Radio Script #1042
Little Talks on Common Things
March 9, 1975
Last week our broadcast closed with the account of a fatal railroad accident in 1871. Today let us pick other items from the Gospel Banner of the 1860’s and 1870’s.
As a Universalist paper, the Banner was naturally interested in the welfare of its Maine school, Westbrook Seminary, which (by the way) was not located in Westbrook, but in what was then Deering, now a part of the city of Portland. It is the present site of Westbrook Junior College.
As early as 1858, the Banner announced the results of a prize composition contest at the Seminary, and at the same time called attention to the wider educational interests of the denomination. The annual meeting of the Universalist Education Society had just been held in Waterville. Its purpose was not only to promote education, but also to provide financial aid to young men interested in training for the Universalist ministry at the denomination’s seminary connected with Tufts College. The secretary’s report lamented: “During the past year there have been no applications from young men desiring to enter our ministry. We have funds on loan only to one young man. Surely there must be in our Universalist families other youth who would make good ministers.”
Concerning Westbrook Seminary that report said: “The school is still in debt to the amount of $7,000, the same as a year ago. In the general depression of business and the present scarcity of money, it seems inadvisable to make an effort at this time to discharge this debt. Application has been made to the Legislature for aid from the state, but the state too is in the condition of the poor widow in the Gospels, and may be unable to cast even two mites into the seminary treasury. In Maine there is a growing feeling that the state should foster only the common schools and leave academies and colleges to the care of their friends. The state also proposes to establish normal schools, making it even harder for academies and colleges to obtain state aid. Let us, at least, foster our own.”
In 1872 there appeared in the Banner this ad: “Tufts College, 4 miles from Boston, offers a four year course leading to A.B. degree, three year graduate course to Bachelor of Divinity, a three year course in Civil Engineering, and two years for the degree of Bachelor of Philosophy. Our 17 instructors use the best methods. Excellent rooming accommodations. Tuition $60 a year; theological students free. Room $30, board $3 a week. In addition to free tuition, scholarships of $100 each are available to theological students.”
Through the years, the Banner continued to carry ads for Westbrook Seminary. Here is a typical one, published in 1877. “Westbrook Seminary, Stevens Plain, Maine. Fall term commences Tuesday, August 14. Tuition: Common English $8 per term; Higher English, Commercial and Scientific $10. Board and room, including fuel and light, $2.50 per week. Extras: Modern languages, each $2.50; bookkeeping $2.50. Penmanship $2.00; Crayoning $8; painting $12, music $12.”
An earlier Westbrook ad in 1858 contained one unusual item. It said: “Board at the Gentlemen’s Boarding Hall, including room, furniture and washing, $2.50 per week. By dispensing with tea and coffee, boarders may reduce table expenses to $1. 50.” It seems incredible that, in 1858, the use of tea and coffee could make a difference of a dollar a week or two-fifths of the usual board charge.
The Universalist denomination was one of the first to admit women into the pulpit, a movement which 100 years later is exciting controversy in the Episcopal Church. Reporting on its national convention at Rochester, N. Y., in 1859, the Banner said: “Three unsuccessful efforts were made to approve female preaching, but it was finally postponed.” Ten years later the denomination accepted women preachers.
In nearly every issue the Banner gave a list of major food prices in Augusta. In 1859 beef was 10 cents a pound, butter 15 cents, and cheese 8 cents. Potatoes were 45 cents a bushel, and eggs were 15 cents a dozen. As early as 1860 the Banner was defending Maine’s prohibition law and expounding the cause of temperance. That is why it gave free advertising to a certain hotel. A paragraph in the Banner said: “Any of our readers who need accommodations in Skowhegan will do well to stay at the hotel of our friend Turner. There is no better inn in Maine. Such orderly premises, loaded tables, sweet beds, and comfort in all respects are not often found in hotels. Though not an avowed supporter of temperance, the host will not tolerate rum or the smell of rum on his premises. He has proved that a first class hotel can be kept without liquor.”
Photography had just come in when, in 1859, the Banner published this ad. “New photographic gallery. Starbird and Dodge have fitted up rooms over Bradbury and Morrill’s office, where they are ready to make photographs, daguerreotypes and ambrotypes. We call special attention to our large sized photographs, finished in India ink, colored or plain, this is the most desirable picture now made.”
