Radio Script #1331

Little Talks on Common Things
December 12, 1982

A few years ago, when Colby’s Memorial Hall on the old campus was demolished, there was saved from the ruins the metal box which had been deposited in the corner stone. That had occurred on August 14, 1867.

Colby was the first college to erect a building in memory of its Civil War dead. After Gardner Colby saved the college from closing in 1866 by his gift of $50,000, the alumni persuaded the trustees to authorize a new building to contain a chapel, library and alumni hall, to cost $30,000. The trustees agreed to use $10,000 of accumulated funds that came from the public campaign which accompanied the Colby gift and to raise $1O,OOO more, and the alumni were to raise the remaining $10,000.

The cornerstone box contained a list of subscribers to the fund up to August 14, 1867. The list was led by Colby’s new philanthropist, Gardner Colby, who, in addition to the $50,000 he had already given, pledged $2,000 for Memorial Hall, on condition that the remaining $18,000 be raised. When the cornerstone was laid, the trustees had already voted to change the name of the institution from Waterville College to Colby University.

Two other gifts were for $1,000 each, from H. B. and H. M. Hart and from Jack Shirley. The Prescott family gave $500, as did also the local Percival family. The Harts and the Prescotts were prominent Baptist families in Massachusetts.

The way Waterville citizens responded to the appeal indicates how highly they valued the college. Dr. Nathaniel Boutelle, son of the wealthy lawyer and land owner Timothy Boutelle, gave $300. Solyman Heath, founder of the prominent Heath family, and father of the two Colby men who had organized Waterville’s first company in the Civil war, gave $100. Another $100 came from W. A. F. Stevens, the only Waterville-man who had lost two sons in battle. Both sons had attended the college. From Senator Lot Morrill came $150, from Joshua Nye of Fairfield $100, and from E. F. Webb, lawyer and horse breeder and from R. B. Dunn, $50 each..

The college faculty then consisted of only five persons, Pres. James T. Champlin, Professors Charles Hamlin, Moses Lyford, Samuel K. smith. and Edward W. Hall. In spite of their meager salaries of $800 a year, they each gave one-eighth of a year’s pay, or $100 to the fund. $250 came from a man who had no connection with the college, the rising statesman James G. Blaine. Stephen Coburn of Skowhegan, whose family would
later give hundreds of thousands to the college, gave $50 for Memorial Hall.

Although he was a low-paid Baptist minister, A. D. Small, father of Colby’s later President, Albion Woodbury Small, gave $100. Jim Blaine was not the only Augusta man to contribute. Samuel Cony, for whose family Cony High School is named, gave $100.

Waterville’s highest ranking Civil War veteran was then General Isaac Bangs, who gave another hundred. Only a few years before the cornerstone was laid there had graduated from the college a young Dan from Clinton, George Flood. In 1867 he was employed in a clerical capacity by the A & I Railroad, which would soon become part of the Maine Central. He came up with $50. He is the man who went on to found the Flood Fuel Company. The total list contained subscriptions for $13,120, much more than half the needed $20,000 to supplement the already existing $10,000.

Another valuable item placed in the cornerstone box was a catalogue of the college Library in 1845. Until Prof. Hall placed the books in the new library that was a part of Memorial Hall, there was no such thing as a card catalogue; and from time to time the College had published a list of its library holdings. Evidently none had been published since 1845, a long 22 years before the laying of the Memorial Hall cornerstone.

That 1845 catalogue listed 2,775 volumes, but only 2,196 titles, because 579 volumes were duplicates. Because the College had been founded by Baptists, one would expect its library to have many religious books, and that was indeed the case. There were 566 of them, of which 110 were devoted to sermons.

But among these books were several valuable titles not connected with the Baptist faith. There was a copy of Calvin’s Institutes, published in 1572, and his Commentary on Isaiah, 1609. There was a 1660 edition of Thomas More’s “Grave Mysteries of Godliness”, and a choice copy of Commentaries of 1656. It may seem strange that the works of Emanuel Swedenborg, founder of the Church of New Jerusalem, were lavishly represented. That was because of the active promotion of Swedenborgism by Colby graduate Timothy Paine of Winslow.

In the field of literature the holdings were small but impressive. Representing American writing were Washington Irving’s Sketchbook and Bracebridge Hall, but not one of the popular novels of J. Fenimore Cooper. Great English authors before 1800 were well represented. There were full sets of Shakespeare, Samuel Johnson and Scott. The poetry of Milton, Pope, Coleridge, Wordsworth and Burns was there. The British novelists Defoe, Richardson and Smollett were not represented, however. The library had no copy of Robinson Crusoe. In 1845 religious prejudice against the novel was still strong.

One of the few American books was Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography, but the college library had three different biographies of Napoleon. One choice item was a set of the 1763 edition of Samuel Johnson’s Lives of the Poets. Of the library’s 2,775 volumes only 17 dealt with the subject of history, mostly of Greece and Rome. But the library did possess Davidson’s History of the Civil Wars in France, published in 1647. Four of the volumes dealt with American history, and there was a copy of Morse’s History of New England, published only 35 years before the catalogue.

Among the few books on law was a 1771 copy of Blackstone’s Commentaries, the one book that most affected American jurisprudence. In that very year 1845 it was having a profound influence on the 36-year old Abraham Lincoln. Of the categories into which the catalogue divided the library holdings, there is one with the general title Science. That was subdivided into Botany, Chemistry, Geography, Natural History and Natural Philosophy. Natural History covered the present sciences of Biology and Geology. Natural Philosophy dealt with Physics and Astronomy. There was an early work by Charles Darwin, Researches in Geography and Natural History. Thirteen more years would pass before Darwin would shock the religious community with his Origin of Species.

By 1845 the Library was receiving regularly a number of important periodicals, including the Edinburgh Review, the London QUarterly Review, and the North American Review. The Library had the 1828 edition of Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary, but no set of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

The classics were, of course, extensively represented, both in original languages and in English translation. Both Greek and Latin were then required for graduation from the college. So all the great writers of Greece and Rome were represented. and there was a leather-bound copy of Plutarch’s Lives. Very useful was a large Hebrew Grammar and a Hebrew Dictionary. The catalogue contained a list of library rules. Because boys all wore caps in those days, one rule was: “Each student shall have his head uncovered when in the room”. Another was “No student shall remove any book from a shelf nor enter any alcove where books are shelved.” The fine for keeping a book beyond the loan period was two cents a day. If a student lost a book, he had to buy a replacement himself, or pay the college double the cost. No books could be taken out during vacation except by written consent of the President of the College.

Memorial Hall had a main structure of two stories and a one-story wing, high-posted, with a balcony. In that wing was the college library, into which Edward W. Hall brought the books from the small room in South College which had previously held them. On the ground floor of the main building was the college chapel, where students assembled daily from its opening in 1867 to the removal. of the college to Mayflower Hill.. On the second floor was a large, open room called Alumni Hall, used for many college social functions.

In Memorial Hall tower was placed a clock, but it kept time so poorly that students were warned to pay little attention to it. Instead they bad to go by the sound of the college bell which rang out to begin and end all class periods.

Year: 1982