<\/p>\n
In the early years of this program I often brought to your attention account books that rural merchants kept long ago. It has been some time since I referred to such a record, and I want to bring one of those Kennebec merchants to your attention today. He was Dudley Sinclair, who kept a general store in Clinton in the 1840s, more than 130 years ago.<\/p>\n
For our social history, perhaps the most important thing we learn from store records like Sinclair’s is how largely dependent Maine farm people were at that time on the products of their own farms and the work of their own hands. Although the average store carried a wide variety of goods – groceries, dry goods, hardware, and other supplies – the number of different items was less than can be found in about any specialized store today.<\/p>\n
By the 1840’s the country store had almost fully emerged from the earlier custom of being dependent upon irregular shipments of what were called West Indies goods from some wholesaler in Boston or New York, and were a long time in reaching the store. For a store in Clinton they would have been shipped to Hallowell, and from there might have reached Clinton by one of three routes: (1) Overland by ox team all the way, (2) by whale boat up the Kennebec and the Sebasticook to Benton Falls, (3) by longboat to Waterville, thence overland to Clinton. The long stretch of rapids and rips above Ticonic Falls made freight traffic on the river above Waterville impractical although small boats with a few packages could make such trips.<\/p>\n
Although by 1845 they stocked more than the West Indies goods, the method of delivery was still the same. Then, four years later, in 1849 the railroad came to Waterville, and that made possible trucking over the road between that railroad terminus and Clinton. Seven years more went by, and in 1856 Clinton had its own railroad connection, a station on the Penobscot and Kennebec between Waterville and Bangor. In the last three years of the 1850’s George Flood was using that railroad for frequent trips to his home in Clinton while he attended Colby College. A few years later, Flood was in charge of changing the gauge of that railroad from its wide 5 ft. 6 inches to standard 4 ft 8inches.<\/p>\n
The record shows that, in respect to food, Clinton people bought few different items at Sinclair’s store, but they did buy the same kinds again and again, and at rather steadily fixed prices. The usual amount of coffee one purchased was half a pound for 14 cents. The store sold vast quantities of molasses, usually one gallon at a time, for 33 cents a gallon. Cooking soda called saleratus was most often bought in half pound lots for 17\u00a2. All country stores sold vast quantities of salt fish, both cod and pollock. In 1846 Sinclair was selling it for the unbelievably low price of 3\u00a2 a pound.<\/p>\n
One item Clinton people had to buy at a store was salt. It was sold not by weight, but by measure. A rather rough, course salt – but not so course as rock salt, which the generation of my boyhood used to freeze ice cream – was called Liverpool salt, and the farm homes used large quantities of it. It cost them 32 cents a peck. Fine salt cost 10 cents a quart.<\/p>\n
By 1845 stores were selling crackers, shipped to them in barrels. They were round, hard crackers that sold, not by weight, but by the dozen. Why Sinclair charged the odd price of 13 cents a dozen, rather than a straight one cent apiece, we do not know. By the 1840s people were using a lot of raisins which the merchants dug out of a huge, tightly packed lump, seeds and all, at 8 cents a pound. He sold all kinds of spices, weighing this out an ounce or two at a time. By 1846 Sinclair may have begun to get a little powdered pepper, though that may have been early for its sale in a country store. People bought whole peppers, called pepper corns, and ground them in hand mills at home, just as they did their coffee. Cassia, which is ground cinnamon, was unknown, but that spice was bought in sticks, shaped much like some of the cracker sticks one sees today in restaurants. Powdered ginger, however, had been common since the middle of the 18th century. Sinclair would buy it about 20 pounds, in a wooden box, and deal it out in quarter pound lots.<\/p>\n
In the Sinclair records there is no mention of white, granulated sugar, although he sold a lot of brown sugar. Sugar used for sweetening at the table was a big lump hung over the table by netted twine. As a piece was needed for the coffee or tea, it was chipped off on the spot. Sugar for cooking was the same kind melted down though it could sometimes be bought loose in sizes about like that of rock salt. That kind of sugar Sinclair sold for 17 cents a pound. Of course long before the Boston Tea Party in 1773 Americans had become used to tea, and drank it more often than they did coffee. Sinclair had a popular oolong tea that he sold for 28 cents a pound, and a green tea for 32 cents.<\/p>\n
In Sinclair’s entire account there is no record of a single sale of butter, but he took in a lot of it from the farms. The going price was 12 cents a pound to the farm wives. Because Sinclair bought lots of it, his outlet must have been some city market, though how he shipped it in the summer without its spoiling is a mystery. In June 1846 he bought more than 100 pounds, and June was not a good month to keep butter before the days of refrigeration.<\/p>\n
