Little Talk #968
April 8, 1973
[podcast]http://web.colby.edu/scimport/files/2011/02/LT968.mp3[/podcast]
One way to determine who was in Waterville a century or more ago is to examine the old tax lists. So let us take a look at Waterville taxpayers 138 years ago in 1863. Preserved is the list which the selectmen of that time – Eben Bacon, Jonathan Coombs and Perley Dow – submitted to the tax collector Nathaniel Crommett. The message of commitment was worded as follows: “Herein is committed to you a list of assessments made on the polls and estates of the taxable inhabitants of the town of Waterville, and upon the estates of non-resident proprietors thereof; said list amounting to $3,831.41, being the entire amount of the state, county and town tax for the year 1835, together with $86.82 deficiency of highway taxes for the year 1834, so that the whole amount is $3,918.23, which sum you are to collect agreeable to the directions in our warrant of this date.”
The accompanying warrant read: “You are hereby required to levy and collect from the several persons named in the list herewith the amount sat down opposite his name, the total from all such sums being $3,918.23. You are to collect and pay over this commitment as follows: To Asa Redington, Jr., Treasurer of the State of Maine, $463.16, on or before January 1, 1836; to David Pike, Treasurer of Kennebec County, $553.62, one half on or before September 1, 1835, the other half on or before January 1, 1836. The remainder you are to place in the treasury of the town of Waterville to be dispersed according to law, one half by October 1, 1835, the other half by January 1, 1836; except however that, by vote of the town, you are authorized to abate from the tax listed against any person at the following rates – for payment made within thirty days of this date 6%, within sixty days 4%, and within 120 days 2%. If any person shall neglect to pay his assessment, you are to distrain the goods and chattels of that person to the value of his assessment, and you may hold the distraint order for four days. If he shall fail to pay his assessment within the four days, then you shall sell at public auction the property so distrained for the payment of the assessment plus charges; and you shall post notice of such sale in some public place in Waterville at least 48 hours before the sale. If there be any overplus from such sale, you are immediately to restore such surplus to the distrained tax payer. In want of goods and chattels sufficient to make distraint within twelve days, you are to take the body of such negligent person and commit him into the common jail of the county, there to remain until he pays his tax or such part thereof as shall not be abated by the county commissioners.”The poll tax then levied alike on every male inhabitant seems to us today very unusual and I cannot even guess at the explanation. That poll tax was $1.23.
As for property taxes the largest assessment was against Nathaniel Gilman, for a property tax of $185.56. Only one other person was assessed more than $100. He was Timothy Boutelle, whose tax was $106.82. You may recall that, more than once on this program, I have said that, between 1820 and 1850, the two wealthiest men in Waterville were Nathaniel Gilman and Timothy Boutelle.
The third largest taxpayer was the merchant Simeon Mathews, whose tax was $84.76. Then came Asa Redington with $73.96, followed by James Stackpole with $72.96. Then in order, were Benjamin Crowell, Zebulon Sawyer, James Moor, Nehemiah Getchell, Jonathan Hobbs, William Pearson, and William Redington, whose taxes ranged downward from Crowell’s $59.30 to William Redington’s $39.96.
There were, in fact only twelve men in Waterville who paid a property tax of more than $35 in this long-ago year of 1835.
It is interesting to note how little was paid my members of families that later became distinguished in Waterville. Lemuel Dunbar’s tax was $11.90. Jonathan Heywood’s $7.72; Moses Appleton’s $21.94; John Cool’s $1.52; Josiah Morrill’s $13.76; Alexander McKechnie’s $6.08; Oliver Marston’s $10.65; Abijah Smith’s $11.52; and Harrison Smith’s $2.56.
The later leading citizen Sumner Percival, in 1835, paid only a poll tax, and the same was true of John Stackpole. The largest taxpayer out at Ten Lots was Renard Sturtevant, whose tax was $9.96.
The total number of all taxpayers on that 1835 list was 480, and 1/40 of those taxpayers paid more than 1/5 of the taxes.
