USA > Maine > Cumberland County > Harrison > Centennial history of Harrison, Maine > Part 32
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5. Nellie A., b. Mar. 25, 1860; married Lyman Cobb of Windham, Me .; their children: Percy E., b. -.
6. Lillie E., b. Oct. 11, 1864; married Ist, Ernest Bean of Mason, Me .; 2d, John Blair of Des Moines, Iowa.
7. Ada M., b. Apr. 2, 1872; married George Flint of Sweden, Me. They have one child: George Har- rington, b. Aug. 9, 1891.
Lors, b. July 28, 1836; died Mar. 19, 1844.
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DORMAN FAMILY.
For almost fifty years past, no family in Harrison has a more able or worthy history than that of LEANDER DORMAN. He was a son of Benjamin and Hannah (Dav- 1s) Dorman of Bridgton, who moved to Wayne, Kennebec County, where he was born April 6, 1825. He resided successively in Wayne, Mercer, St. Albans, Hartland and Dixfield, where he learned the trade of carriage making and carried on that business there several years; moving afterward to Buckfield, and prosecuting his trade there successfully, being a skilled workman and noted for the reliable quality of all work produced at his factory. He married December 5, 1858, Mary Louisa Hawkes (born January 16, 1834), daughter of Daniel Hawkes of Minot. She had been, in early childhood, adopted into the family of Dr. Horace A. Barrows of Bolster's Mills, by whom she was treated with all the affectionate care due to a natural daughter. She was carefully educated, and be- came well fitted to be a teacher in the public schools, in which profession she was very successful and popular until the time of her marriage. Mr. Dorman removed from Buckfield to Harrison, May 13, 1862, succeeding to the occupancy of the pleasant homestead of the late foster- parents of Mrs. Dorman. There he established again a shop for working at his favorite occupation, and to the present year he has continued to serve the people of his community with great credit and faithfulness. Early and late, at the age of eighty-five years the sound of his ham- mer at the bench or anvil may be heard by any passers by the old shop. Mr. Dorman retains his vigor and ca- pacity for hard work to a remarkable degree, and is able to carry a bundle of shingles to the roof of a building and lay them as neatly and fast as a practised carpenter. In his proper trade he excels in both wood and iron work. Children :
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RENA BELLE, b. in Buckfield, Dec. 2, 1859; married Charles B. Drake of Squaw Valley, Cal., and resides there.
LUCY EVELINA, b. June 16, 1861, in Buckfield; married Arthur Myron Deering of East Denmark, Me., Sept. 4, 1907.
ALICE MAY, b. in Harrison, Aug. 4, 1863; married Adel- bert C. Buck of Harrison. Children : (See Buck fam- ily.)
LOUIS BENJAMIN, b. Feb. 3, 1866, in Harrison. Went to Fresno, Cal., Nov. 3, 1887 ; lived in Oleander eighteen years ; his present address is Fowler, Cal. He married Minnie Beha, b. Feb. 21, 1869, in Baden-Baden, Germany. They had children: Leander, Jr., b. Jan. 31, 1893. Lou- isa A., b. Apr. 14, 1894. Elsie Mabel, b. Nov. 9, 1895. Louis B., b. Jan. 3, 1898. Charles E., b. May 27, 1899. George R., b. Mar. 3, 190I. Walter A., b. Aug. 10, 1902. Mrs. Minnie (Beha) Dorman died June 9, 1903. Mr. Dorman married 2d, Mrs. J. E. Green of California, with four children, three sons and one daughter. Mr. Dorman has been engaged in grape growing for making raisins, with success, and is situated in a pleasant com . modious home in the midst of a productive farm.
MABEL LOUISA, b. Apr. 13, 1868; married Sept. 19, 1891, Charles Henry Brett of Otisfield. Children: Ethel May, b. Oct. 14, 1893. Alice Dorman, b. Sept. 5, 1895. Law- rence Henry, b. Oct. 23, 1896. Payson Julian, b. May 7, 1898. Grace Mabel, b. Dec. 3, 1901. Theodore Roose- velt, b. Mar. I, 1904.
GENEVA AUGUSTA, b. Aug. 27, 1870; married in 1897, Dr. Leon D. Wight of Gorham, N. H. They had two children.
FANNY AMANDA, b. Oct. 24, 1872; married Dr. Edward A. Wight of Harrison, Dec. 27, 1894. Their children were: Edith May, b. in Harrison, Nov. 2, 1895; died Oct. 8, 1900. Donald Gordon, b. Nov. 6, 1896. Josephine Louise, b. Sept. 18, 1898. Paul, b. July 25, 1900; died in infancy. Edward Leander, b. Oct. 12, 1904.
