Radio Script #395

Little Talks on Common Things

November 23, 1958

When a Maine town had only one newspaper a hundred years ago, it was likely to get a lot of biased political news, because in that day most newspapers were violently partisan. But when a town had two newspapers, one on each side of the political fence, things really became exciting. Both sides were likely to be unsparing in their attacks on each other. Such was the case with the two papers in Belfast in 1838: the Belfast Republican and the Waldo Patriot.

About a month before the state election in 1838, the Patriot accused the Belfast Republican of libel and forgery. This is what its fiery editorial had to say: “Malicious libel and most infamous forgery has been perpetrated. We have never witnessed a more spontaneous burst of indignation than was exhibited last week in this community when it was discovered that an article in the Republican Journal, purporting to be a communication from Mr. James Avery of Monroe, charging our sheriff, Col. Thatcher, with the crime of bribery and corruption, was a sheer fabrication, manufactured by some of the Journal clan for vile and detestable purposes. We publish today Mr. Avery’s statement under oath, disavowing the authorship of the piece, and denying the truth of the charges in it. The ordinary billingsgate of the Journal we regard as idle wind, but a possible charge of aggravated offense against the laws of the land cannot pass unnoticed, especially when the assailants attempt to assassinate the reputation of an estimable citizen. Col. Thatcher is a native of York County, where he resided for nearly a half a century, and always sustained a reputation above any suspicion of dishonor. He has lived with us only three years, and because he has not become so widely known here as in York County, he will doubtless now take some decisive steps to vindicate himself. But, as bad as the evidence of the evil plot already is, there is worse to come. We have obtained a clue which will unravel the whole plot. We shall soon be able to disclose the most atrocious depravity and fiendish malignity. We have come into possession of a full history of this matter, although we have not as yet the names of all the miscreants, but we expect soon to have them all.

“When Hugh Anderson returned from Washington and resumed the editorial chair of the Journal, we had reason to hope for a return of decency and honor in the conduct of political warfare. Though we cannot believe that he had any part in concocting this foul forgery, he is the responsible endorser and must be held to his just liability. James McClintock had the opportunity to do this deed of darkness, and he also had a motive. He is one of the martyred deputies. He has from $500 to $1,000 in bets placed on the election. For many months he has circulated petty scandals about the sheriff. We now give him fair warning. If it shall appear that he is guilty of this forgery, we intend to publish a full report of an action of slander, Edward Young and wife vs. John C. Black, which was tried in this county six years ago and in which James McClintock acquired no enviable notoriety.”

Apparently nothing came of this tempest in a teapot. The Patriot’s threat to print further revelations came to naught. What we have just told you was published on August 10, yet throughout all the rest of the year 1838 the paper contains not another word on the subject. The state election in that year went against the Patriot’s side, for the Patriot was as staunch a Whig paper as the Waldo Republican was Jeffersonian.

The names are somewhat confusing, because those who were officially called the Democrat-Republicans (a hyphenated name) in Jefferson’s time, were called Republicans in 1837, and that is why their supporting newspaper in Waldo County was called the Belfast Republican. But by 1844 the party had taken the first rather than the last half of the hyphenated name and called themselves Democrats.

Some of you will remember that Maine’s famous Aroostook War was sometimes called Fairfield’s farce. That was because its most prominent promoter was Governor John Fairfield, who had been elected in 1838, and it is that election which, in its issue of September 14, the Waldo Patriot bemoaned ;n the following editorial: “The returns have reached us from a large portion of the state, and they indicate the election of Mr. Fairfield by a decisive majority. The Whigs have faithfully stood at their posts and they deserved a different fate. But they have been beaten and must acknowledge that their opponents have carried the state. Never has there been so hotly contested an election. Party spirit verged on madness. We forbear to enlarge on the manner in which the election was carried in this vicinity. We can only say that there are influences stronger than patriotism, among them the allurement of Bacchus.”

Two years later the Waldo Patriot had its revenge, because it was in 1840 that the Whigs were victorious, Fairfield was defeated, and Maine went “hell bent for Governor Kent”.

In 1838 the system of indentured apprentices, or what people generally referred to as the “bound-outboys” was flourishing. Often badly treated, those boys ran away. But not often were the masters glad to get rid of them. Such, however, seems to have been the case with Benjamin Shute, who put this ad in the Waldo Patriot: “Absconded from the schooner Marcellus of Bucksport, while lying in Boston some weeks since, an indentured apprentice Portuguese boy of color, aged 19, named John Baptist. This is to forbid all persons from harboring or trusting said boy on my account. However, only one cent reward will be paid for his return.”

