Radio Script #293
Little Talks On Common Things
February 19, 1956
A great man has gone. Franklin Winslow Johnson, foremost citizen of Watervi lie and founder of the New Colby on Mayflower Hi I I, died last night after 85 years of a rich, rewarding life, al I of whose adult years were spent in the service of youth. Mayflower Hi II is his monument, but the literally thousands of men and women scattered allover the world, who were influenced by him as teacher and administrator — those grateful men and women are his reward. Frank Johnson was The first of what have been cal led the modern principals of Coburn Institute, for he was the first to follow Dr. James Hanson, whose name had been a synonym for Coburn for more than forty years. Little did Frank Johnson think, back there in 1894, that the day would come when the name Johnson would win even wider and more illustrious renown as a synonym for Colby.
When the great Wi I liam Raney Harper became president of the University of Chicago, he cal led one by one four Colby graduates to assist him in bui Iding a national university in the Middle West. He cal led Nathaniel Butler to be dean of the undergraduate col lege, Albion Woodbury Small as dean of the graduate school, and Shai ler Mathews as dean of the Divinity School. But the university also planned a private high school to prepare students for university admission, and Dr. Harper needed someone to head it. He selected another Colby graduate, Franklin Winslow Johnson. During his ten years in charge of the Chicago school, Frank Johnson’s successful administration became so wei I known that Teachers College of Columbia University cal led him to the chair of Secondary Education at that famous institution, where he remained unti I he came to Waterv; I Ie as Colby’s president 26 years ago.
When Dr. Johnson took office at Colby it was already a good col lege, strengthened especially by the devoted, sacrificing labor of his predecessor, Arthur Roberts. But Colby was then a col lege almost unknown outside a narrow circle in New England. What a difference today! National magazines, the motion picture screen, radio and television have carried the name and fame of Colby allover America and into distant lands. Others have had a part in this wider recognition of Colby, but it could not have happened at all had not a big man persisted against al I disappointments in his vision about a little col lege. Frank Johnson proved to al I the doubters and critics that the impossible is only a little harder than the difficult. The bui Iding of Colby on a new site could not be done. It was foolish even to talk about it. What a crazy, impractical dreamer Frank Johnson was! But here today, on the heights of Mayflower Hill, stands the college of which every Watervi lie citizen, as well as every Colby graduate, is justly proud. And it is there because a boy from Wilton, Maine caught a vision about the college in Watervi I Ie which was his alma mater, and in devoting himself to that vision, Frank Johnson forgot hi mse I f into i nmorta II ty •
The executive head of this radio station, WTVL, Mr. Carleton Brown, has prepared a memori a I program for Dr. Johnson wh i ch wi II go on the ai rover th i s stati on at seven o’clock this evening. Mr. Brown graduated from Colby early in Dr. Johnson’s presidency and is now a trustee of the col lege., Listen tonight at seven o’clock for WTVL’s tribute to Franklin Winslow Johnson.
Here’s some more information about old Lincoln County, not the comparatively sma I I area that now goes by that name, but the whole vast territory between the Androscoggin and the St. Croix. The county seat of Pownalborough originally embraced al I the territory now in the towns of Wiscasset, Dresden, Alna, Perkins and Swan Island. The first town meeting was held not at Dresden, where the court house was later bu i It, but at the garr i son house in Wiscasset, on June 25, 1760. The very next year, however, the court house was erected on the east bank of the Kennebec. Because court was held there for a very large area, no place in Maine, previous to the Revolution, was more distinguished for its able and talented young lawyers.It was Wi Iliam Cushing of Pownalborough who administered the oath to George Washington at the President’s second inauguration.
Two of the most prominent non-English settlers at Pownalborough were John Polereczly, a soldier from Alsace, who came with General Rochambeau, the first town cler~, and Frederick,Theobald, chaplain in a German division of Burgoyne’s army at Saratoga. It was Theobald who gave the community the German name of Dresden.
On September 21, 1775 Arnold’s expedition stopped at Dresden. There Major Samue I Goodw i n supp lied Arno I d wi th a p I an of the Kennebec “to the severa I heads thereof”, and of carrying places to Arrmeguntick Pond and the Chaudiere River, as wei I as the passes and carrying places to Quebec. He also gave Arnold a copy of a journal which described al I the quick water to and from Quebec, showing a west way to go, an east way to return.