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PHILIP EASTMAN.
PHILIP EASTMAN, son of Asa Eastman, was born in Chatham, New Hampshire, February 5, 1799, died in Saco, Maine, August 7, 1869. He married July 23, 1827, Mary Ambrose (born in Concord, New Hampshire, July 23, 1802), daughter of Stephen and Hannah (Eastman) Am- brose.
Mr. Eastman graduated from Bowdoin College in 1820, A. B. He was admitted to the bar in 1823, and commenced practice in North Yarmouth, Maine, where he remained till 1836, when he removed to Harrison. He remained in Harrison till 1847, when he removed to Saco, Maine, where he formed a law partnership with his old classmate, Mr. Bradbury, and remained in the practice of his profession until his death.
He was actively interested in town, county, and State affairs, and was often called to stations of honor and re- sponsibility. In politics he was a Democrat; was chair- man of the Board of County Commissioners for Cumber- land County from 1831 to 1837; was elected to the State Senate in 1840-42, and in 1840 was chairman of the Com- mittee on Revision of the Statutes, and superintended the publication of the work. In 1842, he was appointed chair- man of the Commission on the part of Maine to locate grants in the territory which had been claimed by Great Britain in the northern part of the State. In 1849, he published a Digest of the first twenty-six volumes of the Maine reports. He was a member of the Maine His- torical Society, and was for several years a Trustee of Bowdoin College. For six years prior to his death he was President of the old bank, which is now the Saco National. He was closely identified with the social and business in- terests of the city of his residence. Children :
ELLEN J., b. in North Yarmouth, Jan. 28, 1829, died in Saco, Aug., 1904.
CHARLES FARLEY
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AMBROSE, b. in North Yarmouth, Apr. 18, 1834; married Charlotte S. Haines. He graduated from Bowdoin Col- lege in class of 1854; received A. M. degree in 1857; practiced law in Saco until his removal to Boston in 1859. He continued in practice at the latter place until his death in 1903.
EDWARD, b. in Harrison, April 3, 1837; died in Saco, July 5, 1882. He graduated from Bowdoin College in class of 1857, A. B. He was elected to the State Leg- islature in 1876, as a Democrat; was Trustee of the Saco Savings Bank, Director of the Saco National Bank, and Trustee of Thornton Academy. He married in Balti- more, June 2, 1869, Nellie Chase (b. in Saco, Aug. 23, 1843), daughter of Amos and Frances (Akerman ) Chase, and had children as follows: Philip, b. Apr. 23, 1869, and died in Aug. of the same year. Chase, b. Sept. 12, 1874, graduated from Bowdoin College, A. B., class of 1896, and from Harvard Law School in 1899, L. C. B .; was member of Phi Beta Kappa, and Delta Kappa Ep- silon, respectively ; is now practicing law in Portland, Me.
Hon. Philip Eastman, who is well remembered by a few Harrison people yet living, was tall, finely proportioned in form, and of handsome face and agreeable manners. He was universally respected for his high moral and profes- sional character, and his kindly disposition as a neighbor. He was eminently deserving of all the civic honors con- ferred upon him.
G. F.
CHARLES FARLEY.
Mr. Charles Farley was for many years a prominent business man of Harrison, and many now living recollect him well. The following sketch was prepared by his son, Cyrus Farley, Esq., of Portland.
CHARLES FARLEY, who built up the wire business in Harrison from very small beginnings, was born in Ips-
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wich, Massachusetts, June 14, 1791, and was descended from Michael Farley, who came to that town in 1676, as the agent of Sir Richard Saltonstall of London, to establish a woolen mill in that town, the first of the kind in this country. The Farleys for two generations pre- vious had been woolen weavers of high standing, and Sir Richard selected Michael to establish the business in the New World. The business in Ipswich finally came under the ownership of the Farleys, and was continued by their descendents for many years.
At the opening of the Revolutionary War, one of the brothers then in control lost no time in getting a musket on his shoulder, and was in the fight at Bunker Hill. That musket, with his initials carved on the stock, has been rev- erently preserved, and now ornaments the wall of a sit- ting room in Portland, Maine. The spirit of '76 must have been more intense in those days than some of us in these peaceful times are able to realize. As indicating this spirit it may be interesting to mention the reverence ever afterward shown this brother who had enlisted for the war. At its close he returned to Ipswich, and being unmarried, he made his home with the brother who still carried on the mill. He was always treated like a guest, and no matter who might be at the table, lady or gentleman, he was always helped first.
