Radio Script #717

Little Talks on Common Things

February 12, 1967

Not long ago I told you about the oldest American newspaper it has ever been my privilege to handle and examine in detail, the Boston Gazette for June 20, 1737. In the collection found in Pittsfield, Maine by Mr. Roger Ross of the Metropolitan Insurance Company is another old newspaper by modern standards, but not nearly so old as the Boston Gazette. This one is an issue of a paper called the Christian Mirror, published in Portland in 1823, at a time when that city was the capital of the new State of Maine.

Portland’s first newspaper had been the Falmouth Gazette, started in 1794. By 1820, when Maine became an independent state, there were half a dozen such papers, some of them political, others religious, in content and support. The Christian Mirror was a religious paper, though not sponsored by any particular denomination. It was published by Arthur Shirley and edited by Asa Rand.

The Mirror was in no sense a local newspaper; it contained in its issue of May 2, 1823 not a single item of Portland news. Its four pages were devoted to articles about religion, missions and Sabbath schools. It is of interest today only as it reveals some of the thoughts that filled folks’ minds and behavior that was expected of them 144 years ago.

The editor was concerned about a certain Mr. Wolff; so the leading article in the Mirror started thus: “We are concerned about the escape and labors of Mr. Wolff, a zealous missionary to the Jews and others in Turkey, who was known to have been at Aleppo a short time before the earthquake. Fear has been entertained that he perished in the ruins of that city. We have now learned that Mr. Wolff did escape, and after much hardship arrived on the island of Cyprus. He next turned up in Alexandria, where he was introduced to the British Viceroy of Egypt. There he told the Viceroy of his hope to establish a Christian College at Bulaka near Cairo.” Then Wolff disappeared again and the Mirror editor feared he had fallen into the hands of Barbary pirates.

Now what is especially to be noted in that account is that in 1823 a Christian missionary in Turkey was concentrating his attention on the conversion of Jews. At that time Equatorial Africa was an unknown land except for a few spots on the coast, but into the south, nearer the present Union of South Africa, missionaries had found their way. The editor of the Mirror had received a letter from a missionary named Key, written more than a year earlier, in March, 1822, which (by the way) was the very year when the first missionary to go to a foreign land from Waterville was graduated from Waterville College (later Colby). For it was in 1822 that George Dana Boardman received his diploma from Colby’s first president, Jeremiah Chaplin, and a few years later young Boardman would join Adoniram Judson in Burma.

Mr. Key wrote from what he called Boschuam Country, about thirty degrees south of the equator. The natives he described as Bushmen, Namacquas, and Hottentots. All of the tribes, he wrote, were scattered over barren plains, living in very small communities of twenty to thirty families. The Bushmen, he said, are regarded by all the other tribes as the wildest, not much better than animals. “But that opinion is wrong”, he avowed. “My observations have shown me that the Bushman is active, ingenious and readily teachable. He is vicious if offended, but docile if treated kindly. Farther north, where few Europeans have ever ventured, the country is inhabited by numerous tribes, all jet black in color, athletic in agility, and free from any kind of deformity. Their manners are peculiar and they are grossly superstitious.”

In 1823 Sunday Schools were just beginning to be popular. That was about the time when a few theological students at Colby first started a mission Sunday School on the Waterville Plains. Listen to what the Mirror had to say about that new religious institution then called the Sabbath School: “The government of the school should be at once mild and energetic. The teacher of gospel truth should govern in the Christian spirit. Harsh measures and severe manner, often employed in other schools, will not do in a Sabbath School. The school should preserve the solemnity that belongs to the Sabbath. The book of instruction should be solely the Holy Scriptures. Do not demand too much of the child’s memory. Let them memorize scripture, but a very little at a time. Of course only pious persons must be the teachers; irreverent individuals must not be tolerated as Sabbath School teachers.”

Only two columns on the third page of the Mirror were at all concerned with matters other than religion. One item reported that in the past 1S months more than 400 slave ships had left the African coast, carrying 100,000 slaves. Most of those ships were bound for the mainland of North or South America or the islands of the Caribbean.

Another item reported three ships taken by pirates within a few miles of Mavana. One of the captured ships was the brig Mechanic from Portland. Another item said: “M. Murat, ex-king of Naples, has been refused passport to visit his uncle, Joseph Buonaparte, in the United States.”

