Radio Script #359
Little Talks On Common Things
December 15, 1957
About a year ago the physics bui Iding on the old Colby campus was torn down. The bu i I ding was known as the Shannon Obse rvatory, because the money to bui Id it was provided chiefly by Col. Richard Shannon of Colbyfs Class of 1862.
It wa s i nteresti ng to see what had been p I aced in the corne rstone of that b ui I ding when it was erected in 1889, and thanks to the vigi lance of Dick Dyer, CoIby’s Director of Public Relations, those oontents have been preserved. Besides the usual college publications of the time, and contemporary copies of the Watervi lie Mai I, the box contained a view book of Watervi I Ie, which I have found , excepTionally interesting. There is a two-page engraving, obviously a drawin9, not a photograph, labeled “Bird’s Eye View of Waterville”. It shows the city as it was in the early 1880’s. By that time Ticonic Bridge was open and uncovered; but the railroad bridge was still a covered structure. There was no Burlei gh Street, no west Street, no Bart lett Street. The fi rst of the Lockwood bui I dings had been bui It, but on the Wi ns low si de of the ri ver, where now is the great ~ II i ngsworth p I ant, there was on Iy vacant I and. On the County Road, between the ra i I road bri dge at North Street and the Cedar Bri dge over the ~·1essalonskee, there was not a sing Ie dwe I ling, and on the Fi rst Ranqeway the re was exactly one house. Cool Street had only two houses.
The rest of the booklet is fi lied with pictures of individual bui Idings or street scenes. The churches, the college bui Idings, and the schools are shown. There i s a scene of Pleasant Street, look i ng north, wh i ch shows th ree horsedrawn vehicles, among them a hearse. On the east side of Main Street, north of the block which housed the Arnold store, There were only low ramshackle bui Idings.
Monument Park and its new monument were proudly depicted. Among the private residences pictured were those of J. H. Plaisted, F. A. Smith, Nathaniel Meader, C. A. Hami Iton, Dr. Pulsifer, M. C. Foster, Daniel Wing, John Ware, and Mrs. Sarah vlare. The Elmwood Hotel was then a three-storied structure with a dormered fourth story, and was decorated with cupola and tasseled overhangs of the gingerbread period. Side by side on the west side of Main Street stood the Peoples and the Ticonic banks. Altogether the booklet gives an interesting depiction of Watervi lie 70 years ago.
Considerable insight can be obtained into the customs and habits of changi ng ti mes by an exami nation of persona I account books, especi a Ily of accounts kept at different peri ods in the same fami Iy. I t has been my recent p ri vi lege to exami ne two such accounts, kept by the father and the grandfather of a ~/atervi lie man who came here from the town of Di xmont. The grandfather’s preserved record is a carefu I list of rece i pts and expend i tures for the year 1878. The son left a longer record, al I the income and outgo from 1901 through 1907. In discussing these records we are therefore talking about a period 80 years ago compared with one 50 years ago.
In the first place both of these men always spent a little less than they earned. Occa s i ona I I y a month t s expend i tures wou I d exceed a month T s rece i pts, but the balance carried over from the previous month was more than sufficient to offset the di fference. The grandfather’s income in 1878 came chiefly from his farm products, and only incidentally from his trade of harness maker. In January he sold a dressed hog for $26. In February he got $6 for four cords of wood. In May the sale of a calf netted five dollars. In September he received $20 for wintering a calf~
and in December he got fi ve dollars for another hog. I n January hi s eggs were br i ngi ng 22 cents a dozen, but by Ap ri I the p ri ce had fa I len to ten cents. He usually ‘got 18 cents a-pound ·for butter,.but one month.he had to let it go for 15 cents. As for his harness work” his rece i pts were most Iy for sma r I repai rs)’ ranging from 20 to 50 cents, with an occasional item going as high as three dollars. He charged a dollar for making a ha Iter” $2.50 for a set of reins. He di d some hai r cutti ng, whether wi th hi s harness shears or otherwi se we do not know. In ~.4arch his accounts carry the receipt item HCutting hair 10 centsl!: in April “cutting hair 20 cents”; and in each of several other months, rTcutting hair 10 centsfT. The inference is that in Apri I he must have given hai rcuts to two di fferent persons on the same day.
There is no evi dence that th is grandfather ran a tavern, but, like many a Maine ftarmer of the time” he did sometimes take pay for meals. Maine folk were always hosp i tab Ie to trave ling strangers, but those strangers were expected to pay for food if they were ab Ie to do so.
