Radio Script #1201

Little Talks on Common Things
April 29, 1979

Last week I told you something about the well known Paine family of Winslow – information I gleaned chiefly from records kept and writings published by Timothy O. Paine, graduate of Colby College in 1847.

As we continue the Paine story today, let us begin with Timothy’s brother Benjamin who was born in Winslow in 1815 and married Elizabeth, daughter of Josiah Hayden, a Winslow pioneer. He spent his entire life in Winslow, and when Timothy and Albert compiled an account of the family, they were greatly dependent on Benjamin’s memory of the old days. He lived in a little house on the hill above the railroad station. Some of the family would gather at Benjamin’s on the occurrence of the annual meeting of Maine Central stockholders in Waterville. Several of the family owned that stock, and the railroad furnished free passes to stockholders and their families for the annual meetings.

In 1883 Benjamin wrote Timothy about their deceased parents, Lemuel and his wife. “The remains of our dear parents were moved in September from the old burying ground to the new yard. This new part was owned by Sidney Howard who is selling burial lots at $10 each. It will not be long before we too are buried beside them.”

Occasionally Benjamin let loose in criticism of one or another of his own brothers. On one occasion he wrote Timothy about Brother Albert, the Bangor lawyer. “In Albert’s opinion the great mass of people are ignorant and hardly worthy to be called citizens. He considers all jurymen ignorant farmers, mechanics and business men. He and his brother lawyers are the only fit persons to settle disputes. I don’t think the time will ever come in this Land of Liberty when what he would like will be accepted.”

“You ask why father went to Augusta. He was called there on the jury. I doubt if Albert considered Father ignorant. Father was Provost Marshall through the Civil War. His properties, acquired by hard work, included a plaster mill, which apparently Albert never heard of. I know about it because later I owned half of it. It was good property.”

“Albert has no right to publish his wrong conception about other Paines. He certainly would have been mad if anyone had published all the facts about him. I don’t claim to amount to much, but I have been town clerk, treasurer, tax collector and auditor, and for 20 years I have been the Maine Central agent in Winslow. I entered the planing mill when I was 17 years old.”

“I think Albert is wrong in describing Father chiefly as a farmer. He did enjoy farming but on only 17 acres. He was principally a trader. In one year I know that he made over $1,000 buying and selling land. The plaster mill supplied his best income.

“Now a word about myself. For five years after I was 21, I lived at the old home with Father and Mother. I married when I was 26. The home place was not willed to me. I paid for it, not only paying the other heirs what Father requested, but also paying our stepmother $600, which Father did not request. What Elizabeth and I have we earned by our own toil.

“I opened the store with David in 1862. In four years we sold $80,000 worth of goods at a smart profit, and I saved most of my share.”

It is apparent that Benjamin had some jealous feelings about the superior education of his brothers. He seemed to have an inferiority complex that he exhibited in remarks about education. In one letter he said:

“Albert writes a lot about college life, as if those who never went to college are of little account. He ought to have consulted with some of our Maine Central employees who can hardly write their names. They are skilled workmen and make good, honest livings. What a mess this world would be in if all men were college graduates and lawyers. I think every person has been born to fill some place in life. If they find the right place, they will fill it, whether minister, lawyer, mechanic, or farmer. I wish Albert would shut up about lawyers being the most important persons, nor do I agree with him that a person is liberally educated just because he went to college. I know some men who are actually more informed about what constitutes a liberal education than are some of my college acquaintances.”

Long sections of the Paine letters concern disputes about the location of Lemuel’s sheephouse. The lengthy controversy was too trivial and too unimportant to recount in detail. Sufficient to say that Benjamin’s view finally prevailed and the others at last agreed that the sheephouse near the Sebasticook stood where Benjamin said it did.