Colby College played so large a part in the development of Waterville, that it is well for us to be reminded of some aspects of its own development. Not long ago one of these broadcasts referred to changing expenses at Colby over the years. Today I want to talk a bit about what students studied at Colby in the early days. The first catalogue of the college was published in 1825, just four years after the original Maine Literary and Theological Institute was changed by act of legislature of the new State of Maine to a four-year degree granting institution called Waterville College.
At that time, and for more than half a century afterward, there was no such thing as elective courses. Every student in each class took exactly the same subjects; that is, a fixed curriculum for all freshmen, another for sophomores, another for juniors, and a fourth for seniors. The college year was divided into three terms. The first term began the last week in August and extended until early December. Then came the long, winter vacation, lasting until mid-February. Then, after one week’s lapse, began the second term, lasting until early May. After another free week, the third or summer term started in May and lasted until August. Commencement came about the tenth of August. That, of course was the end of the college year; but instead of a long summer vacation, as now, there was a lapse of only two weeks before the new college year, or fall term, began.
The basis of all college studies in the first quarter of the 19th Century, from Harvard down to the newer denominational schools, was the languages and literatures of Greece and Rome, popularly called the Classics. In the first term of the Colby freshman year, the only subject other that Greek and Latin was Ancient geography, restricted to the lands adjoining the Mediterranean. In the second term that subject was replaced by Roman Antiquities, and in the third term by the first truly non-classical subject any freshman ever faced – Algebra. Throughout the year they studied portions of the Greek New Testament on Monday mornings, and had declamations of Friday afternoons.
Anything to do with the subject we now call English first confronted the student in his sophomore year. The subject was call rhetoric, which was a study of writing based on English texts that were themselves based on the work of the Roman rhetorician, Quintillian. Sophomores had to write a composition every week. During the year sophomores also studied mathematics and philosophy, and heard weekly lectures on European History. All through the year they were reading Greek and Latin Classics, and had more practice of turning English into Latin and Greek.
In junior year, there was more Greek and Latin, but also a single term of chemistry and one of electricity and optics. Math was taken all three terms, and there was one term each of philosophy, literary criticism, and ethics.
A time-honored text that Colby students faced for half a century came in first term of senior year. It was Paley’s Evidences of Christianity. They had a term of astronomy, and devoted another term to a book that greatly affected the minds of the founding fathers of America, John Locke’s Essay on Liberty. In this second term seniors took a course called Philosophy of the Mind. That was the beginning of was later called psychology.
Both juniors and seniors, like the sophomores had to write a composition every week, and recite declamations every Friday.
French, the first modern language to be taught at Colby, came early, though it was taught only for a single term in freshman year. Its introduction was in 1831, and nearly a year later it was followed by a single term of German.
In 1831 began the first course that had any relation to the modern science of geology. It was a course called Topography. In the same year there first appeared courses called natural theology and intellectural philosophy; and in the same catalogue first appeared the word calculus. What later became physics was represented by separate courses in optics, electricity and magnetism. Although the college had started as a theological seminary, not until 1832 was Hebrew put into the liberal arts curriculum. Then every sophomore had to take it for a single term.
It was the catalogue of 1832 that first referred to any scientific equipment. Nowhere in the early catalogues is the word science used. What we today call science was designated as either natural philosophy (the physical sciences) or natural history (the earth and life sciences). The 1832 catalogue tells us, “The philosophical apparatus was principally procured in London by a distinguished natural philosopher at an expense of $1,500.”
As for literary the catalogue said, “Students have access to libraries containing 2,060 volumes.” Why the plural “libraries”, rather than library? That was because, in addition to the college library, the two literary societies each had its own library and in 1832 that of Erosophian Adelphi actually held more volumes than did the college library.
Hard as it is to believe, the only change in the Colby curriculum between 1932 and 1850 was the introduction of zoology. But by 1850, the lecture system was already beginning to modify the older system of verbatim, memorized recitation from textbooks. Concerning lectures, the 1850 catalogue said: “In connection with the regular recitations, lectures are delivered on chemistry, geology, mineralogy, botany, conchology, Greek and Roman history and literature, History of the English language, and Means of Preserving Health.
Note that as late as 1850 no Colby student studied either English or American literature. The only literature then considered worthy of study was that of the Classical writers of Greece and Rome.