This grandfather’s uniform charge for a dinner was 25 cents, but he didn’t get it often. Total receipts from that source for the whole year of 1878 were less than five dollars. Once in a whi Ie he received 25 cents for boardin~ a horse • wonder how long it was common practi ce to charge exact Iy the same amount, 25 cents, to feed a man or a horse. Anyhow, it is interesting to know that there was a time when, in that respect, a man and his horse were considered equa Is •
You may be sure that this grandfather’s expenditures were limited closely to Ii fe’s necessities. He did allow himself the one lUXUry of subscribing to a Boston paper, but most of his payments went for the commonest needs. January was a typical month. He paid $8.00 for a barrel of flour, $1.80 for 18 pounds of sugar, $30.00 for 30 pounds of lard, $1.25 for shoeing a horse, $5.00 for five yards of pant cloth, $1.75 for a pair of boots, ten cents for a lamp chimney, and 25 cents for kerosene oi I. Throughout the whole year there is no mention of coffee, but he bought a lot of tea at 44 cents a pound. The fami Iy was apparent I y fond of oyster stew, for severa I ti mes in each of the col d months appear the charges Hoysters 20<t, crackers 10<t r;. Q.n Iv three ti mes in the who Ie year did he payout money for meat: in February $1.00, in June 40 cents, and in October 25 cents. In August he paid $5.00 for cloth to make a coat, and it cost him 50 cents to have it cut.
If any of this grandfather’s grocery items could be cal led a luxury, it was raisins. His fami Iy consumed large quantities of them at 12 cents a pound.
Twenty-three years went by and the man’s son, whom we cal I Father~ as we called the older man Grandfather, was keeping his own accounts~ beqinninq in 1901. Let us see how the times had changed. Like Grandfather, Father did a bit of harness mending, but he paid much less attention to it. He was interested in something Grandfather didn’t have in 1878, bicycles. Just as Grandfath~ er’s harness business had been incidental to his farming, so Father’s bicycle repair work was just a side-line to his farm. What kept Father’s accounts out of the red was the monthly cream check. It made him run pretty close to the wind when some of the cows were dry, but with the coming of the calves, cream became abundant and the check would shoot up from a low of six dol lars to a high of thirty dol lars.
Like grandfather, the younger man took money for meals, but his service was a bit more extensive. His receipts for lodging as wei I as meals shows that he operated a modest kind of tavern. In the intervening auarter of a century the charge for dinner had gone up from 25<t to 50<t.
Father, unlike the older man, indulged in a few luxuries. He bouqht oranges, candy and gum in smal I amounts, and almost every month he spent a nickel or more for peanuts. He paid ten cents for a stick pin, and once spent a luxurious 76 cents at a social in Plymouth, probably whi Ie he was courting. And how Grandfather wou Id have scorned Father’s payment of ten cents for vi s i ti nq cards.
Whi Ie Grandfather had his Boston paper, Father once paid 75 cents for a book. He doesn!t give us its title. Father’s accounts are liberally sprinkled with charges for postage, but no such item is disclosed in Grandfather’s records. Perhaps his rare use of postage is concealed in his monthly item cal led Sundries, an item that never exceeded 20 cents. Father once spent 5 cents for toothpicks. What would Grandfather have thought of that?
We have no evidence that Grandfather was a joiner. Father on the contrary paid 30 cents in January, 1901 as dues to the Grange. In Apri I dues and a badge, also in the Grange, cost him 70 cents. In May his Knights of Pythias dues amounted to a dollar, and in July another $2.00. In August he handed over $2.00 for the sixth degree.
This joining business was not al I outgo. In FebrUary, 1902 he took in $6.00 for serving supper to the Knights of the Golden Eagle, but in the same month $2.00 went to the same organization for dues.
We have noted that, early in 1901, Father paid 75 cents for an unnamed book. Apparently he was an avid reader. He subscribed to the New England Homestead and the Youth’s Companion. He paid $1.50 for a life of the man who was then President of the United States, Wi I liam McKinley.
In the Grandfather!s account there is no record of savings, nor is there any evidence that the father had any savings account in a bank. But he certainly set money aside in a personally kept savings account. For several years he put aside regularly 60 cents a week. Then in Apri I, 1902 he borrowed $9.20 from the account, obviously to buy clothes, for the next item in the book says “clothes $12.75!t. But in the immediately followin9 weeks he not only set aside the usual 60 cents a week, but on June 20 he returned $5.00 of the borrowed money to the savings fund. Then on August 6 he returned $1.80. At the end of the year. it- was a II pa i d back.
The grand.father seems to have had no troub Ie keep i ng track of every cent, but the father often found pennies slipping away, he knew not where. At the end of January, 1902, he put down “shortage 50 cents ff. At the end of August he fe It obliged to record l1 not-accounted for $2.63. 11 In November he wrote !’Unaccountable 77 cents
The accounts of Grandfather do not reveal that he had any hobby, but Father had a stamp collection and was persistently adding to it, even when it meant parting with cash. On June 1, 1901 his account shows “stamp for collection 30 cents 1~. In J u I y he bought 50 cents worth: in August he hazarded a quarter; and in September 20 cents. Apparently his interest faded because after December; 1901 no more such expenditures are recorded.
The father had two sources of income which do not appear in the grandfather’s accounts. One of these was for digging graves, for which his charge was $2.00. The other less gruesome occupation was teaching school, which he did hrough several years in the winter months, teaching only what was cal led the winter term for total payment of $60.
AI I this comes from the records in 1878 and in the first seven vears of the 20th century, of an industrious and highly respected Maine fami IV in the town of Dixmont. Who were they? They were Amos and Arthur tv10rse respectivelv .. the grandfather and father of Perry Morse of Watervi I Ie.
Year: 1957