Having given you Benjamin Paine’s critical view of his brother, Albert, it is time to give you the other side of the picture, for Albert Paine was indeed a prominent man, far better known than his critical brother. Albert had been born in Winslow in 1810, had graduated from Waterville College in 1832, studied law, and from 1835 until his death in Bangor at the age of 95, lived in that city as a lawyer and banker, active until a few years before he died. He served the state as bank examiner, insurance commissioner and tax commissioner. It was in 1881 that he wrote the Paine Genealogy of which his brother Benjamin was so critical. On several occasions Albert argued cases before the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington.

In one letter to his brother Timothy, Albert confirmed the time of building the house that still stands and in which the last Paine resident was Dr. Edward Paine. Albert said: “I can just remember living in the old house and moving into the new one in 1814 when I was only two years old. I am sure, because it was during the War of 1812 when the Embargo Act severely affected Maine trade and money was scarce. Of course I was then too young to know about that, but Father often told us later about those days, and how hard it was to get the house built in depression times.

“You say Father was poor. I suppose in a sense he was. But how did he get and pay for that farm? How did he bring up eight children who never wanted for food and clothes, and how did he manage to give some of us such a good education? I cannot recall any regular money coming to him, yet he was never in debt. He seemed never to lack money to pay for anything the family needed. I really doubt if he could, in comparison with the neighbors, really be called poor.”

Another brother of Timothy Paine’s was Charles, who met with a tragic death in 1848 at the age of 38. He was captain of the Kennebec steamer Halifax that plied between Augusta and Waterville. On May 28, 1848, the boiler of that steamer exploded in the lock at Augusta, killing the captain and all others on board, including three crewmen and five passengers.

His mother, the wife of Lemuel Paine, kept a diary. On June 13, 1848, she wrote in it: “This is Charles’ birthday. For 38 years he gave us joy. Then he was killed. My son, my son, how could I give you up and say farewell. Today I wrote a “long letter to my sister on the circumstances of Charles’ death.” On Sept. 15, 1848 the mother recorded: “I have just been down to the river with Elizabeth and Sarah to see the Steamer Halifax, now fully repaired and ready to go down to Hallowell, where its boiler will be installed. I cannot recover from what happened to Charles on that boat.”

In spite of their sad connection with the Steamer Halifax, the Paines did not shun that reconstructed craft. The mother’s diary has at different times such entries as these: “Caroline took the Halifax for Gardiner where she will teach school for three months.” “Benjamin took the Halifax to carry papers to Augusta.”

In the Paine papers are many references to Waterville College. Let me mention a few of them. Here is one from Mrs. Paine’s diary, August 8, 1848. “Commencement at Waterville College. Last evening I went to hear an address by D. D. Caruthers, as I held him in high esteem. I had hardly entered the church when there came a tremendous hail storm. I seated myself in the gallery, thinking to hear more distinctly. The hail pounding on the roof was bad enough, but even worse a crowd of young people, mostly Healds and Ayers, both boys and girls, rushed into the gallery with their loud voices. The whole gang had their mouths wide open. I managed to live through the exercises, but the lesson was a wholesome one. I will know better than to sit in the gallery again, and I can certainly teach my own daughter not to behave like those Heald girls.”

When Timothy Paine was a freshman at the College, he wrote this letter to his brother, Albert, in Bangor. “Things are happening on the college grounds. President Sheldon is in front of his house spreading hay. Last fall we set out 70 trees on the college lot. One of the students has mown a place in front of South College about a rod long, then he gave up for the day. The great locust tree in front of my South College window gives beautiful shade. We get along well. President and faculty give great satisfaction and are very familiar with the students. We have final examinations in about two weeks. Sitting on the seats so long is the worse part of that.”

By that last sentence, Timothy Paine referred not to long written examinations, but to the more tiresome ordeal of sitting through several hours of oral examinations. The whole class was assembled in one room – in this case Timothy and all his fellow freshmen. Then each was individually examined by the professor, while the whole class had to sit through it all.

Next week we will have the last broadcast on the Paine family, devoting most of it to their most illustrious member, Timothy Paine himself. But now we must say goodbye until next week.

Year: 1979