Radio Script #227
Little Talks On Common Things
May 16, 1954
A Ma i ne farmer was one day approached by one of those book agents we were talking about on this program a few weeks ago. The agent was seiling a set of books with the Impressive title “How to Farm Successfully”. The farmer listened patiently; then he sa I d: “Son, tal nt no use for you to go on. I don’t need them books. Why, I a In ‘t farml n9 now ha I f so we II as I know how.”
The re i s food fo r though tin tha t comment. I tis app ropos of one 0 f my favorite prayers: “Oh, Lord, we need not more light, but more strength. Thou hast already given to most of us the vision to see what we should do. Give us now the courage to do what we a I ready know we ought to do.”
That sentiment is good also for our nation. We have the hydrogen bomb, capab Ie of destroy I ng who Ie c I tl es and I mmobll I zing great areas. What sha II we do with It? It not only takes wisdom to find the answer. It takes great courage to exercise It. Suppose the best answer proves to be that we should not be the first to use the H bomb. however great the temptation. To obey that answer would take tremendous courage.
Yes, in many areas of life we already know or can easily determine what we ought to do. It is someth I ng else to have the courage to do It.
Now let us turn to a bit of Maine history. Many of our people believe thata hundred and fifty years ago a big majority of Maine inhabitants were chafing under the Massachuestts yoke and getti ng more and more rebe Iii ous b ecause the mother state would not set Maine free. That opinion is far from the truth.
After 1800 the General Court (the legislature) of Massachusetts showed no pronounced opposition toward Maine’s becoming a separate state. The position taken by Massachusetts was in fact exactly the same position which the U. S. Congress now takes toward Puerto Rico. Our federal government has declared that the Puerto Ricans can have what they a territory of the United states. want. Repeatedly they have voted to remain Not yet do they want their independence. likewise, throughout the first two decades of the nineteenth century, Massachusetts sa i d “let the peep Ie of Ma i ne deci de”. No less than six times the people of Maine failed to poll a sufficient vote in favor of independence. Not until the convention of 1819 did they get support strong enough to present a proposed constitution to the Massachusetts legislature and subsequently to the Congress.
I was especially interested to encounter, a few weeks ago, contemporary information about that last successful effort to make Maine a separate state. A good friend, who asks to remain anonymous, loaned me a little paper-covered volume printed in Portland in December, 1819. It is entitled ”The Maine Regi ster and U. S. Ca lendar for the Year of Our lord 1820″. Si nce the vo I ume was on sale before New Years Day of 1820, it appeared several months before Ma I ne became a state and a year before our fi rst state government was set up.
The Httle book contains detailed information on the plans for the new state. On June 19, 1819 the Governor of Massachusetts had signed the act permitting Maine to become a separate state as soon as the national Congress should approve the new state’s constitution.
The final convention which drafted that constitution had among, its members many names long prom i nent In Ma i ne • Its p res I dent was W I I Ii am KI ng of 8ath, who later became our first govemor. There was Daniel Cony, Augusta’s great public benefactor; Albion K. Parris of Portland, Maine’s foremost attorney and a trustee of Bowdoin College; Alexander Greenwood of Hebron, for whom is named Greenwood Mountain, the hi I I top on which was bul It the Western Maine Sanitarium.
One of my own maternal ancestors, James Irish of Gorham, was a member. From the Kennebec Va Iley severa I we II remembered men he Iped make that Const! tution of Maine. Two of them were from Waterville — Ebenezer Bacon and AblJah Smith. Fairfield, then one of the valley’s largest torms, also had two members –.
Stephen Thayer and Genera I WI I I i am Kanda II. Yassa Iboro sent Samue I Red I ngton; Wi ns low was represented by Wi Iii am Swan, and S i <lney by the man to whom we once devoTed two broadcasts of th i s program — Dr. Amb rose Howard. . Eleazer Coburn went to the convention from Bloomfield, John Neal from Madison, Wentworth Tuttle from Canaan, WI II I am A lien from Norri dgewock, Eli as Tay lor from Be I grade , John Colbath from Rome, and Dani e I Stevens from Ch ina.
Now what about the e lecti on in 1819, when the peep Ie were for the seventh time asked to cast their votes for or against separation? The total vote was better than two to one t n favor of a separate state — 17,091 votes to 7,132. Everyone of the nine countl es voted in favor, but the vote I n Hancock was very close, 820 to 761. In York it was 2,086 for and 1,646 against. Our own county of Kennebec made the best showing in the state, 3,950 for and only 641 against. Kennebec was the only county In which every town voted a majority In favor of separati on.
The cold, recorded figures printed 134 years ago in this old, paper-bound book, te II none of the reasons for certain strange contrasts in the vote, but it is interesting to speculate a bit about those causes. For instance, the rura I towns of York County and a few of the large’r toms were strong Iy opposed to separation. Lyman so voted 117 to 21, Newfield 110 to 35, Lebanon 106 to 62. On the other hand Hollis voted overwhelmingly in favor of separation, 175 to 1. BI ddeford sp lit I ts vote a I most even Iy, 50 for and 49 aga! nst; whereas Saco, just across the river, voted 325 for to 16 against. Maine’s venerable town of York voted 151 for and 136 against, whereas its neighbor and nearly as old town of Wells was dead set against separation, 408 to 49.
