Radio Script #1211

Little Talks on Common Things
October 7, 1979

Many times this program has referred to old schoolhouses in different parts of Maine, but not until recently have I seen the full account of the building of such a schoolhouse. It is that kind of story that I want to tell you today. The information comes from a very old, handwritten note book in the possession of Hobart Pierce, Sr., well known market gardener on Rice’s Rips Road just west of the Colby College campus.

The location of that schoolhouse built 157 years ago in 1822 was in Lewiston, a town that was then just beginning to develop at the falls of the Androscoggin. The account concerns the erection of a schoolhouse for District No.7, in the part of Lewiston toward Sabbatus where Hobart Pierce lived as a boy. He thinks the schoolhouse described was still standing when he first attended school and was the one he first went to.

It was, however, not the first schoolhouse on the site. On March 23, 1822, the voters in District 7 decided to build a new schoolhouse on the same lot where the old schoolhouse stood. They did not intend to spend much money to house their school. Their vote was: “to raise $130 to build the schoolhouse.” They also voted to follow what was a common practice – put the job up to auction, letting the lowest bidder do it. To superintend the construction on behalf of the district they made Amos Davis chairman of a committee, accompanied by Josiah Straw and Aaron Davis. The section of Lewiston where the building was to be placed was, by the way, known as the Davis neighborhood. On March 27 they held another meeting and voted not to put the job up to auction, but to have it done by the District under the supervision of the committee, which turned out to be pretty much under the supervision of Amos Davis.

The first specific act was the appointment of John Carroll “to survey the lumber for our schoolhouse.” Those March meetings were held at the home of Jeremiah Clough, but when they met at his house again on May 22, they immediately adjourned to what the record calls “the place of our school frame.” That meant the work was already undenway, and that the outside frames had been constructed. That did not mean that the house itself was erected, because on the same day John Carroll agreed to lay the underpinning for $1.60. What “place of the frame” did mean was that, in accordance with custom of the time, the four sides of the building were being framed flat on the ground. After the foundation had been laid, the four sides would be erected upon it, probably with ceremony of public house-raising. After those sides had been raised and attached, the roof would be put on. Then the inside would be finished and the building opened for use.

On September 28 they voted to assess the District $250 for the schoolhouse and the expense of a winter school, but two weeks later they rescinded that vote because the entire expense of the new building had already been met. The record shows no account of a school conducted in the building during the winter of 1822-23. But in the spring of 1823 they made plans for use of the building. Most school districts were happy with having a single school agent. This Lewiston district had three, whom they designated first, second and third agents.

It is important to know that school arrangements were not made by the year, but one term at a time. In the early years of the 19th century a term was seldom longer than ten weeks, and sometimes as short as five. The way a district usually operated was to have as many weeks of school in the whole year as the money allotted to the district by the town would allow.

There was no uniform state law requiring a certain number of school weeks in the year, nor did the town require the same number of weeks in each of its districts. Sometimes a district had only two terms a year. That seems to have been the case in Lewiston’s Distict 7. On November 2, 1823 they voted to appropriate $5 for a summer school in 1824. That did not mean what we mean today by summer school, but that, in addition to its usual fall and winter terms, there would be a summer term. Later in the century it became common to have fall, winter and spring terms – but not at the time of this Lewiston record. In those days, from early spring until fall, the boys were needed for work on the farms, and could attend school only in the winter.

In that fact lies part of the explanation of the district’s appropriation of $5 for a summer term. Since that term would be attended only by girls and very small boys, it was deemed proper to place it in charge of a woman, who could be hired for about half of what they would have to pay a man. It is a good guess that they intended the $5 to cover the teacher’s pay for all five weeks at one dollar a week. In the winter, when the big boys were in school, it was thought necessary to have a man in charge.