That old issue of the Christian Mirror contained exactly four small ads. Here is the first one: “Vol. II of Scrott’s Family Bible is received and ready for subscribers at William Hyde’s Bookstore, No.3 Mussey’s Row. Just published for sale as above: Dr. Worcester’s Sermons, Account of the Revival in Boston SO years ago, Henry Martyn’s Sermons, the Missionary Herald for April, and Youth’s Guardian for March.”

Another ad said: “A new tract depository for the convenience of the inhabitants of Lincoln County, the general agents of the N.E. Tract Society have made a deposit of tracts in Waldoboro. They are committed to the care of D.M. Mitchell, who will sell them on the same terms as in Boston or at the General Depository at Andover.”

One ad was signed by one of the best known Maine ministers of the time, Rev. Benjamin Tappan of Augusta. It read: “The directors of the Maine Branch of the American Education Society will meet in Brunswick at the house of President Allen of Bowdoin College on the 19th of May at 3 p.m. Young men desiring to be received as beneficiaries of the Society, to have their college expenses paid, are requested to make application at the time above mentioned.” In those days any young man who avowed intention of studying for the ministry could usually get help from one of the many religious societies, of which the American Education Society was the most prominent.

One more ad, the smallest of the four, completed the advertising in that issue of the Mirror. It advertised one of Maine’s oldest and at that time one of the State’s most flourishing academies. The ad consisted of only twelve words: “Limerick Academy will be opened May thirteenth under the instruction of Charles Freeman.”

Another Portland paper, a single issue of which is in Mr. Ross’ collection, is a curiosity indeed. It was called the Portland Pleasure Boat, and this particular issue is dated April 10, 1851. The masthead tells us: “Portland Pleasure Boat. J. Hacker, Owner, Master and Crew. Published weekly at one dollar a year, paid in advance, or two cents a copy. The editor’s office is at No. 87 Fore Street.”

This amusing paper seemed not to be designed to promote either religion or a political party. Its columns were given over almost entirely to caustic comments by the editor on almost everything under the sun, but especially to goings-on in Maine. The old paper is somewhat remindful of a much later publication, John Gould’s “Enterprise”.

As for religion, the Pleasure Boat was decidedly anti-clerical as revealed in many of its items, of which two serve well as examples. One of those items said: “A Reverend He-goat in France, who was caught by his housekeeper in a situation with a married woman, poisoned the housekeeper with his own hands. He has now been sentenced to the gallies for life. Perhaps the deluded dupes of priestcraft will get their eyes open some day.”

But Editor Hacker’s venom was not leveled solely at one sect. Here’s what he said about another cleric: “Rev. Sebastian Streeter. a Congregationalist minister of Boston, has united in marriage 3,000 couples since he commenced shearing his flock. At $2.00 a pair, that is a total take of $6,000. Why do those who wish to marry not singly take each other in the presence of witnesses and save themselves the fee? They could do so with perfect legality. Then they would strike one more blow at the domination of the clergy.”

The equivalent of the modern movie star was in 1851 the singer, Jenny Lind, whom the showman P.T. Barnum had brought to America. The editor of Pleasure Boat showed what he thought of the Swedish Nightingale: “Were she what she ought to be, she would not be hawked about the world by Barnum, swindling the starving poor out of their rights. We despise the way laboring families are ground down to the most miserable wages in order to furnish the means for paying Barnum and Jenny enormous sums.”

The middle of the nineteenth century saw much agitation about the so-called wild lands of Maine, the lands still held by the state and as yet unappropriated to either private or public interests.

The editor of Pleasure Boat said the people were asking some pertinent questions. Just where is the land located? What is the quality of its soil? What crops can it produce? How far is it from Bangor or other market? What about its wood and timber? Where and to whom do prospective settlers apply? The editor then said: “Will Dr. Holmes of the Maine Farmer, or the Land Agent, or anyone else please answer these questions? I believe Dr. Holmes has visited the region and can give us information.”

Editor Hacker didn’t like the idea of a standing army in the United States. He was strong anti-slavery, but in 1851 he had not the slightest notion that war was only ten years away. Listen to what he said about army service: “Any able-bodied man can be better employed than in scouring guns in peace time or in slaying human beings in time of war at seven dollars a month. How much better for a young man to shoulder an axe, march to Aroostook County, take possession of a hundred acres of land, which he can pay for by labor on the roads, build a cabin, and clear a farm. So long as he remains a soldier, he has nothing to hope for. There are now at Fort Preble the best looking company of soldiers I have ever seen — young men who might well be in better business. How can they be content to loll around at the fort when they might be owners of handsome and productive farms?”

Year: 1967