Radio Script #1048

Little Talks on Common Things
April 20, 1975

It is well occasionally to note what the town and city records tell us about Waterville in days gone by.

In 1854, three years after Pine Grove Cemetery had been opened, the town accepted a gift of 8 adjoining acres to be added to that public burying ground.

In 1859, as a prelude of 15 years before the coming of the Lockwood Mills, the town voted to exempt from taxation all cotton and woolen factories that would be set up in town. And that was two years before the Civil War would start the nation’s big boom in manufactured cloth.

In 1860, Waterville got its first supervisor of schools. At that time the office was not the same as a superintendent employed by the School Committee. In 1860 that first supervisor, Solyman Heath, was rather a substitute for the committee, the sole person in charge of the town’s general oversight of the separate district schools.

In the Presidential election of 1860, Waterville cast 504 votes for Abraham Lincoln, 186 for all other four candidates, including the popular Stephen A. Douglas. Four years later in 1864 the Waterville vote was 508 for Lincoln, 184 for General McClellan. Two years earlier Waterville had approved Abner Coburn for governor and James G. Blaine for Representative to Congress.

Floods kept taking out all or part of repeated bridges between Waterville and Winslow at Ticonic Falls. In 1872 Waterville voted to raise $26,000 to pay the town’s part in a new Ticonic bridge. The next year the voters reluctantly allowed West Waterville to become a separate town, at first under that name, but later changed to Oakland. In the same year the voters appropriated $1,000 for the year’s operation of a new experiment in education, a free high school.

Confirming the decision made in 1859 to exempt textile factories from taxation, the town meeting of 1874 voted such exemption for ten years to “the manufacturing establishments hereafter to be erected by the Lockwood Cotton Mills, and all machinery and capital used to operate the same.”

At one time, Waterville had 17 different school districts, each with its own committee. In 1875 the number of districts were reduced to five, named the Village, the Webb, the Penny, the Cook, and the Marston districts. At the same town meeting the voters decided to enlarge and remodel the town hall at a cost of $5,000. That town hall was the old West Meetinghouse, erected in 1796 for both religious and secular assemblies. When the City Hall was built near the beginning of the present century, that old building was moved back and turned to face Front Street. Until it was torn down, more than 40 years ago, the old meetinghouse was used as a National Guard armory.

The Free High School, started in 1873, lasted only one year. In 1874, the town voted to authorize the school committee to contract with the Waterville Classical Institute for the tuition of secondary school pupils residing in Waterville. Two years later, in 1876, it was voted to make arrangements for resumption of the free high school and build a high school building. At the same meeting it was voted to abolish the school districts and to put all the town’s schools under a single school
committee.

That autumn of 1876 saw the opening of Waterville’s first high school building at the corner of Pleasant and School Streets. The new high school presented a moral, if not actually a legal obligation to the Institute that would soon change its name to Coburn. So, at a special town meeting later in the same year of 1876, it was voted that at the end of the current school year in June the arrangement with the Institute should be terminated, but so far as an arrangement could be made satisfactorily with Principal Hansen, Waterville pupils who had already begun classical studies at the Institute should be permitted to complete those studies at town expense. Free textbooks came to Waterville in 1877, when the town voted $800 for that purpose.

Sewage got attention in 1880. The town then voted to construct a drain from the west side of College Avenue near the Elmwood Hotel, down Union Street to the Kennebec River.

Because of the Lockwood Mills, the area of Waterville called the Plains was growing rapidly, and the residents were clamoring for a neighborhood school. So in 1883 the town voted $3,000 to build the Redington Street School, the building that is now the headquarters of the local unit of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

It is amazing to note how early an evening school was started in Waterville. In 1882, an appropriation of $200 was voted for that purpose. In the same year $3,000 was voted to replace with a new building the old brown schoolhouse on Mill Street. That new building was known to many people still living as the Western Avenue School.

It was in 1883 that the trust funds of the Pine Grove Cemetery had their start. The town accepted a fine legacy from the estate of W. B. Arnold, the income to be used for care of the cemetery.

