<\/p>\n
I have mentioned numerous Maine newspapers on this program, but I don’t think I have ever before taken any items directly from one of our most famous papers of the Civil War period, the Bangor Whig and Courier. I recently chanced upon the issue of that paper for May 16, 1868.<\/p>\n
In that year railroads were very much in the news. The Bangor paper said: nIt is reported that at last the Bangor and Piscataquis R.R. <\/em>is to be built. A contract has been let to Andrews of Biddeford at a price of $19,850 per mile. This price includes depots, fences, land damages, and everything to put the road in first class order.”<\/p>\n Another item said: “The Portland and Kennebec R.R. has placed on Conductor Mitchell’s train one of the most elaborate passenger cars in New England. It was built at Augusta, holds 60 passengers, is finished with chestnut and walnut woods, and is upholstered in the latest style on cast iron frames.”<\/p>\n Still another announcement told the public that the Knox and Lincoln R.R. <\/em>would soon connect Bath and Woolwich by a steam ferry to cost $80,000. That Knox and Lincoln R.R. <\/em>had not been constructed in 1868. It had been surveyed and construction was expected to begin soon. The road was to run from Woolwich through Wiscasset, Newcastle, Damariscotta, Nobleboro, Waldoboro, Warren and Thomaston to Rockland, a distance of 45 miles. As the Bangor paper said, it would be connected with the Brunswick and Bath R.R. <\/em>by a ferry.<\/p>\n Plans were also under way for a railroad out of Belfast. The Bangor paper said: “Contractor Munroe of Boston arrived in Belfast on Tuesday to look over the proposed route of the Belfast and Moosehead R.R.”<\/p>\n As for existing railroads in 1868, the Grand Trunk ran an appealing ad. It said: “Ho for Chicago! Great reduction of fare. Take the Grand Trunk to the Republican National Convention at Chicago on May 20. Unprecedented low rate of $24.50. Portland to Chicago and return.” That was the convention which nominated General Grant for President.<\/p>\n There was national news in that issue of the Whig and Courier. Wendell Phillips had repeated his slander about General Grant’s drinking habits at a meeting in New York. Phillips said his conviction was increased by Senator Wilson’s statement that he never knew Grant to drink. Phillips said he never knew Wilson to tell the truth about anything.<\/p>\n As an ultra-reconstruction paper that wanted to see only harsh treatment of the defeated South, the Whig and Courier was disappointed when Congress failed to impeach President Andrew Johnson, and they were especially indignant at Maine’s senator William Pitt Fessenden for voting against the impeachment. But the paper took courage in hope for the outcome of the 1868 election. It said: “We shall soon have in the White House the great general who led our armies to victory and who will stem the evils now flowing from the perverse rule 0 f Andrew Johnson.”<\/p>\n Plans so forcefully started by John Poor to see another railroad through to Canada — he already owned a controlling share in the Grand Trunk — had resulted in starting construction of the European and North American, to run from Bangor to Vanceboro and there connect with Canadian roads to St. John and Halifax. The company soon encountered financial difficulties and it was proposed that the City of Bangor should officially come to the rescue. That is what accounts for the following item in the Whig and Courier in 1868: “There will be a meeting of the stockholders of the European and North American R.R. to see if they will authorize an act to extend the time for completion of the railroad to Lincoln, and to accept an act authorizing the City of Bangor to loan its credit for the railroad’s construction and to authorize a mortgage to the City of Bangor of the line from Bangor to Winn, this to insure payment of the city scrip issued in behalf of the railroad.” Waterville College was, by the way, one of the investors in that Bangor scrip.<\/p>\n For many years after the Civil War every newspaper contained ads by war claims agents. C. P. Brown of Bangor advertised thus: “By laws just enacted each soldier will be paid money in lieu of rations for every single day he was held a prisoner by the Rebels. The same will be paid to the heir of each soldier who died in prison. Blanks are obtainable at my office. I also collect pension, bounty and pay claims as heretofore.”<\/p>\n Bangor has always been Maine’s great lumber port, and it is<\/em> interesting to note prices <\/em>quoted by the Whig and Courier in 1868. Dry price Was $60 a thousand, spruce boards $16. Extra quality clapboards brought $60 a thousand, and the best shaved cedar shingles $6.’\/5. <\/em>Six foot cedar posts could be bought for 13 cents; 12 foot posts for 40 cents.<\/p>\n As always we find the ads in that 1868 paper of special interest. The Bangor Bazaar was selling hoop skirts cheap, and did stamping and stitching on order. Charles Fraser had just opened what he called a New Saloon on Hammond Street. It was not a bar room, but a restaurant, featuring oysters cooked in all varieties. Ice cream was expensive in those days. Fraser sold it at $3 a gallon. S. H. Dale proc1ai:med that he had for sale Shetland shawls in scarlet, black and white; also 600 hogsheads of Muscavado molasses and 40 hogsheads of centrifugal sugars. All this had arrived on the Schooner Goldfinch from Cuba, tied up at a Bangor wharf.<\/p>\n A famous Maine school ran an ad in that 1868 Whig and Courier. It said: “The Abbott Family School at Little Blue, Farmington. The summer session will commence on Thursday, May 28. Study, exercise, recreation, health, manners and morals.”<\/p>\n Here are just a few of the other ads of things once common, but now rare: “Nothing shines like Excelsior Harness Black.<\/p>\n “John Patten has cabinet organs and melodeons for rent.