Charles, the subject of this sketch, at the age of fourteen went to Salem, Massachusetts, to learn the trade of silver- smith of Robert Brookhouse, who afterwards became a weal- thy East Indian merchant, and whose name will long be preserved in the memorials that he left to that town. Young Farley's apprenticeship was after the custom of those days, when boys were "bound out" for seven years, the compensation being board and forty dollars per year. In those days there was little capital, and labor was the only source of wealth. It was the purpose of the master to get all he could, and not to give too much in return. It
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was held to be a privilege of the master to flog the boys for any misconduct, or inattention to business, and, though young Farley himself escaped this affliction as far as known, he has been heard to say of one boy, that after his punish- ment he blubbered out the consolation that "He had but six years, eleven months, and a fortnight longer to serve." In other respects young Farley's experience was not unlike that of the others. Corn meal in different forms was the principal food, and the richest drink furnished was "shells." We all know what corn meal is, though perhaps not for a steady diet, but few of us know what a mean, insipid, and musty drink is made from boiled cocoa shells. If any of the boys did not like this there was always a plenty of water. But such hard fare was not unfavorable to the development of a good constitution. Though Mr. Far- ley lived to the age of eighty-six he was never sick, and never needed the services of the dentist. The only tooth that he ever lost was kicked out by a horse, and it was no gentle kick, either, for he ever after carried the scar at the corner of his mouth, and it can be seen in his pic- ture.
He was in singing school in Salem on that eventful evening when Skipper Ireson, "tarred and feathered, and put in a cart," was brought up from Marblehead. It broke up the singing school for that evening, and probably put an end to young Farley's musical education, for he never could sing. He did not live long enough to hear Ireson's name vindicated, and the blame put upon the crew. The historian of Marblehead resents the charge put upon Ire- son, and says that, to the crew, and not to Ireson, belongs the blame for the cruel act. As there was but one skipper, and a numerous crew, all of whom were presumably resi- dents of the town, it does not appear to be a very desirable vindication of the town's character, as it acquits one, and accuses twenty; but it has the merit of being a friendly act towards Ireson.
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At the expiration of his apprenticeship, Mr. Farley moved to Portland, and established himself in the same business at which he had been working - that of silversmith. The long hours of labor to which he had been accustomed were continued by him in his own shop. There were no eight or ten-hour days in those times, but mechanics worked as farmers do, early and late. It was nearly fifty years later before a ten-hour day was established for mechanics, and the Deering Block on the corner of Congress and Preble streets, Portland, was the first building erected under that law. In those days there was no machinery used in making silver spoons, or other silver ware, and it was all hard work, but Mr. Farley was one of the kind that never tired.
While he was engaged in the silversmith business his brother-in-law, Cyrus Hamlin, went from Waterford, Me., to learn the trade with him, but, after two years' work, he decided to study for the ministry, and he was for thirty- five years a missionary in Turkey, and was the builder and president of Robert College on the Bosphorus. His mechanical experience must have been a great help to Hamlin, for while he was a student at Bowdoin College he made the first steam engine ever built in Maine, and used it in illustrating his lectures on the steam engine, de- livered in different parts of the State. The subject was new then, and interested everybody. He was able a few years later to set up, in the Sultan's Palace in Constan- tinople, a telegraph line, and explain its workings. The en- gine which he made is still preserved in the museum at Bowdoin College.
Mr. Farley did not long continue in the silversmith busi- ness. Some fortunate investments in the Cuban trade led him away into that more rapid way of making money. In this business he made money as fast as did others at that time. But there came a sudden and unexpected change. "Cornering the market" is not a modern trick. A mer- chant, who had obtained Mr. Farley's endorsement for
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eighty thousand dollars, thought that he could corner the molasses market, but finding himself "cornered" with no hope of escape, jumped into the Kennebec and drowned himself, leaving his kind endorser to pay the eighty thou- sand. This he was able to do, and did as fast as the notes matured without having a single attachment put on his property, though there was then no bankrupt law, and the "grab game" was the rule.
Two things in connection with this loss are worthy of note. He was never heard to utter a regret over the loss, and none could ever be extorted from him. This indiffer- ence was not feigned, for he held "life to be more than meat," and often said that he had no desire to leave a for- tune; that inherited wealth wrecked almost all who re- ceived it. His religion was of the most stalwart and sin- cere kind, and controlled his whole life seven days in the week. His character was doubtless much influenced by the preaching of Dr. Payson, whose church he joined soon after taking up his abode in Portland. No other man stood so high in his estimation. He often praised sermons highly, but always qualified his praise by saying, "not since Dr. Payson's day."