By 1860 the Banner was espousing the movement to abolish capital punishment in Maine. In that year it said: “The recent sentence to death of Captain Holmes has awakened anew a public awareness of the cruelty of the death code and its utter contradiction of the principles of Christianity. It is taken for granted that the people of Maine are now opposed to capital punishment. At present the law is a dead letter, but if any Maine governor should favor the gallows in a specific case, the death sentence would be legal. What has made the law a dead letter has been the refusal of every recent governor to sign a death warrant, despite the sentence of the courts. But the Legislature has persistently refused to change the law. How long shall we permit the defenders of the death penalty to retain this obsolete law?”
Well, despite the campaign of the Banner and other denominations besides the Universalists, Maine did permit the law to remain in the statutes for nearly twenty more years after that editorial was published. In 1879 – 96 years ago – Maine did abolish the death penalty.
In 1880 the Banner paid attention to what is now the prosperous Swedish settlement in northern Maine, in the towns of New Sweden, Stockholm, and surrounding communities. The Banner said: “An emigration of 20,000 Swedes and Norwegians to the rich farm lands of Aroostook is reported about to take place. Four families, consisting of 26 persons, with six teams filled with furniture, arrived in Bangor last week from Belfast, where the immigrants had landed. They are now on their way to Aroostook.”
Although the Banner’s figure of 20,000 Scandinavian immigrants to Maine was greatly exaggerated, the number that did come was sufficient to have lasting and beneficial influence on Northern Maine.
When I was a boy in Bridgton, the Universalists were criticized for allowing dancing in their social hall. I was therefore interested to see this statement in the Banner, appearing as early as 1860. “Some people’s idea of religion would shut Christians out of recreation and enjoyment. They question the genuineness of a person’s religion, if the person craves amusement. We do not recommend complete conformity to the world, trying to reconcile God and Mammon. But that the Christian must always carry a long, sober face and never have any fun, is indefensible. The Christian can have social pleasure without being irreligious. Let his conscience be his guide.”
During the Civil War, the Banner, like all other papers, carried news from the battlefield. In those accounts we find nothing that we have not already told about on this program, except for one very exceptional ad, which said in 1863: “Friends and relatives of our brave soldiers and sailors should see that they are supplied with Hallway’s Pills and Ointment. No better present can be sent to them. Coughs, colds, want of appetite, and headaches are common in the army. Hallway’s Pills are the remedy. For wounds, by bullet, bayonet or sabre, there is nothing better than Hallway’s Ointment.”
In 1869, the Banner printed a fitting memorial to one of the foremost Universalist ministers, Sylvanus Cobb. He had founded the Universalist Church in Waterville in 1826, and had represented this area in the Maine House of Representatives at the same time as Timothy Boutelle was in the state senate. At that time, the two men had worked together diligently for state support of the new college in Waterville. The Banner article in 1869 said: “A native of Maine, Sylvanus Cobb was a man of extraordinary talent and influence. As teacher, preacher, editor and author, his life was literally worn out at the age of 67, when he died in East Boston on October 31, 1866. His remains were placed in the family lot in Woodlawn Cemetery, Malden, after an impressive and largely attended service in the School Street Church of Boston. The monument now placed over his grave is in the form of a Christian pulpit, designed to symbolize his life’s labor. It is a solid block of marble with a tassled drapery. It stands on a molded plinth, and shows the marble form of an open Bible. On the right hand page are the words “God said let there be light”, and on the left page “I am the resurrection and the life”. On the front of the monument is the single word “Father”; on the back is the inscription “Sylvanus Cobb, born July 17, 1798; died October 31, 1866.”
Now we close these two broadcasts based on the old Gospel Banner with what the paper had to say in 1872 about the education of girls. “About the only place where girls are taught is the common school. It is true that we have institutions for young ladies, but we have little use for this young ladyish nonsense. In those schools, the attention is on elaborate dress and affected manners. Snobbishness and superficiality prevail. Their object is to polish, not to educate. They are seminars of useless knowledge. What we need are schools where girls may receive a thorough, substantial education, just as boys do. A lady who can play a piano but cannot spell, who can speak a little French, but murders the English language, is not an educated person. Whether the best school would be for girls alone or a mixed one, we will not argue. There is crying need for good schools for girls on any terms.”
Year: 1975