\nSixty-two years ago the town of Fairfield was honored by a long article in a magazine published in Bangor. That periodical was the Industrial Journal, a monthly publication devoted to Maine development. Through the courtesy of Mrs. Raymond Rogers of Waterville, I have seen the issue of April, 1911, with its feature article about Fairfield. The article especially interests me because in that year I was a Colby sophomore, and we had just held our annual fraternity banquet at the Gerald Hotel in Fairfield, a picture of which adorned the cover of this old magazine.<\/p>\n
It is a summer photograph showing large awnings over every window of the hotel’s three upper stories. Before launching into an account of industrial and commercial Fairfield, the long article began with a general description of the town. It said: “Picturesquely located on the banks of the Kennebec, and including numerous, important islands in the river, the town is of large area, having five post offices within its limits: at Fairfield Village, formerly called Kendalls Mills, at Fairfield Center, Hinckley, Shawmut and Larone. Incorporated in 1788, Fairfield had 492 people in the nation’s first census in 1790, and had grown to 4435 by 1910”.<\/p>\n
Of the Gerald Hotel the magazine said: “Erected through the enterprise of the town’s leading citizen, Amos Gerald, it has just come into the hands of a new owner, F. L. Allen, who comes from far away Daniels, Washington. Mr. Allen resided in New England before locating in the Pacific Northwest. He ran the Vermont House in Wilmington, Vermont and two hotels in Seattle. Landlord Allen has already inaugurated improvements at the Gerald, changing the lobby and adding a piazza in front.”<\/p>\n
When this magazine was published, the Keyes Fibre Company was less than ten years old and its founder, Martin Keyes was still its head. Of that small factory, which has since become an international manufacturer, the Journal said: “A wonderful transformation has been wrought since Martin Keyes began making plates from wood pulp at Shawmut. Today the new plant is midway between Fairfield and Waterville. The factory is of brick with concrete foundations. Last year a large wing was added. The equipment includes eleven machines, one of them a huge triple. The output is a million plates per day, made in 17 shapes and sizes. The ground wood pulp comes from Skowhegan in more than a carload a day. Out of the factory goes a monthly shipment of thirty freight cars. At the time of the San Francisco earthquake in 1906, five carloads of Keyes plates were rushed to the disaster area.<\/p>\n
“The Keyes factory runs in three shifts night and day, and some ninety hands are kept busy. The great plant is run by electricity supplied by the Waterville and Fairfield Railway and Light Company”.<\/p>\n
That is an interesting account – think of it! Keyes Fibre was considered a big local industry when it employed 90 people. Today, with its plants in several states from Maine to California and with operations in foreign countries, Keyes is really a big company and extremely important to the industrial welfare of Central Maine. Naturally I am grateful to the Keyes management for its 25 years of continuous sponsorship of Little Talks on Common Things.<\/p>\n
In 1911 the American Woolen Company was Fairfield’s largest industry. Established on an island in the Kennebec, just across the first of Fairfield’s three bridges, the mill employed 250 people. It was officially called the Kennebec Mills of the American Woolen Co. and operated 56 looms. Another industry was the Fairfield Furniture Co., started in 1876. In 1911 the company was specializing in tables, making more than 100 different styles of extension and kitchen tables, using red oak and Maine ash. The plant included the mill, finishing room, store house, boiler room, and office. Operated by water power, the factory used steam for the dry house. The Journal tells us, “Five traveling salesmen are kept busy marketing the tables allover the northeast.”<\/p>\n
Now nearly forgotten is the Maine Screen and Ventilator Co., active in Fairfield in 1911. Organized in 1908, the business succeeded a company with the intriguing name “No Draft -Ventilator Co.” All the Journal could say about it was, “The new company has been in Fairfield only two years, but it is already expanding. At first in the small Knowles building, the company moved last fall into the large set of buildings formerly occupied by the S. A. Nye Co. Some of its machines are made especially for this business.”<\/p>\n
Another business few people now remember was the Nemo Company. The Journal said: “This company was incorporated four years ago. It originally made automatic pianos, many of them placed in hotels allover New England. Now the company makes the Kineo brand of coats, caps and aprons for grocers, druggists, barbers and chefs.”<\/p>\n
Two well known names in Fairfield in 1911 were Guy Hume and Henry Newhall. In 1907, they organized the Hume and Newhall Co. to operate a thoroughly modern sawmill, located about a mile above Fairfield Village. In 1910 the mill produced 18 million feet of lumber, 8 million shingles, and 300,000 clapboards, employing 250 men during the summer months, and 50 the year round. The Journal added: “The Hume and Newhall Co. also has extensive operations in the woods and last winter cut on Seven Mile Township six million feet of logs. They also cut in Jackman four million feet. The company operates a large farm, a boarding house, and a big machine shop. The Fairfield boom is now operated exclusively by Hume and Newhall. During the driving season of four months some 50 men are employed, and it is an operation not exceeded by any other of its kind on the Kennebec.”<\/p>\n