In 1884 the Ticonic Bridge, rebuilt only twelve years earlier, was in bad repair. A committee was appointed to investigate thoroughly and recommend action. Their recommendation was for an iron bridge, the first to cross the Kennebec at this location. The selectmen were authorized to issue bonds for Waterville’s share of the cost. But action was stalled by the failure of Winslow to concur. Waterville insisted that the expense should be borne by the two towns in proportion to property valuation. At last, in August, 1884, Winslow agreed to submit the issue to a referee, who decided the cost should be borne according to the state valuation, not the local levy, placed on each town. The joint committee of the two towns turned to John Chaney of Boston, an experienced iron-bridge engineer. The contract, not including the stone work, was let to Cofrode and Saylor of Philadelphia for $26,286. Less than a year later, on March 17, 1885, the new bridge was ready for use. Including the stone piers and abutments, the total cost was $36,863.

When the Maine Central shops came to Waterville in 1886, a group of merchants and professional men agreed to pay for a certain period any taxes that the city should refuse to exempt. Of course those leading citizens were strong enough to see that the city government went light on the shop taxation. Meanwhile the railroad had built for rent a number of dwelling houses for the shop workers. So, instead of granting a sweeping exemption, the city government rather cleverly passed a vote that gave advantage to the railroad while at the same time preserving the principle of taxation. The vote read: “For purposes of taxation, the Maine Central RR shops shall be valued at $1,000 for twenty years from April 1, 1877; and dwelling houses being excepted and valued additionally; and with the further understanding that any additional state and county taxes levied on the shops must be paid by the railroad.”

The growth of Waterville made a supply of city water, beyond that of numerous household wells and town pumps, imperative. In 1886 the city voted a contract with the Waterville Water Co., and a committee was appointed to investigate the company’s charter and make sure they were legally empowered to assume municipal contracts. The deal was concluded in May 1887. That water supply was not from the present source, China Lake, but from the Messalonskee, whose increasing pollution caused a typhoid epidemic about 20 years later and necessitated our present excellent supply.

In 1887 the new water company agreed to build a reservoir to hold at least ten million gallons at some point not less than 175 feet above the level of the street at the Common (now Castonguay Square), and to carry the water in iron pipes to be laid on 26 named streets, to supply a need of 1-1/2 million gallons daily, to set and furnish 50 hydrants, and to furnish water to residents at no higher rates than those charged by the Gardiner Water Co., and to supply free of charge water for town schoolhouses and watering troughs. The city would pay $40 per hydrant for the first 50, and $30 for each one beyond fifty. The contract was to continue for 20 years and then be subject to renewal on mutually satisfactory terms. The selectmen were authorized to locate the hydrants. The company selected, and the town approved, for the reservoir site an area in the vicinity of the Mountain Farm and Ridge Road on Upper Main Street, and it is still the reservoir for our China Lake water.

In 1887, it was voted to erect on the Pleasant Street lot of the old North Brick Schoolhouse a new 8-room brick school at a cost of $2,000. That was the North Grammar School, taken down a few years ago to make room for the Waterville YMCA. At the same time it was voted to buy a lot for a schoolhouse near College Avenue above the railroad crossings. That land was purchased from Prof. Samuel K. Smith, father of the late Congregational pastor, William Abbott Smith, and on it was built the Myrtle Street School.

In 1896, it was voted to instruct the City Council to construct as soon as possible a new city hall to replace the old meetinghouse, in which town meetings had been held since 1802, and in which the business of the new city had to be rather inefficiently conducted. It was quite a project, with cost estimated at $75,000.

It was January, 1902, before the city hall built on a foundation put in the year before, was far enough along to have its roof put on. Money had run out, and $20,000 more was needed to complete the building. That money was raised, and before the next winter the Waterville City Hall was opened.

And that completes our account of important municipal actions in Waterville between 1854 and the opening of City Hall in 1902.

Year: 1975