today, it is hard to real ize that in 1800 that river front was a beehive of activity_ Hal lowel I was then the busi est place in Ma i ne east of Portl and, and its peop Ie· fe It sure it was on the way to becoming the metropolis of the whole District of Maine. Its wharves were lined with packets, loading barley, oats, corn, lumber and potash, or unloading manufactured goods from Boston or products of the West Indies.
Ferry boats carried persons, horses, and carts across the Kennebec. Out of the vi Ilage ran sixteen stage coaches. The main street was often so crowded with country teams that it was difficult for carriages to pass. Merchants, in from their country stores as far away as Belgrade and Readfield, Winthrop and Wayne, drove directly to the wharves, where they bought groceries, rum, molasses and other products right off the ship. Hal lowell was the bus i ness center of a reg i on 60 mi les around.
Prominent Hallowel I citizens got delusions of grandeur. They hoped to dispute with Montreal and Quebec the business of lower Canada north of New Hampsh ire and VermonT. In 1807 the Ameri can Encyc I opedi a sa i d that Ha I lowe II was the natural head of Kennebec navigation, that it was a better distribution point for Canada than was Portland, and that it was certain to become one of the largest American cities.
The principal source of the town’s prosperity was trade resulting from its access by ocean-going ships. It was practically a seaport town, and like many such towns, it took to shipbui Iding. The vessels bui It and owned at Hal 1- owel I sai led not only up and down the American coast, but to foreign ports across the Atlantic and even around the Horn. Return cargoes brought huge profits to the owners. Much of the capital of the town was invested in its ships.
The expected trade with Canada did not develop. Instead the bui Iding of the Atlantic and St. Lawrence Rai I road turned that trade to Portland. Then came the Portland and Kennebec Rai I road, going through to the new state capital at Augusta. Bit by bit Hal lowe I I lost the trade of a wide area, the Androscoggin and Kennebec Rai I road picking up the farmer’s products between Watervi I Ie and Danvi lie, the rai I road to Farmington taking the business of Franklin County. At I ast there was left I:i tt J-e- more than loca I bus i ness unt i I the great granite industry got underway in the 1870’s.
It is fascinating, disappointing, and disi Ilusioning — this story of the rise and fall and the rising again of a Maine town, only in our day to fal I again to the commercial depths it knew at the time of the Civi I War. The ups and downs of fortune, characteristic of many an American town, tell the story of Central Maine’s once most prominent city, old Hallowel Ion the Kennebec.
Year: 1956