Our speculation is this. Feeling swung the way of local interest as interpreted by some dynami c loca I leader. A group of Boston merchants strongly opposed to separation had influential representatives in Wells, whereas their business competitors, the growing merchant interests of Portland, had just as i nf I uentl a I friends in Saco. I tis harder to di scove r the reasons for oppos ition in rural towns. Our guess is that it is explained by the Massachusetts associations of strong, loca I leaders.
Now let us take a look at some other contrasts in the separation \4Ote in parts of the state outs i de York County. My own nati ve town of Sri dgton \4Oted 90 to 34 in favor of separation, but Windham, a town much nearer Portland, where separati on senti ment was very strong, \4Oted 86 to 52 agai nst a separate state. Paris went 171 to 40 in favor, but adjoining Hebron stood 80 to 61 agai nst.
Someth I ng ce rta I n Iy swayed the voters of Wa I doboro and Warren. I n the first the vote was 280 to 24 against and in the second it was 127 to 24 against. In Bath, however, the voters stacked up 250 \4Otes in favor and only 76 against. A number of towns cast all their votes in favor of separation. Among them were Mt. Vernon, Rome, Freedom, Thornd I ke, Jonesboro and DI xfl e I d. Just one town In the whole state had the dubious distinction of casting all its votes against separation. That town was Appleton.
Waterville’s vote was 184 to 22, Winslow’s 113 to 2, Sidney’s 100 to 86, Vassalboro’s 114 to 37, China’s 38 to 5, Clinton’s 163 to 1, Albion’s 48 to 7– a II of these in favor of a separate state.
I n Somerset County, Fa i rf lei d favored the move by 117 to 26. Canaan by 192to 16, Norridgewock by 160 to 33, Madison 60 to 11, Solon 46 to 2, and Bingham 11 to 3. only in Bloomfield was the vote close, 48 to 41.
The small size in 1820 of what is now Maine’s second largest city is revealed by Its vote on separation, 89 for to 17 against. In fact the total vote cast in Canaan was tw ice the \4Ote cast in Bangor.
In Maine’s fi rst legis lature, 133 years ago, Watervi lie was large enough to rate its own di sti nct rep resentati ve. Wins low was then grouped wi th China for one representative. Fairfax (now Albion) was grouped WiTh Freedom, Unity with Joy, Norridgewock with Bloomfield, Bangor with Orono and Sunkhaze. But, believe it or not, Fairfield was then big enough to have a representative all its own, just as did its nei ghbor Watervi lie.
The old register of 1820 gives a list of all church organizations occupying church bui Idings in Maine and the names of their ministers. The reference to my native town is elspecially interesting to roo. As many of our listeners know, I have for many years been a Bapti ST, but it was not a Iways so. My boyhood was spent under the aeg i s of another Protestant denoml naTi on. Until graduaTed from high school I regarded the Bapti sts as a hard-she lied, reacti onary, soroowhat decadent seCT. They had no operati ng chl,Jrch in my town during all my boyhood years. By the tiroo I entered high school the old Baptist meeting house had become a hen house. There hadn’t been a service in it for many years. In 1820, however, that denomination was very much alive in Bridgton.
Th is old regi ster records two mi n i sters in the town — Nathan Church, Congregational, and Reuben Bell, Baptist. The register shOlis that the noble patri arch, co-founder of Hebron Academy, Elder John Tripp, was sti II pres i di ng over the Hebron Baptist Church in 1820; Thomas Adams, whom we talked about a few weeks ago, was at the Vassalboro Conqregational; Fifield Holt presided over the same denomination at Bloomfield, and Josiah Peat aT Norridgewock.
Clinton Baptists had as thei r leader a man with one of the most resounding first names in the whole state, Mehibosheth Cain.
Among the members of the Massachusetts ~dical Society located in ~4aine, and a d I rector of the soci ety, was Wate rvi I Ie’s renc:1,’med Dr. M:>ses App leton. He, you may perhaps remember, was a prominent investor in Watervi lie real estate and a director of the Waterv’ I Ie Bank.
In 1820 banking in Maine was in its infancy. Strangely enough, the bank with the largest capital was not in Portland or Augusta. It was the Wiscasset Bank with a capitalization of $250,000. The Cumberland Bank in Portland had capital of $200,000, and the Ha11Otie11 and Augusta Bank $150,000. No other of Ma i ne ‘s tota I of fl fteen banks was cap ita I i zed for more than $100 ,000. There was then just one savings bank — the Portland Institution for Savings.
Wages and salaries were as correspondingly low as was bank capitalization In 1820. The President of the U. S., James Monroe, got $25,000 a year. Vice President Daniel Tompkins got $5,000, one thousand less than the four cabinet members. Yes, Monroe had only four men In his cabinet, and those four were equally divided between North and South. John Quincy Adams of Massachusetts was Secretary of State. Smith Thompson of New York, Secretary of the Navy; WI 1- Ilam H. Crawford of Georgia, Secretary of the Treasury; and John C. Calhoun of South Carolina, Secretary of War. Each received a salary of $6,000.
John Marshall, great expounde’r of the law, got $5,000 as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and each of his associate justices got $4,500. The Attorney General rated only $3,500. And that Maine man whom we have already mentioned — A Ib I on K. Parris, fecJera I judge for the DI strl ct of Maine, rece I ved the princely salary of $1,000 a year.
NOlI let us close with the biggest shock of all from this old 1820 register. It gives a list of all post offices and postmasters in Maine. It is hard to beI ieve, but Watervi lie is not mentioned. Is it possib Ie that Watervi lIe had no post office 18 years after it became a separate tOlln? .
Year: 1954