Radio Script #603

Little Talks #603, February 23, 1964

It has been a long time since I have referred on this program to any of Waterville’s earliest newspapers, those that preceded the long-lived Waterville Mail.

Few people probably have ever heard that the Waterville Mail itself had an indirect connection with Hathaway Shirts. In 1847 Charles Hathaway, who had already started to make shirts in Waterville, decided to start a newspaper, which he called the Waterville Union, and described it as “a journal of news, literature, science, art, agriculture, religion and morality”. Working as a printer on the paper was Ephraim Maxham. After only fourteen weekly issues, from March 18 to June 17, 1847, Hathaway decided to suspend publication and sold the printing plant to Maxham, who started a new paper called the Eastern Mail. That was the paper that later, under the management of Maxham and Wing, became the Waterville Mail and continued regular publication for more than sixty years.

Waterville’s first newspaper was the Waterville Intelligencer. Although its publisher was William Hastings, the first issue was pulled from the press by a young printer who was a member of what became one of the most famous families of the Kennebec Valley, giving Maine a governor, a United States senator, the state’s leading cattle dealer, a prominent surveyor, and other notables. The young man’s name was John Burleigh and the date when he printed the first news sheet produced in Waterville was May 23, 1823. The Intelligencer lasted five and a half years, the final number appearing on November 6, 1828. That was a good record for a newspaper 135 years ago. Almost every town, even small ones, found someone starting a local newspaper, but few of them lasted more than a year. Long-lasting weekly papers in Maine’s smaller towns — papers like the Oxford Democrat, the Bridgton News, and the Piscataquis Observer — have been very few indeed.

Only a month after he had given up the Intelligencer, publisher William Hastings started another Waterville paper called the Watchman, which had a short life of only thirteen months. Then John Burleigh decided to start a paper of his own to which he gave the name the Times. Its masthead said: “Published every Saturday by John Burleigh”.

That paper was kept going for a little over two years until September, 1833.

Meanwhile Burleigh encountered competition. A rival paper appeared on September 8, 1832, published by Daniel Wing who, like Maxham, had at one time worked for Hathaway on the old Union. Wing called his paper by the jaw-breaking title of Watervillonian. It was short-lived indeed, ceasing publication in January, 1833. In January, 1834, three months after he had closed his weekly Times, John Burleigh came out with a new paper, the Waterville Journal. It is what that newspaper tells us about the way folks lived 130 years ago that I want to share with you today.

Many papers printed in our small towns in the first half of the 19th century were not, by today’s standards, newspapers at all. They were more frequently a sort of combination of literary and religious journals. In 1834 John Burleigh’s Waterville Journal carried under its masthead these words: “Devoted to science, literature, morality, religion and news.” But the only news Burleigh printed was extracts from other papers. For instance, in his issue of September 30, 1834 there was not one scrap of local news, nor in fact any news at all about Maine. Burleigh’s news items in that issue of nearly 130 years ago consisted of the story of a theft of $2,300, told by the N.Y. Journal of Commerce; the Portsmouth Journal’s account of the closing of the woolen mills at Salmon Falls, N.H.; and the Salem Register’s story of the killing of American sailors by savages on the Fiji Islands. There were about a dozen similar items from allover the world, and you may be sure that. in those days long before the telegraph or the cable. all the events had occurred many months before their publication. John Burleigh’s Waterville Journal was therefore not at all what we would today call a local newspaper.

Like most weeklies of the time. the Journal had a strong religious bent. In fact a large number of Maine newspapers were published by former ministers or evangelists.

One of the most famous of such papers in Maine was the Rural Intelligencer, published in Augusta by a Universalist minister named William Drew. The first page of John Burleigh’s Journal was devoted entirely to religion. One column was filled by a sob story from the London Revivalist called: “The Sinner’ s Excuse”. Another was a kind of editorial on “Welsh preaching on the divinity of Christ. Then, spilling over on to page 2 was a long article, “Passages from the Life of Rev. Rowland Hill”. The sub-divisions of that story were headed Early Piety, Apostacy, Hidden Talent, His Converts, His Watchfulness, Influences of the Spirit, and Let Your Light Shine.

Fortunately no local paper of that time leaves us entirely ignorant of local conditions. Although the columns may be utterly devoid of local news, the reader can nevertheless get a.rather clear impression of what life in the town was like. You have often heard me say this before, and now I repeat it with emphasis. The best revelation of conditions, customs, and ways of living in our Maine towns a century or more ago is found in the advertisements in the local papers. It is the ads, not news, that tell us what we want to know. and John Burleigh’s Journal in 1834 was no exception. We have long known that Waterville’s earliest mills were not on the Kennebec, but on the Messalonskee. That is borne out by the following ad in Burleigh’s paper:

“For sale on liberal terms, a valuable mill privilege, situated on the Mile-and-a Half Stream, at the lower dam, and within half a mile of the Kennebec, from which logs can be taken without difficulty. It is considered one of the best privileges on the stream and is capable of extensive improvement. About 11 acres of land covered with wood and lumber can be had with it. Also for sale, a carding machine with or without the cards. Samuel Hitchings.”