As I have often mentioned on this program, it was this need of men in the winter schools that controlled the calendar of Maine’s only colleges, Bowdoin and Colby – for at least three-quarters of the 19th century. The long college vacation was not in the summer, but in the winter, to give the college students, then all male, a chance to teach in the public schools.
Because room and board for the teacher was always a problem may have been one reason why frequently a school had a different teacher every term.

The Lewiston district followed a method that most teachers detested – having the teacher do what they called “boarding around.” As they prepared to open their school in the fall of 1823, the Lewiston district voted “to board the teacher according to the number of scholars a voter may send, and each voter to supply wood in proportion.” We may be sure that such a method provided very uneven treatment for the teacher. In one house he might get very good meals; in another he might nearly be starved. And to pack and move every week or two was a nuisance. One page of the record gives the list of parents and the number of pupils that each had in the school. Jeremiah Stanford was a prolific father. He led the list with nine children. No other family had more than four, but altogether there were 14 families providing 43 pupils.

Now let us see how they built the schoolhouse. We may state at once the astounding fact that it cost a little less than the $130 originally intended, the total bill coming to $124.51. All the labor was done by the 14 heads of families themselves, with the help of their older boys, except for the employment of a mason to build chimney and plaster the inside. The people did not donate their work, but were paid at usual wages, not in cash, but by having their time credited on their tax bills.

We have heard much· about the common wage of a dollar a day. Those Lewiston men got less. Their pay was 4 shillings a day, 67 cents. Besides labor, they provided materials for which they were paid, and I assure you at low prices. The only skilled laborer was the mason, who got $1.25 a day.

Amos Davis, Chairman of the Building Committee, was paid the largest amount – $21.00. John Carroll got $15.41, Aaron Davis, $13.09, and Joseph Fuller, $13.1·9. None of the others received more than ten dollars. Except for nails, spikes and lime, all the materials were found close at hand. The lumber for sills, joists, and boards came from nearby trees, and the local shingle mill supplied the large quantity of shingles used. Because there were so many shingles and no mention of clapboards, we assume the walls of the schoolhouse as well as the roof were covered with cedar shingles. We may well be amazed at the price of those shingles, $2.00 a thousand. That is two mills per shingle.

When the frame was up and the roof put on, the inside walls were covered with plaster that was made on the spot. This we know because among the items listed as furnished were lime and hair. An unspecified quantity of lime was listed at $2.50, and 10 bushel of hair for 50 cents. We are not told whether the hair came from the sweepings of a barbershop floor or from a slaughter house. The cost of the foundation was correspondingly small. I have already told you that a man agreed to lay it for $1.60. The stone cost just 80 cents and $1.33 to haul it, making the total of the foundation on which to place the wooden building only $3.93.

The building had six windows with six squares of glass each. That glass cost six cents a square or a total of $2.16. One resident accepted the job of making the window frames and the sash to go over the door. He was told that he must clean the boards for the framework- shave them and plane them smooth.

They did have to buy nails, spikes and hinges, but the total of those items came to less than ten dollars. Close at hand they found 200 bricks for the chimney, which the mason put up in two days. Like all such early records, those accounts reveal the continuing use of the British shilling long after the American dollar had become common.

The price of the lime, for instance, was given in both currencies, 15 shillings and $2.50. It is the shilling that accounts for that odd daily wage of 67 cents. It was four shillings. On man got eight shillings, $1.33 for his labor and his oxen to haul the foundation stones.

The old record shows a separate account for each of 14 residents. Because Amos Davis had the largest bill, his account reveals a diversity of items: $3.46 for lumber, $2.65 for nails. $2.00 for shingles, 24 cents for spikes, 50 cents for hair, and $6.33 for labor.

The mason got special favors. Besides his $1.25 a day and the use of a helper at 67 cents, he was provided three meals a day at one of the homes for 50 cents a day,and as a special bonus was given a quart of rum that cost 25 cents.

And that is the story of the building of one schoolhouse in Maine more than a century and a half ago.

Year: 1979