Radio Script #74
Little Talks On Common Things
June 25, 1950
Not all of the people who knew Waterville intimately a half century ago now live in this vicinity. It takes Franklin Johnson’s favorite club, the Colby Old Timers, to bring back to Waterville a lot of those fine people with memories of by-gone days in the Kennebec Valley. The Old Timers consist of Colby alumni who have been out of college fifty years or more. This year they gathered nearly fifty strong for their annual reunion in connection with the Colby Commencement. The new initiates in the club, the Class of 1900, provided the largest class group, with such well known persons as Fred Lawrence of Portland, Frank Severy, oil field engineer of California, and Charles Towne, long an administrator in the schools of Providence, Rhode Island.
The graduate out of college the longest number of years was Robie Frye, who graduated from Colby 68 years ago in 1882. He looks and acts not more than 60 years of age, but next December Mr. Frye will celebrate his ninetieth birthday. He was glad to see Jim Connolly, the writer of sea stories, honored by Colby, because for many years Mr. Frye and Jim’s brother worked side by side in the Boston Custom House. Running Mr. Frye a close second for honors was John Cummings of the class of 1884, who saw his 88th birthday last week. Mr. Cummings led a long and distinguished career as a Baptist missionary in Burma, spending many years in Karen country, where that first graduate of Colby, George Dana Boardman, had preceded him 60 years before. In 1915 the King of England bestowed upon Mr. Cummings the Kaiser-i-Hind medal for distinguished public service in Burma.
Two Waterville residents represented the class of 1887 at the Old Timers’ dinner: Harvey D. Eaton and Joel Larrabee. The latter is looked upon as a mere youngster among the Old Timers, because he will be only 85 next November. Younger still is Bert Drummond, who represented the class of 1888. Bert won’t be 85 until next May. Sorely missed were two old Waterville boys of the class of 1889, Charles Hovey Pepper and Edward F. Stevens. Present at many Colby Cummencements and always together, these two devoted sons of Waterville and of Colby could not attend this year. Pepper was born in Waterville in 1864, the son of Colby’s Civil War president, George Dana Boardman Pepper. After graduating from the college, Charles studied art in Paris, Berlin and Vienna, traveled throughout the Orient, became an expert on Japanese prints, and was a portrait artist of repute. HeP?inted the portrait of Arthur J. Roberts, which hangs at the head of the main staircase in the Roberts Union on Mayflower Hill. Stevens, though born in Burma, spent many years in waterville. He became the illustrious head of the Library School at Pratt Institute and a national authority on printing and binding of fine books.
The Old Timers were delighted to have brought to their attention some items from the Waterville Weekly Sentinel, published during the months of January and February, 1888. They remembered well the names of the merchants whose ads then appeared, the Waterville citizens whose names then made news, and especially the college happenings which were recorded in a weekly column headed “The Bricks”.
The big news at the college was Charles Pepper’s departure for a trip to Europe for his health. It proved to be the beginning of a career in art, not merely a regaining of such health that Mr. Pepper still lives today. But when he left Waterville on January 19, 1888 to take a transatlantic boat from Boston, none of his college mates knew that a future prominent artist was given a send-off. A few days before his departure all of his classmates and a few other friends gathered at his home for a farewell party. They handed him a package of letters, with the date when to be opened written on the outside of each, so that he would have a new letter to read each day of his voyage across the Atlantic. On the day of his departure all members of his class were at the railroad station, and sent him on his way with classand college yells. Probably they sang the old song “Phi· Chi”; as they did on most occasions. Never have I heard Phi Chi more lustily sung than it was by that group of Old Timers at their 1950 reunion, led by that old-time glee club chorister, Franklin Johnson.
It is a pity that modern Colby students don’t know the resounding, marching words of Phi Chi. The song was still very much in vogue during my own student days from 1909 to 1913, but when I returned to take up residence in waterville in 1923 it had disappeared. What put Phi Chi out of existence? Was it one of the casualties of the First World War? Who knows? Those Colby Old Timers were indeed interested in some of the old news items about Waterville, not merely about Colby. Here are a few of the items that appeared in that winter of 1888.
“The Salvation Army have received an addition to their band in the shape of a powerful, if not very accomplished, cornetist.”
“A Leap Year skate was held at the ice rink last Tuesday. Gentlemen were appropriately escorted by their lady friends. A band furnished music, and no accidents have been reported.”
“Agents of the Horsford’ s Bread preparation have been in town giving exhibitions of the excellence of that article in the manufacture of different kinds of bread and pastry. At Lane and Walls’ and L. W. Rogers’ stores they have turned out delicious griddle cakes and hot biscuits for the benefit of the public, thereby giving any hungry man an excellent opportunity to procure a square meal gratis.”
“W. H. Dow’s horse, hitched in front of Perkins’ store last evening, became frightened at children passing with sleds and started ahead, colliding with the hitching post. The shafts and harness were broken and the horse, thus freed, took to the sidewalk on the opposite side of the street and perambulated on his way, pedestrians respectfully moving aside for his benefit.”