The next summer the Patriot took another jibe at the rival, the Belfast Republican Journal. It said: “The bad weather of the last 10 days has had a bad effect on our neighbor the Journal. In yesterday’s issue they manifested all the premonitory symptoms of hydrophobia. We believe no one as yet has been bitten, though several have been barked at. We think the public safety requires that they be muzzled, at least until they stop frothing at the mouth.”

When it found opportunity, the Patriot took a crack at the national administration which was also Democratic in 1838. On one occasion the paper said: “It should not be forgotten that during the Adams administration the expenses of the Government were $13 million a year, while under Van Buren they are now $32 million a year. Nor should it be forgotten that under Adams $10 million of debt was paid off, while under Van Buren $10 million of further debt was contracted, and what is worse this debt was made by the issue of Shin Plasters.”

Shin Plaster was of course the derisive name for the depreciated paper currency of the time, but what is even more worthy of notice is the cost of federal government in 1838 compared with today. If the Patriot had a right to complain that the expense of operating the government in Washington had tripled between 1828 and 1838, just look at the tremendous difference between that cost in 1838 and the cost 120 years later in this year of 1958 – $32 million in 1838, $76 billion or 76 thousand million in 1958.

It didn’t cost much to operate the schools 120 years ago. In those days Maine had no State Department of Education, no Commissioner, no State Board. In fact the state did very little to help the local communities support their schools. It had been only a few years since the schools had enjoyed benefit of the bank tax. That meant that the state tax on banks was by statute devoted to helping the towns pay for their schools. According to the report of the Secretary of State, to whom all information about the schools was reportable by the towns, in 1837 there was spent in Maine for the support of schools a total of $195,614, a little more than one dollar for every person in the state for Maine’s population was then about 181,000. The communities themselves raised $159,800, while $35,800 came from the bank tax. How thoroughly decentralized education was at that time is shown by the fact that there were then 3,446 school districts in Maine. Compare that with our present 143 districts, which are likely to be reduced to fewer than 100 within a few years, because towns are sure to take advantage of the Sinclair Law to secure better schools at no additional cost.

In out own county of Kennebec there were in 1837 a total of 435 school districts with a census of 26,257 people — men, women and children. The county towns raised $24,000 for the schools in all those districts, an average of $55 a year for each of the 435 districts. Even when $4,800 was added from the bank tax, it brought the average up to only $66 per district. When, however, you consider that teachers were then seldom paid more than $2 a week, that $66 would stretch quite far.

Since newspapers were first published, there has never been a time when they did not carry advertisements of lost articles. Nowadays such ads usually concern lost pocketbooks or jewelry, or sometimes clothing. We don’t read today such ads as one that appeared in a Belfast paper in 1838. Here it is: “Lost — from the sled of the subscriber, near the Head of Tide, on Wednesday evening last, a ten gallon keg of molasses. The finder, on returning it, will be suitably rewarded. Levi Snow.”

In the same issue of that Belfast paper appeared an ad for a private school. As indicated by the figures I have already given you about financial support of the public common schools in 1838, you can well understand that private elementary schools were usually patronized by families that could at all afford to do so. Such schools continued in Waterville, for young children as well as for those in their teens, well within the memory of persons still living. One of the last such schools was conducted for many years by Miss Julia Stackpole.

Well, let’s see what that Belfast ad of 120 years ago had to say: “James W. Webster will open a school for the instruction of children and youth in the various branches of English education on Monday, September 22. Children under 12 years, one shilling per week, of twelve years and upwards 25¢ per week. Mr. Webster will also open a singing school at his schoolroom on Tuesday evening, September 23. Terms of tuition, $1 per scholar. Lights will be furnished by the Instructor free of expense to the pupils. The book known by the name of “The Boston Academy Collection” will be used.

Fed up as we are with all the soap and detergent advertising on television today, we can appreciate the simpler times of long ago, when ads like the following were common: “A NEW ARTICLE OF ECONOMY for washing clothes without rubbing or pounding, this soap, which has recently been invented in Boston, where the sale of it is immense, is warranted to wash clothes in a superior manner, saving all the labor of rubbing, which wears out the clothes. It will injure neither clothes nor hands.”

Long before the days of singing commercials on the air, the newspapers occasionally published an ad in verse. As we close tonight, listen to this one in the Waldo Patriot on September 14, 1838:

“Hollis Monroe is still at his old stand, No. 4 Main Street,

Belfast, always ready to dispense health to the sick and good bargains to purchasers.

Do you need a pill or potion

For a fancied ill or notion?

We have doctors that can cure yer,

Make young of old or vice versa.”

Year: 1958