<\/p>\n “J. H. Clergre, maker of ladies and gents’ wigs, has moved to No. 119 Exchange Street.<\/p>\n “The new Ironclad Monster Trunk can be seen at the Bangor Trunk Factory. We also repair and cover trunks. Attractive and durable skin trunk covers in stock.<\/p>\n “$500 reward to anyone producing a better article fer scouring knives than my Ixle Knife Polish. George B. Robinson.<\/p>\n “The Inside Route. Steamer City of Richmond leaves Bangor Monday, Wednesday and Friday for Portland. Returning, leaves Portland the same evenings.”<\/p>\n On this program I have often mentioned the Kennebec lands and have explained how the land titles go back to the old Plymouth Colony. But not until tonight have I ever told you just what happened to those titles through the years nor how confusing they became.<\/p>\n In 1661 the colony of New Plymouth deeded a patent of the lands on the Kennebec that it had purchased from the Indians, extending from the Cobbosseecontee to. the Wesserunsett, and going back from the river 15 miles on each side. The deed was conveyed to four men, to hold in equal shares. These four were Antipas Boies, Edward Tyng, Thomas Brattle and John Winslow.<\/p>\n King Philip’s War and the ensuing troubles with the Indians so long delayed settlement that as late as 1750 very few white settlers lived along the Kennebec between what are now Gardiner and Skowhegan. A group of Boston business men, led by Dr. Sylvester Gardiner, decided to do something about it. They eventually succeeded in buying most of the land for their corporation, called the Proprietors of the Kennebec Purchase, incorporated in 1753, but such purchase was not easy. Much water had run down the Kennebec since the sale of the tract by the Plymouth Colony to Antipas Boyes and his three partners. At that time each partner had owned one-fourth of the whole vast area, but their heirs were not easy to trace, nor were their sales to others, despite recorded deeds. At the risk of boring you with names, I must tell you enough of What happened to give you a glimpse of the complications.<\/p>\n Boyes bequeathed his quarter to relatives, Antipas and Samuel Marshall. Antipas Marshall sold his 1\/8 share to four men, two sixths of it to two of them, and one sixth to each of the others. By this time it was clear the ownership of the grant was being reduced to shares of 1\/48 each, after having started as 1\/4. Antipas Marshall’s brother Samuel sold his portion to two men, from whom James Bowdoin, James Pitts and Benjamin Hallowell purchased 1\/48 each. Tyng’s quarter went to his four children, giving each 1\/16 share in the grant. From one of those children John Goodwin of old Pownalborough got into the deal. Many years later John Tyng of Dunstable, grandson of the original Edward Tyng, brought suit against the proprietors to secure his inherited rights. In 1784 he won his battle in the courts and Was admitted as one of the proprietors.<\/p>\n Thomas Brattle’s quarter was even more confused. He died intestate in l683,leaving what was then one of the largest estates in New England, valued at 7,227 pounds. He left seven children, and from them by various means rights came to Sylvester Gardiner, Florentius Vassall and Benjamin Hallowell, who were already proprietors of the company. No fewer than twenty other persons shared in Brattle’s holding. John Winslow, for whom the town of Winslow is named, sold 2\/5 of his quarter to Robert Temple and 2\/5 to James Jolippe, retaining 1\/5 for himself. All of those shares became very much subdivided by later purchases and bequests. The result was that, by 1696, the shares in the Kennebec lands were divided into 560 parts.<\/p>\n Who were the original proprietors of the Kennebec Purchase in 1753? A.t that time there was a total of only 192 shares. Forty eight, or exactly one fourth of the whole tract, was held, in various fractions, by five persons who acted in common, representing the interests of John Winslow, descendant of the original John of the 1661 purchase. The best known of his colleagues was Robert Tapl… Sylvester Gardiner and Phineas Jones held 12 shares each, while 11 were owned by William Brattle. Eight shares were owned by each of seven men, among whom were the prominent names of Florentius Vassall who gave his name to Vassalboro; Thomas Hancock, brother of John Hancock, first signer of the Declaration of Independence; and William Bowdoin, a member of the family that is still recognized in Maine by the towns of Bowdoin and Bowdoinham and by Bowdoin College. Among the three persons who held seven shares each was Benjamin Hallowell, from whom Hallowell got its name, and whose son married a daughter of fellow proprietor Sylvester Gardiner. Altogether in 1753 there were 33 named proprietors, several of whom held only fractions of a share.<\/p>\n Forty three years later in 1796 the number of proprietors had been reduced to 27, with six men holding more than half the shares: James Bowdoin, Sylvester Gardiner, Benjamin Hallowell, Thomas Hancock, Robert Temple and Florentius Vassall. One knighted Englishman held eight shares. He was Sir William Baker, who lived in London and never saw his Kennebec lands.<\/p>\n In 1816 the company sold at auction their remaining lands and closed up a business which, with all its settlements and land titles, had lasted for 1,5 years after the original purchase from the Plymouth Company.<\/p>\n Year: 1962<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Read the script for “Little Talks” program #556, Broadcast on December 16, 1962<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":405,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1182,35296],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8233"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/405"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8233"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8233\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}