<\/p>\n
A few weeks ago, when I talked about the controversy over a site for Waterville’s new post office in 1909, I told you one objection to the site finally chosen, on the triangle at the junction of Main and Elm Streets, was that it posed the necessity of building a new fire station, since the old station occupied part of the lot needed for the post office. One prominent element in the objection was that the city couldn’t afford both a new fire station and a new high school and that the school need was paramount. Fortunately we got both.<\/p>\n
Today I want to tell you about the building of that new high school more than 40 years ago.<\/p>\n
There had been considerable talk but no formal action toward relief of the very crowded high school at the corner of Pleasant and School Streets, when the city election in the spring of 1909 put Frank Redington into the Mayor’s office. He was at once torn between his sincere desire to see a new high school and his campaign pledge of an economical administration. So, in his inaugural address, Mr. Redington said he did not think that more than a start could be made that year and the first task should be very careful planning.<\/p>\n
At that time the Superintendent of Schools was Denis Bowman, not only a competent executive, but also an outspoken advocate of progress. His high standing in the community was attested by the fact that, despite his known activity in the Democratic party, Mr. Bowman was unanimously reelected superintendent by a predominately Republican school board, whose chairman was Dr. J.F. Hill. The board, at their organization meeting, a few days after the Mayor’s inaugural, took the emphatic stand a start ought to be made at once on a new high school.<\/p>\n
In a long letter addressed to the citizenry through the Waterville Sentinel in June, Mayor Redington showed that the high school was very much on his mind. His letter makes it clear that there was as hot a controversy over the site for a new high school as there had been to locate the post office. Mayor Redington wrote: “I am now taking the responsibility to urge upon the city the purchase of a lot on the north side of Gilman Street and commence at once the construction of a high school built there.” The Mayor said he was aware that there was opposition, both as to the lot and as to the nature and size of the proposed building, but he was convinced the Gilman Street site was best. The ground was high and would show the building to best advantage. The building, facing south, would have the sun all day. The lot was bounded by three streets and the building would have ample surrounding land.<\/p>\n
“The air here”, said the Mayor, “is pure and clear. and the drainage is perfect.”<\/p>\n
The Mayor presented in convincing terms the relative sizes of the new lot and the existing high school property at Pleasant and School Streets. The old site had 250 feet on Pleasant Street and 175 feet on School. The new lot had 424 feet on Gilman Street and 253 feet on Burleigh and West Streets. Then the Mayor waxed sarcastic about a counter proposal to build a larger building on the old high school lot rather than take the new site on Gilman Street.<\/p>\n
He wrote: “Now picture in your mind’s eye a building as large as City Hall placed on the present high school lot, with the medium sized residences all around it. Wouldn’t the contrast be incongruous? The height of the new building would tower over the whole neighborhood and would rise so high that the beautiful shade trees on both streets would obstruct the windows. Or would you have those beautiful trees cut down? And when it was all done, the lot would still be too small.”<\/p>\n
Then the Mayor took up the objection that the plans were too fancy. The city needed just as cheap and practical a building as it could get, not something for display, those critics said. The Mayor retorted: “Why do you comb your hair? You need not. Isn’t it for looks? Why do you carry a gold watch, when a tin one would do quite as well? Why do you admire any beautiful thing except to please the esthetic sense?<\/p>\n
“Now I want the citizens of Waterville to go over to this lot, step right up on it and allover it, then tell each other what you think. Bear in mind that we are building a school for the next hundred years.” Little did Mr. Redington or anyone else dream that the school would already be overcrowded in 40 years.<\/p>\n
The City Council accepted Mayor Redington’s proposal. The land was purchased, building plans were approved, and on August 19, 1909 Mr. Redington turned the first shovelful of sod for the foundation of the new high school. The contractor, Horace Purinton, set to work a crew of a dozen men and six horses plowing up the ground and scooping the earth away. In 1909 no one had ever heard of a big motor bulldozer.<\/p>\n
The Sentinel reported: “The work on the foundation will consume about three weeks, and the first floor will then be started.”<\/p>\n
A week later the paper reported that the work was progressing well. It said: “The present contract with Horace Purinton calls for the city to spend $14,000 in the first stage of the work. The completed building will cost $70,000.”<\/p>\n
What today would seem unusual was that the Waterville lodge of Free and Accepted Masons had charge of laying the high school cornerstone on October 5, 1909. The Sentinel began its story with these words: “With the beautiful and inspiring ceremony of the ancient and honorable fraternity of Free and Accepted Masons, the cornerstone of the new high school building was set in place yesterday afternoon in the presence of a large concourse of citizens and hundreds of children from the public schools.”<\/p>\n