After the loss from endorsing he had another - the loss of a vessel at sea - which nearly impoverished him. He then moved to Waterford, and tried farming, but his im- patient nature could not wait for things to grow. In 1844, he moved to Harrison, and began the building up of the business at the wire factory. This was a great help to the town, at that time, employing many men, and bringing in much money from outside sources. It was also a busi- ness of great interest, especially to a stranger, to watch the process, and see wire as it was drawn from a small coil of quarter inch iron through a series of dies without a break, until, in many instances, it made a coil fully five miles in length. Among those who worked in the factory the writer recalls the names of Frank Walker,
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John Caswell, Aaron Smith, Joshua Gray, and "Deacon" Joe Tuttle, the interesting narrator of his experiences in the Florida War. Some of these men contributed their share to the debating society that met over Nelson's, or Illsley's store, on the corner, where they discussed such subjects as, "Which is the most useful member of society, the farmer or the mechanic?" Both sides usually won.
In addition to the wire factory, Mr. Farley had a grist mill in which he ground wheat and corn for the farmers throughout Harrison and other towns, and a saw-mill where he cut much lumber for the Portland market. This lumber was carried in the canal boats, with which Long Pond was then alive. The writer remembers that a new canal boat, before it was soiled with cargo, took nearly the whole town out on a Fourth of July sail. The wind was strong and squally, and, as these boats carried no bal- last, it occurred to some after the excitement of the day was over, that the town took a risk that it would not be well to repeat. To the boys of those days those boats were the largest vessels that they had ever seen, and they were often thrilled with the stories of storm and adventure on the lakes and canal. The writer has been on board of the famous "Great Eastern," but was not so much impressed as he was by the first sight of the Steamer "Fawn," as she came up to the wharf on her maiden trip, under the command of Capt. C. C. W. Sampson.
Mr. Farley's puritan spirit looked with disfavor upon certain kinds of sport on Sundays, and his efforts for a quiet and orderly day did not make him popular with a certain class. They showed their resentment on one oc- casion by printing and circulating some verses ridiculing his efforts in this direction. But not being an office-seeker, and having no special use for popularity, he did not mind this. He had a dog, Ponto, that seemed to be in thorough sympathy with his master on this point. A more peaceable dog than he was could not be found on six days of the
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week, but if he saw a man go by the house on Sunday in his shirt sleeves, or otherwise give evidence of his disregard of the day, his disapproval was both marked, and barked. Mr. Farley was not averse to legitimate amusement, and no man had a heartier laugh.
The only sail boat of any size on the pond at that time was one which he brought from Portland, and which was originally built for lightering vessels in Cuba, and was ca- pable of carrying five hogsheads of molasses at a time. He took great pleasure in sailing this boat on the pond, though her safety was more highly praised than her speed. He delighted in the water, and was an expert swimmer. On one occasion, when dressed for church, a call for help came from a wharf in Portland, where a boy had fallen overboard. He plunged in head first, and found the boy on the bottom, and brought him to the surface, and to life.
He kept no one in the dark as to his position on any subject. The Maine Law found in him an earnest and sin- cere supporter. It gave much amusement to the "rummies" to learn that the large annealing pots used in the wire factory, and which he used to have hauled from Portland in winter on sleds, furnished a very convenient cover for smuggling in a barrel of rum. Some time later, Neal Dow, in writing about the devices resorted to for evading the law, mentioned this trick, and referred to his friend, Mr. Farley, as the "wine manufacturer" of Harrison. The substitution of an "n" for an "r" may have been due to the compositor's poor eyesight, or to his love for a joke.
It is presumed that the dams between the two ponds have been strengthened since those early days, when they were a source of anxiety at every time of high water. This anxiety would sometimes last for a week, and every un- usual noise or outcry in the streets would turn the thoughts at once to the dams. One night, after a day of much worry, two cats got into a fight over in Mr. Farley's wood-
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shed, and in their gyrations they knocked a brass kettle down the back stairs. This waked Mr. Farley very sud- denly, and he leaped from bed, exclaiming: "The dams have gone now."
In 1855, other reverses came upon Mr. Farley, precipi- tated mainly by the failure of parties in Boston to whom he had formerly rendered much assistance, and again he had the opportunity to "take joyfully the spoiling of his . goods." This ended his career in Harrison, and he moved back to Portland, and later to Boston, where he died in 1877, aged eighty-six years.