The Moors comprised one of Waterville’s most prominent families. They were merchants and ship builders. In 1834 they had decided to close their retail store. situated near the site of later Lockwood Mills; so they put this ad in John Burleigh’s Journal: “J.M. Moor & Co., having been under the necessity of changing their business, all who have unsettled accounts with them are invited to call and settle immediately. It will be necessary for us to put into the hands of an attorney every account that is not soon settled.”

Even the town tax assessors had an ad in Burleigh’s paper. It reveals what the old tax lists had already shown some of us namely, that state, county and local taxes were separately assessed. But by 1834 those separate taxes were all committed to the collector to call in at one time, although each person’s tax bill had to show clearly how much of the total was for local, how much for county, and how much for state. The collector, James Stackpole, Jr., was authorized to grant a discount of 6% for payment within 30 days, 4% within 60 days, and 2% within 120 days.

In those days 130 years ago, businesses frequently changed hands. Between 1798 and 1830 Nathaniel Gilman was a partner in at least five different Waterville firms.

Most of the time it was physically the same store; it was only Gilman’s partner that changed. Let us take a look at Waterville firms that were going out of business in 1834, according to their ads in the Journal.

“Boots and Shoes. Opposite the Post Office. The subscribers offer the remainder of their stock at cost for cash or 90 days credit on a good note. All persons indebted to them are respectfully invited to settle by note or otherwise before August first. Golden and Anderson.”

Here’s another: “At cost. No mistake. The subscriber, about to leave Waterville, will sell his stock of goods, consisting of an assortment of English, West Indies and Domestic goods, at cost, and many articles for much less. Also the store now occupied by the subscriber, for sale or to let on reasonable terms. H.S. Nickerson.”

Now let us see what other things were offered to Waterville buyers in 1834. William Pearson had just received on consignment cook stoves, box stoves, Franklin stoves, and fire frames. If one inquired at the Journal office, he could buy or rent a pew in the Universalist Church. If he held stock in the Ticonic Bank, he had better attend its advertised meeting on October 6. If he wanted a bargain in a home, he should see Russell Blackwell, who offered a one story dwelling, pleasantly situated in Waterville Village, with a barn, wood house and outbuildings. Blackwell would sell the whole place with an acre of land for $700. He also announced that he had for sale a new shipment of two tons of Sandwich nails.

Almost the only specialized stores in the 1830 ‘ s were the apothecaries and the jewelers. There were very few strictly grocery stores or dry goods stores. Even in a growing village like Waterville, the general store, long familiar at rural crossroads, still prevailed. Such a store was Zebulon Sanger1s. In September, 1834 he had just started the business and his ad began with these words: “Zebulon Sanger has commenced business again in this town and has taken the large, white store lately occupied by Simeon Mathews, next north of Appleton and Gilman’s, and is now opening a large stock of goods to be sold on reasonable terms.”

What were the goods that Sanger had stocked? Among his yard goods were broadcloths, cashmeres, satinets, flannels, Italian silks, prints and muslins. Of course he had plenty of shawls, for both men and women then wore them. He had sheeting, cotton batting, feathers and yarn. He announced also a big assortment of hardware and called special attention to his grindstones. He stocked both men’s and women’s boots and had a few pairs of French slippers. His crockery department was filled chiefly with what was called hollow ware, but he ~id have a few China tea sets.

While he didn’t carry furniture, he did sell something he called not mirrors, but looking glasses. Of course Sanger’s big business was done in foods. He told the public in his Journal ad that he had on hand 110 quintals of codfish, a thousand barrels of coarse and Liverpool salt, 10 chests of Souchong and Hyson tea, 65 barrels of salt mackerel, 10 hogsheads of molasses, 20 boxes of tobacco and 12 bags of coffee. At the end of his long ad Sanger reminded folks that his store was the place to buy cast steel, sleigh shoes, spike rods, dye woods, indigo and sperm oil.

As early as 1834, when highways were largely unimproved, the carriage maker was doing a good business. Samuel Stilson made a specialty of a single gig which he sold for $70. He was then bUilding also half a dozen wagons with swelled bodies and stuffed seats and hung on thorough-braces. He said those wagons were as comfortable as a chaise, but he would still build a chiase on order.

Let us close this broadcast by showing how a publisher financed his paper in the 1830’s. The Journal’s subscription rate was $2 a year, and Burleigh announced: “Most kinds of country produce will be taken in payment. Individuals procuring eight responsible subscribers will be entitled to a ninth copy free.”

Year: 1964