Besides butter, Sinclair took in trade many other products. Long after the 1840’s, as late as the early 1900’s, when I worked in a village store, much of the trade was by barter. We took in all kinds of farm products in partial payment for groceries, and that was only a grocery store, not a general store like Sinclair’s in Clinton. Eggs, of course, saw prices fluctuate with the season, but the highest Sinclair paid in the scarce period of winter was 20 cents a dozen – the more usual price was 10 cents. Like every other store of the time, Sinclair’s sold rum. His records do not distinguish between the two kinds of rum sold by Maine merchants earlier in that century – W.I. and N.E. rum. W.I. was the superior West Indies rum made right where the molasses was extracted from the cane; N.E. was inferior, but cheaper, New England rum, made after the molasses reached Boston. Sinclair, whichever kind he sold, called it just rum, and his price was 65 cents a gallon.<\/p>\n
Sinclair actually sold more drygoods, footwear and clothing, than he did food products. It is astonishing to note the different kinds of cloth he had in stock: calico, gingham, percale, alpaca, sheeting,blanketing, twill, duck, satin, summer stuff and woolens. There was thread, yarn, twist, silk of all colors, and buttons galore, hooks and eyes, stays (corsets) and their fastenings. He sold no belts, but plenty of suspenders for a quarter, lots of handkerchiefs, lace, ribbon, edging and trimming.<\/p>\n
In the records there is not a single instance of ready-to-wear garments for men, and none except underwear for women. But Sinclair did sell headgear for both sexes. Here are a few items: 2 palmleaf hats 40 cents; 1 felt hat 75 cents; lady’s bonnet $1.25; hat ornament 25 cents. 1 fancy bonnet $2.00; silk glazed cap 75 cents. The book does not mention spools of thread. It was sold in hanks at 17 cents.<\/p>\n
Notice these references to footwear: 1 pair shoes 92 cents; 1 pair shoes 50 cents; lady’s laced boots $1.50; pair of rubbers $1.00. Sales were, of course, affected by the changing seasons. In November 1846, Sinclair had numerous sales of shoes, caps, gloves, flannel, leather mitts, and one of his few ready-made items – shawls. He must have got quite a thrill when one splurging citizen bought 18 yards of wool cloth for $7.40. Perhaps to drown his sorrow at such an expenditure, the man also bought a quart of brandy for 14 cents.<\/p>\n
The store’s records also tell us when the haying season was at hand. In those days before haying machinery of any kind, stores did a big business in scythes, snaths, scythe stones and wooden hay rakes. In July 1846 Sinclair sold more than 40 scythes at 92 cents, getting the same amount for the handle or scythe – so that we find in his book numerous entries of “scythe and snath” $1.84. His scythe stones went for 6 cents, and his rakes, according to size from 17 to 50 cents.<\/p>\n
Sinclair’s would not have been a typical country store without kitchenware, and he sold a lot of it. Here are a few of the items: 7 plates 58 cents; doz. plates 34 cents; doz. knives and forks 46 cents; 1 broom 25 cents; 6 glass plates 50 cents; mop handle 40 cents; washboard 25 cents; 6 cups and saucers 90 cents; 1 lamp 67 cents; butcher’s knife 33 cents.<\/p>\n
Now to get a glimpse of the wide range of Sinclair’s stock, let us note at random some of his other charges. Kerosene oil was just beginning to come in, and Sinclair sold many more candles than he did quarts of oil. By 1900 kerosene would be selling for 10 cents a gallon, but in the 1840’s at 96 cents was thought a luxury for most people. Sinclair seldom sold more than a quart at a time, and many sales were in pints. Now for some other items: 1 pipe tobacco, 9 cents; 1 oz. Indigo, 10 cents; bed cord, 25 cents; footings, 25 cents; sheep shears, 67 cents; pudding pan, 37 cents; wheel head, 42 cents; 1 lb. Brimstone, 8 cents; hat band, 10 cents; rifle shot, 7 cents; fish line, 6 cents; bottle of castor oil, 13 cents; chalk, 3 cents; a box of pegs, 8 cents; 6 needles, 13 cents; 4 squares of glass, 12 cents; 1 lb. sulphur, 17 cents; chamber pot, 25 cents.<\/p>\n
You may have noticed how often articles were priced at 17 cents. That in 1846 was a hangover from the days of British currency. After the U.S. started its decimal currency system, the New England shilling of colonial days was valued at six to the dollar, or 16 2\/3 cents each. Hence for many years after the British government no longer prevailed in New England, both goods and services were often valued in shillings. Although the price of 3 shillings was not uncommon, we seldom hear the expression of 3 shillings, but rather from very early times the phrase was half a dollar. But 2 shillings, 4 shillings and 5 shillings were commonly set prices. Since they could not be converted into cents without a fraction, a one shilling price became 17 cents, two shillings 34, but often 33 cents, five shillings 83 cents. That accounts for many of the odd prices in the 1840s.<\/p>\n
Year :1979<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Read the script for “Little Talks” program #1210, Broadcast on September 30, 1979<\/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":[803,35296],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9908"}],"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=9908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9908\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}