Waterville Lodge had called in Edmund Mallett of Freeport, Grand Master of Maine, to lay the stone with appropriate Masonic ritual. Placed in the box were the city council orders for purchase of the lot, the order passed for construction, copy of the contract, roster of the city government for 1909, roster of the Board of Education, a copper cent dated 1909, a list of pupils in each class in the present high school deposited by the president of each class, a copy of that day’s issue of the Waterville Sentinel, and a picture of the Masonic Knights Templar gathered in Waterville on the previous St. John’s Day.<\/p>\n
The newspaper carried several columns describing the occasion in great detail. Especially interesting is the Masonic ritual of the actual placing of the cornerstone. Let us see how the Sentinel told it: “As the stone was put in place, the Grand Master turned to his deputy and asked: ‘What is the jewel of your office?’ The deputy answered, ‘the square’. ‘What does it teach?’ ‘To square our actions by the square of virtue and by it we prove our work.’ ‘Apply your jewel to the stone and report.’ ‘The stone is square, the craftsmen have done their duty. ‘<\/p>\n
“The Grand Master then turned to the Senior Grand Warden: ‘What is the jewel of your office?’ ‘The level.’ ‘What does it teach?’ ‘The equality of all men, and by it we prove our work.’ ‘Apply your jewel to the stone and report.’ ‘The stone is level and the craftsmen have done their duty. ‘<\/p>\n
“To the Junior Grand Warden the Grand Master said: ‘What is the jewel of your office?’ ‘The plumb.’ ‘What does it teach?’ ‘To walk uprightly with God and men, and by it we prove our work.’ ‘Apply your jewel to the stone and report.’ ‘The stone is plumb, and the craftsmen have done their duty.’<\/p>\n
“The Grand Master then said: ‘I declare this stone to be plumb, level and square, to be well formed, true and trusty and duly laid. ‘”<\/p>\n
Then the Masonic elements of consecration — corn, wine and oil — were offered, and the Masonic service ended. It was followed by addresses by Mayor Redington and Dr. J.F. Hill.<\/p>\n
The young people were not neglected. Harold Dubord spoke for the seniors, Alfred Lambert for the juniors, Loll Bryant for the sophomores, and Raymond Rogers for the freshmen. Girls who participated were Amanda Swift, Jeanette Reed, Marian Towne and Marguerite Roak.<\/p>\n
The Sentinel report closed with the following sentence: “A selection from the quartet and the benediction by Rev. George Dana Sanders closed the program, and the lines were reformed for the march of the Masonic bodies back to their hall, where the lodge was closed.”<\/p>\n
As our older citizens well know, the new high school was not immediately completed. The builders encountered quicksand, there was labor trouble, and financing difficulty. So it was the summer of 1913 before the building was finally ready for all the high school classes. But when the entire school was housed in it, the city could be justly proud of its spacious new building.<\/p>\n
As usual there were plenty of Jeremiahs in town who called the new school building a white elephant, an impossible burden on the taxpayer, an empty ark that would never be filled. But by the end of the First World War the building was already too small. By 1922 the city had torn down the old high school building at Pleasant and School Streets and was erecting a junior high school on the lot. Even with the ninth grade removed from the Gilman Street school to the new Junior High School, the Senior High School became again too small. With WPA assistance during the depression years, a big addition was built. But even that was not enough, and the memory of those dreary double sessions that harassed pupils, teachers and parents is still with us, making us profoundly grateful for our latest new high school west of the Messalonskee.<\/p>\n
On today’s program we have time for just one more item. So let us see what the Sentinel can tell us about automobiles that stopped at the Elmwood Hotel in that summer, just before I entered college, the summer of 1909. In October the Sentinel published a story that began as follows: “The clerks at the Elmwood were desirous of knowing at the end of the summer season how many automobiles stopped at their hotel and how many people registered there after arriving in the machines.” The story revealed that between May 17 and October 25 a total of 254 automobiles had discharged 904 passengers at the Elmwood. Today, when about half a dozen makes account for most cars on the road, it is amazing to note how many different makes of cars there were in 1909. Of all kinds stopping at the Elmwood, the lead was taken by the Buick with 22. In second place was the Packard with 20, and third was the Peerless with 15. Among the 254 cars there was just one Ford, and the Chevrolet hadn’t even been invented. Some of the cars of that year have long since disappeared from the scene. There was the Reo, the Pope Hartford, the Maxwell, the Mitchell, the Velie, the Jackson, the Knox, the Locomobile, and of course the aircooled Franklin, and the Stanley Steamer. That summer of 1909 saw stop at the Elmwood six Cadillacs, three Studebakers and two Oldsmobiles.<\/p>\n
The Sentinel concluded: “The automobile is bringing a lot of business to the Elmwood. Even when the passengers do not stay overnight, they usually stop for a meal.”<\/p>\n
Year: 1966<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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