Runaways were frequent occurrences on Waterville streets that winter of 1888. The next week after the item about Dow’s runaway horse, the Sentinel printed the following: “A runaway stirred up things for a few minutes Tuesday afternoon. Allie Moore was trying out the paces of one of Charles Hill’s horses down the tempting smoothness of Main Street, and as he was scooting along at a 2:30 clip by the Arnold block, his sleigh struck the sled of John Britt standing there. In a twinkling the sleigh was demoralized, as were also the trousers of the driver.”
Then for the third successive week the Sentinel came up with another runaway item: “Runaways are vary numerous but none the less very exciting. A horse belonging to Prunella Jones, left standing in front of the Plaisted Block, started and tore down Main Street Saturday afternoon, causing a general stampede. The pung attached to him collided with a stone post in front of Redington’s and came to grief. The horse continued his mad career, frightening William Barton’s horse, which also started down Water Street but was stopped without damage. The Jones horse then jumped over the fence surrounding the lot where the old Continental Hotel formerly stood, jumped back again and fell on the sidewalk in front of Dunn Block, where he was finally subdued after making things very lively for a few minutes.”
By the way, was Waterville’s Main Street ever properly spelled “M A I N E”? The spelling in those 1888 issues of the Sentinel is not uniform. On about half of the items it is Main Street, the way it is spelled for most of such streets allover the united States. But in the other half of those numerous 1888 items, it is Maine Street, with an lie”. Which spelling was then correct? Did the editor have good reason sometimes to write M a i n e?
So far as we know there is only one M a i n e Street in this state. That is the principal street in Brunswick, which is properly and officially spelled M a i n e.
Many Maine towns have streets named for towns to which the street leads or toward which it goes. Augusta thus has Bangor Street; my horne town of Bridgton has Portland Street; Portland itself has Deering Avenue; Lewiston has both Sabattus Street and Lisbon Street. Waterville has Oakland Street, but it led to the Fair Grounds, not to Oakland. The way to that town, formerly West Waterville, is of course an entirely different thoroughfare, the Oakland Road.
Last week we asked the question, “What is a thorough stay?” Well, here is the answer. A thorough stay is a round piece of hard wood about three feet long, used in the old lumbering days to fasten together the long ,soft wood logs of a boom. One of these, water logged and embedded in the bottom of the lake, was recently dug out near the old landing at Chamberlain Lake and brought back to waterville by my neighbor, who made that thrilling flight over the north woods by air. In the old days iron or steel chains were scarce and eXPensive. These pieces of hard wood were fastened to the. logs instead, and they are said to have held the booms just as fast as the big chains now do.
We have talked so much in recent weeks about things of the long ago that it is time we reminded ourselves that life is filled with common things today.
One of those common things — a common experience of most of us — is at sometime in life to lose your pocket book. According to the June issue· of Kys-Items, the plant publication of the Keyes Fibre Company, a most unusual variation of that experience happened a few weeks ago to Randy Getchell, a grinder man at the Shawmut Mill of Keyes Fibre. Mr. Getchell and his wire went fishing at a spot off the Unity Road, and before they set out, Mr. Getchell committed his wallet to his wife for safekeeping. They had to go through a cow pasture and crawl through a fence to get to the pond. When they arrived, Mrs. Getchell found that the wallet was missing. On the way back they made a thorough search, and near the fence through which they had crawled they found — No, they ·didn It find the wallet. But there on the ground was the change, the zipper that closed the wallet, and a tiny scrap of leather.
The rest of the wallet and its paper contents, including currency and three U. S. savings Bonds, were gone. Watching them nearby was a soulfullooking cow contentedly chewing her cud. All she had left the Getchells were the metal scraps from her unorthodox dinner.
Most of you know that Maine was once a banner ship-building state. Even in our own day we are proud of the enviable record made by the Bath Iron Works and their ship yards during two World Wars. But a hundred years ago Maine really built ships. Here is the record for the year 1854 — ninety-six years ago. _ Bath then led the state with 93 launchings in that one year. Waldoboro came next with 89. Belfast had 49, Eastport 41, and Portland 40.
Thirty-six ships first touched the water at Ellsworth, 31 at Machias, 26 at Castine, 16 at Wiscasset, 12 at Kennebunkport, six at York and Kittery and two at Saco. That makes a .total of 468 ships launched in Maine in 1854. That is more ships than were put to sea between 1789 and 1847 bY all the states of the Union in those 58 years all put together, and more ships than were built in anyone year in the Whole British Isles.
Do some of the oThissions surprise you? They do me. There is no mention of Freeport or South Freeport, Whose yards I supposed were booming at that time. Apparently no ships were launched at South Thomaston, which had a very’ famous yard. And what happened to the big yard at Harpswell, celebrated in the novels of Elijah Kellogg?
This is our last broadcast of the season. During the summer we shall give you a rest from these old time things. But on September 17 we shall be back on the air again. Right now we want to express our gratitude to the many listeners Who have provided material for this program. You have made it your program, not mine. Without you to provide the grist, the mill could not grind. As you go on digging up the old newspapers, old account books, old records and old letters, I think we can learn together that there is much to give us pride in the Kennebec Valley heritage.
If the revival of these old-time incidents and legends has any value at all, it is in their challenge to the present generation to make this valley in the last half of the 20th century the same kind of bulwark of freedom, enterprise and neighborly kindness that the settlers around Fort Halifax made it two centuries ago.
And so we say Good-By until September.
Year: 1950