In 1723 was bui It the first fort above Merrymeeting Bay. Erected northwest of the ferry landing on the Richmond side of the Kennebec, it was cal led Fort Richmond. It was continuously garrisoned unti I 1755, when Forts Shirley, Western and Halifax rendered it obsolete.
Fort Sh i r ley, erected on the Dresden side, near where the court house was later bui It, was put up in 1752, two years before the bui Iding of Fort Halifax.
A letter from Temp Ie, Bowdoi nand Gardi ner — three of the proprietors — to Ne I son and Bo I I an in London, read as fo I lows: f’We have made a beg inn i ng at a p lace on the east side of the Kennebec Ri ver, a I itt Ie above Ri chmond fort, where we have about fifty men at work bui Iding a defense, as is customary in the eastern parts, and we have sent down eight carriage guns and ammunition. We sent down 54 Germans, and have agreed to supply them with provisions for twelve months. The town we cal I Frankfort, and hope to have 150 or 200 fami lies of Germans in the fa I I, as we sha II have then a house that wi II be safe from the I nd i ans. I n honor of our governor we sha II name the defense Fort Sh i r ley.!f
Scarcely a year goes by that some Maine town does not have interesting communication with its namesake’town in the old world. Some twenty years ago I was a speaker at a luncheon club in Newcastle when a message was read from a companion club in Newcastle, England. Bangor, Maine and Bangor, England have several times exchanged greetings. But, although we have several Maine towns named for Italian cities, I think last November saw one of the few occasions when communication passed between these municipal mothers and daughters. On November 30″ 1955 a headline in Roma,”; leading daily newspaper of Naples, Italy carried this headline: “La piccolo Napoli d’America saluta la grande Napoli” (Little Naples in America greets big Naples). The story was accompanied by a photograph showing Mr. and Mrs. Jeffrey Weston of Naples, Maine delivering the greetings of that town to the mayor of Naples, Italy.
Mr. Weston had conceived the idea of carrying greetings of the selectmen of the Maine town to the Italian city as a mere stunt, and no one was more astounded than he at the ceremony wh i ch deve loped. A forma I recepti on was arranged, comp lete with uni formed servants, mi Ii tary guard, and other trapp i ngs. The Maine couple toured the city in the mayor’s official automobile and on the following day were given an official luncheon.
Concerning the message signed by the selectmen of Naples, Maine, the Italian newspaper ca lis the signees Phi lip C. Chute, presidente; James F. Flagg, primo amministratore; and Chester Burnham, secondo amministratore.
Whi Ie most of the nation, a hundred years ago, was seeing increased agitation over slavery, Maine was more deeply absorbed in the liquor prob lem. In 1851, under the leadership of Neal 0011, Maine was the first state in the Union to pass a state anti -I i quor law. Li ke most restri cti ve legis I ati on, the new law immediately revealed defects. As a result the 1853 legislature passed amended legislation and did, so good a job that in substance the Maine prohibitory law remained effective for eighty years.
Recently there came to my attention House Oocument No. 23 of Maine’s 32nd Legislature, assembled in January, 1853. The document, entitled HOrinking Houses and Ti pp Ii n9 Sbop.s”, is the report of a joi nt se lect commi ttee of both branches of the legislature, concerning amendments to the prohibitory law of 1851 •
The report says: “The ob je ct of the comm i ttee h as been to rna i n ta i n the i ntegrity of the principal of the original law, which is the destruction of the liquors and the certainty of the penalties; and to remove al I causes of doubt in the appl ication of those principles to the law. The object of this law is not to dictate to men what they shall eat or drink. If men wi II be so besotted as to be drunk at home, and wi I I not thereby di sturb the pub Ii c peace, nor that of the i r fami I ies or ne i ghborhood, the law shoul d not interfere. To reform such cases is the provi nce of the preacher and the mora list. But when the drunkard staggers into the open daylight, a nuisance to all beholders, disturbing, disgusti ng, and ready to quarre I with peaceab Ie and i ndustri ous ci ti zens, it is ti me for the law to lay a restraining hand upon him. It is time also for the law to reach further and take into its iron grasp the manufacturer of such nuisances, the shocking figure who draws his living out of such disgusting objects.”