FERNALD FAMILY.
This family, several members of which have resided in Harrison for many years, were the children and grand- children of TIMOTHY FERNALD, born in Kittery, Maine, May 5, 1777. He came to Otisfield several years before 1800, to work in the construction of mills for Dr. David Ray, one of the earliest settlers who erected the first saw and grist mills at the outlet of Saturday Pond, in 1781.
He married Betsey Whiting Ray, the third daughter of Dr. David and Eunice (Whiting) Ray, and settled on a farm about a quarter of a mile from the Ray homestead, on the road leading to the "Hill." Mrs. Betsy W. Fernald, wife of Timothy, was born October 3, 1781, in the house built by her father one year before, about a half mile west of Edes's (then Peirce's Falls) on Crooked River in Otis- field-now Naples. She was the first female child born in the township after its first settlement in 1775. She died in Otisfield, December 22, 1843.
Dr. David Ray was one of the leading citizens in pro- moting the settlement of the new township and a close friend and coadjutor of George Peirce, Esq., the first set- tler. He was a veteran officer of the War of the American
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Revolution. Before the war, he was a lieutenant in the colonial militia, and was a member of a company of minute- men which was ordered into action on the memorable 19th of April, 1775, the day of the first bloodshed at Lexington. He served in several of the most important campaigns of the war in New England and New York, during the first five years, one of them being a six months' campaign under General Gates at Ticonderoga, in 1776. Dr. Ray was a pensioner at the rate of $103 per annum from March 4, 1813 to the time of his death, December 1, 1822. Mrs. Eunice Ray died July 4, 1843, aged ninety-six years, ten months, twenty-two days.
Timothy Fernald was a skilled carpenter and millwright and was builder of many mills and dwellings in Otisfield and other towns. He and his son, Otis, erected and finished the "Free meeting-house" in Otisfield in 1828, situated near the Ray homestead. The children of Timothy and Betsey W. Fernald were: Miriam, Otis, Betsy, Eli, Mary, Emily, John Colby, and Albert Lewis. Of these eight children, five of them have, for longer or shorter periods, been resi- dents of Harrison.
Otis Fernald, born May 2, 1802, married March 26, 1827, Sally, daughter of Benjamin and Betty (Hancock) Wight of Otisfield. The father of Mrs. Betty Wight was Lieutenant Joseph Hancock, a "minute-man" and veteran officer in the war of the Revolution, who settled early in Otisfield. Otis settled first on the homestead of his father in 1827, where his children were born. In 1838, the family moved to Bolster's Mills, where Mr. Fernald erected a dwelling house and barn and continued to reside there until 1867, when he sold his homestead to Benjamin Skill- ings and removed to Scribner's Mills in Harrison. During all his residence at Bolster's Mills, he carried on farming to some extent, but continued the trade of carpenter and builder for many years and in connection therewith did much work in carriage and sleigh making.
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In early life, he embraced religion and became a member of the Second Freewill Baptist Church in Otisfield, and was clerk of that church for a number of years. He was always, wherever he lived, a firm supporter of the faith of that church and of the preaching of the gospel. During his residence at Bolster's Mills, he was a leading promoter of all movements for educational and social improvement, and was fearless in the advocacy of all measures to ad- vance the cause of temperance and sobriety among the people of the community and State. He was one of the first three men in Otisfield to vote a "free-soil" ticket in the early days of political anti-slavery. He was a charter member, in 1855, of Crooked River Division, Sons of Temperance, a member of the Grand Division and was a most strenuous and faithful laborer in that association. He was for years, an honored member of Oriental Lodge of Masons in Bridgton, and after the organization of Crooked River Lodge at Bolster's Mills, transferred his membership to that lodge by demit. He was a worthy and esteemed member of Crooked River Grange, P. of H. In earlier years, Mr. Fernald had been a bearer of several military titles, viz .: Ensign, lieutenant and captain in the Otisfield Light Infantry, under commissions from the Governor of the State. He resigned his captaincy in or about 1836, and was never afterward connected with the militia.
Captain Fernald retained his lively interest in public af- fairs and in matters of local and general history, to the last years of his life and he was accustomed to engage in the discussions of those subjects by contributions to the local newspaper press, to which his letters were always acceptable. Mrs. Sally W. Fernald was a woman of fine intellect, which was cultivated by her advantages of school- ing in youth, and by the culture which comes from much reading. She was, with her husband, a devoted member of the Freewill Baptist Church and a most exemplary Chris- tian wife, mother and beloved neighbor. In consequence
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