Those who read the published history of Keyes Fibre in Down East Magazine may remember that, when Martin Keyes came to Fairfield, pulp was already being ground at a mill in Shawmut. That mill was still operating independently in 1911. Of course it did not make plates, as did Keyes, but it did turn out pulp for manufacturers of paper products. It was the Shawmut Manufacturing Co., an outgrowth of the lumber mills of Lawrence, Newhall and Page. The Journal said: “The Shawmut Manufacturing Co. turns out both groundwood pulp and lumber. G. M. Stearns of Shawmut is the general manager.” In a somewhat peevish note the Journal added, “The company is not very communicative as to its plans, but a large amount of stone has been hauled the past winter, and rumor has it that a new dam is going to be built, greatly increasing the facilities. Perhaps Shawmut will yet enjoy a genuine boom.”<\/p>\n
Another industry was the United Boxboard Co., with two plants in Fairfield and a third at Benton Falls. Another factory was the crate mill of Albert Jewell & Son. A large part of their business was making crates in which to ship bicycles, but they also made similar containers for sewing machines and other crated articles.<\/p>\n
On Emery Hill a concrete company made building blocks, doorsteps and curbing. They called one of their products, “the double air space miracle building block.”<\/p>\n
At North Fairfield was a corn cannery of the Portland Packing Co.<\/p>\n
Much of Fairfield’s progress in the first decade of the 20th century had been made possible by the electric railway. Let us see what the Journal had to say about that enterprise. “The Waterville and Fairfield Railway and Light Go. incorporated in 1911, was a consolidation of the street railway and the electric light plants. Originally built as a horse car line in 1888, the railway was electrified in 1891. The line was later extended to Shawmut and across the bridges and over the neck to the mills at Benton Falls. The company has on an island at Fairfield a large power house. Cars run every 15 minutes between Waterville and Fairfield.”<\/p>\n
Believe it or not, the Journal boasted that, in 1911, Fairfield was an important publishing center. The Fairfield Publishing Co. not only produced the weekly Fairfield Journal, but also printed at its Fairfield plant the Bingham Herald, the Solon Times, the Norridgewock Gazette, the Oakland Enterprise, and the New Portland Sun, as well as a magazine of wide circulation, Turf, Farm and Home. The printer of all of these was the enterprising Edward P. Mayo, who was also the Fairfield postmaster.<\/p>\n
When this issue of the Industrial Journal appeared in 1911, the Good Will Homes and Schools had been in existence for only a few years. The paper said: “From small beginnings, Rev. George Hinckley has built an institution unique of its kind and destined to be of far reaching usefulness. Established in 1889, its expansion has brought it to more than twenty buildings, representing a large outlay of money contributed by generous donors. The place now makes homes for 145 boys and 30 girls, coming not only from Maine, but from all New England, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n
Naturally the magazine paid tribute to Amos Gerald, of which it said: “Fairfield is the home of Amos F. Gerald, widely known as builder of electric railroads allover Maine. No less than a dozen trolley lines in ten Maine counties owe their existence to Mr. Gerald. During the last season he completed a new concrete residence that is a show place in the community. It is 40 feet long and 30 wide, and has eight rooms, and a circular tower room 21 feet in diameter has nine windows.”<\/p>\n
That concrete dwelling house, of which the Industrial Journal so glowingly spoke, soon afterward became the home of Martin Keyes, and is now the Lawry Funeral Home.<\/p>\n
The Lawrence family meant a lot to Fairfield. Their generosity furnished the town with both Lawrence High School and the Lawrence Public Library. In 1911 the library had 6700 volumes, with Miss Frances Kendrich as librarian. Some well remembered names appear on that year’s list of library trustees: Arthur Totman, Miss Addie Lawrence, Will Archer, and S. A. Nye. Besides the Lawrences, Newhalls, Pages, Totmans, and Mayas, this old magazine mentions other Fairfield persons who contributed much to the town. Among them were the Lawrys, the Connors, the Jewells, the Humes and the Burgesses. Long remembered were Dr. E. F. Kidder and Lawyer George Weeks.<\/p>\n
In 1911, Silas Lawry was President of Fairfield’s Board of Trade, John Partrige was principal of the high school and William Hersey was superintendent of schools.<\/p>\n
Of special interest to me is the fact that only a few years before that issue of the Industrial Journal two graduates of Lawrence High School had been the girl who was to become my wife, Eleanor Creech and her sister Etta.<\/p>\n
Year: 1973<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Read the script for “Little Talks” program #970, Broadcast on April 22, 1973<\/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":[35313,35296],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9340"}],"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=9340"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9340\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}