One of the controversial factors in the discussiJOns, both in 1851 and in 1853, concerned Maine’s native product, apple cider. The committee of 1853 re~ ported: “We see no reason why farmers shoul d not be permitted to manufacture the frui ts of the i r orchards into ci der, and se II the same; but if ci der be found in drinking houses and tippling shops, it must suffer the fate of the poor dog in the fab Ie who fe I I into bad company.”
The 1851 law had forbidden any sale of cider, though not its manufacture. The 1853 amendment read as follOtls: “Nothing in this act sha II be construed to prevent any chemi st, arti st, or manufacturer, in whose trade or art they may be necessary, from keeping at his place of business such reasonab Ie and proper quanti ty of such liquors as his trade or art may requi re, but not for sa Ie; nor to prohibit the manufacture or sale of cider in quantities not less than 28 gallons, to be delivered and taken away at one time.”
The presence of an official liquor agency in each Maine comm~nity was given up so long ago that only our oldest citizens now remember the practice. Let us see, in the words of the statute, how these agencies operated in 1853. “The selectmen of any town, and the mayor and a Iderman of any ci ty, may appoi nt sorre suitable person, as the agent of said town or city, to sell at sorre central and convenient place within the town or city, spirits, wines and other intoxicating liquors, to be used for medicinal and mechanical purposes and no other.” The law provided stern penalties for any agent who violated its provisions.
Of course the prohibitory law had its violators. Some farmers continued to sell cider in lots much less than the legal 28 gallons; whiskey, rum and gin were bootlegged, though on no such vast scale as in the 1920’s; and there were told plenty of stories like the one concerning a Maine man returning home on a train from Boston. Looking up at this man’s big grip on the rack overhead, his seatmate asked, ”What have you got in your bag?” “A new pai r of shoes”, was the rep Iy. ”We II, mi ster”, sai d the other fe II 011, “your shoes is leaki ng.” In spite of persistent violation, the social historian can compi Ie a lot of evidence that the whole tone of moral living in Maine was, for many years, better than in states which operated under various systems of liquor licenses.
There is one fault with the present system of state liquor stores that is hard for some of us to accept. It puts you and me, as citizens of the state, in the liquor bus i ness aga i nst our own wi II. We don’t have to patron i ze the stores as customers, but as integral parts of the state of Maine, we are the se I lers.
It is interesting to note hQII the legislators lined up on that amended law of 1853. That information is provided in a clipping in the Saco Union of March 24, 1853, which came into my hands together with the legislative document. The two major parties were then Whigs and Democrats, with the latter in overwhelming control of the legislature. Because the Whigs voted 49 to 4 in favor of the law, and the Democrats favored it more narrowly by 41 to 39, and the four Free Sai I legislators were al I in favor, the result was 95 to 43, or almost exactly a two to one majority for continued and amended prohibition of liquor.
For Kennebec County, the representatives of Watervi I Ie, Augusta, Vassal boro, and Belgrade favored the law; those from Albion, Clinton and China were aga i nst it. For Somerset County, the on Iy opponents we re from Bingham, Detroi t and Corn~” vii Ie. The representatives from Harmony, Smithfield, Madison, Canaan and Fairfield all voted for the bi II.
The law had some opposition in every county except Hancock, whose eight representati ves a II voted for it.
Let us close tonight with comment on the origin of three more fami liar express ions. How di d the term “pork barre I” get its pol iti cal app Ii cati on? Pork is fat, and fat has for centuries been the symbol of abundance, especi a Ily of unearned abundance. Anyth i ng especi a Ily I ucrati ve that doesn’t have to be pai d for, is fat or pork.
What is a “ham actor”? About 1875 low grade actors, especi ally in mi nstre I shows, were cal led hamfatters, because they used ham fat instead of cold cream to remove make-up.
What about “ca lied on the carpet”? Carpets were ori gi na Ily tab Ie covers of thick fabric. Aristocratic ladies began to use them to cover floors. Because only the gentry and nobi lity of 18th century England had floor carpets, to be reprimanded by the boss in his library or drawi ng roo~ was to be ca lied on the carpet.
And there being no carpet in this studio room, we’ll just call it good night for old times’ sake.
Year: 1956