USA > Maine > Aroostook County > Caribou > Early history of Caribou, Maine : 1843-1895 > Part 6
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To leave the "old house": after building the Trusty house, Dr. Sawin built a little shop just above his house where he opened the first drug store in Caribou. This was soon burned but he immediately re- built on the opposite side of the street and a little far- ther down - the "old laundry building" - which he occupied as a drug store for a while, then, thinking it a better location, he built another store building on the Caribou stream - where Ritchie's drug store stands today - and continued the drug business until 1887 when he sold the business and building to S. L. White of St. John, N. B. and Houlton. In addition to dispensing both drugs and medical advice over the counter, Dr. Sawin had a dental chair and billiard table in the back part of his store where he also kept wall-paper. So his business was not lacking in variety.
The upper story of the building was occupied by the Masons, the first Masonic hall in town, and Dr. Sawin was one of the charter members of Lyndon Lodge No. 170, organized in 1873.
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(As his health was failing, Dr. Sawin moved to Lewiston in 1900 to be near his daughter Josephine, a trained nurse, but the next year removed to Cundy's Harbor, Harpswell, Maine, where he died in June, 1901 at the age of 73.)
1870
The coming of the Swedish colony in 1870 gave increasing impetus to the growth of the town. A supper and lodging for the night was furnished to the colonists - some seventy in number - in the hall over Arnold's store by the citizens of Caribou on the night of their arrival July 30, 1870. The colonists came to St. John, N. B. by steam vessel from old Swe- den, then took a smaller steam boat up the St. John River to Andover from whence they were conveyed to their destination by teams driven down by Caribou citizens, Jacob Hardison in charge, to meet them.
The members of the little colony were brought over by William Widgery Thomas of Portland, Maine, (American Consul to Sweden, first, afterwards made United States Commissioner of Immigration) to carry out his plan for a Swedish colony in northern Maine.
They were set down in the wilderness - a town- ship adjoining Caribou, where a road had been "swamped out" from Caribou, some clearings had been made, and twenty five log cabins had been built by the State, supervised by Jacob Hardison. By act
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of Legislature the previous winter, the State had granted this land to a Swedish colony, in response to an appeal by Mr. Thomas, as being advantageous to the state.
Commissioner Thomas stayed with them for a year or two until his charges had learned some Eng- lish and could "fend for themselves". The Swedes were obliged to come to Caribou, eight or nine miles, for nearly all the necessities of life except what they could raise. At first they walked to town beside an ox- team, some times with ox and horse harnessed to- gether, to get supplies. As Swedes are the most indus- trious and thrifty people in the world, the colony grew steadily, though slowly, and thrived, and their trade helped the Caribou stores - even then only six in number - those of S. W. Collins, D. F. Adams, Ly- sander Sawin, Dwinal Bros. (in the old Vaughan store) John S. Arnold and N. Bartlett. The stores and the colonists were of mutual assistance and equal advan- tage to each other. (The most cordial relations have always existed between the Caribou townspeople and their Swedish-American neghbors, living side by side for nearly three quarters of a century.)
(Not many years after their coming the Swedish people began sending their children to the Caribou High School and have continued doing so until now there some forty scholars coming from the Swedish settlements every year and many of these go on to the Maine colleges gaining high rank in many instances.)
By 1870 the town valuation was $127,279 .; the population was 1410, nearly five times as large as that
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of 1860 when it was only 297. The town of Lyndon had really begun to grow in this decade from 1860 to 1870. Probably the addition of three adjoining plantations, Letter I, Sheridan and Eaton Grant in 1869 had some- thing to do with this rapid increase of population. Lyndon was now a double township, twelve miles in length and six miles in width.
The town expenses, however, were comparatively small. The annual salary paid to the first selectman was only $48., or $4. a month; to the second selectman $17.50 annually, or 35 cents a week. The Superintend- ent of the School Committee received the compensa- tion of $22.74 for a years work - driving long dis- tances to visit the district schools - and the Town Treasurer received $25. annually, probably just his expenses. These fine citizens practically gave their services.
1872
Albe Holmes first came to Caribou in 1872 from Boston with the idea of establishing a starch factory, being interested in two or three such factories in New Hampshire, his native state. He was pleased with the country and at once decided to build a starth factory in Caribou - the first in the state - purchasing the old, abandoned Aleck Cochran mill property for this purpose. The town built a bridge across the stream at this point, for him. Contracts were made with the farmers for planting a large acreage of potatoes, and in many instances money was advanced for this pur-
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pose. This was the beginning of the great starch and potato industry in Aroostook County, the industry that was to make the county famous in future years.
The factory first built by Mr. Holmes was enlarg- ed until it became one of the largest in the country, and factories were also built by him in Van Buren and Grand Isle. The industry developed a cash market that was greatly needed and farming as an occupation took on a more encouraging aspect even though there was no railroad. It may be said that Mr. Holmes did more than any other one man for the wonderful develop- ment of the potato industry.
(He remained in Caribou until his death in April, 1900, leaving a step-son, George H. Howe, (now de- ceased) a daughter, Nellie of Medford, Mass. and a son, Eugene, lawyer in California, first in Los Angeles, now residing in Pomona.)
Until now this narrative has been "the short and simple annals of the poor" but the starch industry brought real money into northern Aroostook instead of barter and exchange and much more opulence be- came visible ever thereafter.
In August of 1872, the second young lawyer came to town - C. B. Roberts, son of Elder J. P. Roberts. Blake, as he was familiarly known, had left his home on Green Ridge at eighteen yeers of age to obtain an education. Part of the time was spent in Farmington Normal School, from which he graduated, and in
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territory that had to be covered by horse and buggy or sleigh. No automobiles then, not a hospital or trained nurse in the county, and he drove night and day for the alleviation of suffering. How much harder was the life of a country doctor then than now!
Dr. and Mrs. Thomas had four children, Bertha, Louise, Edna and Charles, the last of whom is follow- ing his father's profession in Caribou today. Louise and Edna are living in Florida where the family went to live in their later years, and where the doctor, his wife, and Bertha died and are buried.
Just thirty years have now elapsed since the com- ing of the first American settlers. The foregoing pages show something of what growth had taken place in that time. The next twenty years will show a much more rapid gain.
John Sincock, an expert miller, came from Hels- ton, Cornwall, England in 1859 to America to view the country with the idea of bringing his family here to live. He came first to Houlton, having relatives there, then to northern Aroostook where he decided to stay and, within a year, sent for his wife to come to Houl- ton where he would meet her. She came at once with two small children, on a sailing vessel from Southamp- ton - steam navigation being only in its infancy in 1860 - the journey taking some six weeks from South- ampton to Quebec, then from Quebec to Houlton by rail and stage, another two or three days. They went
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first to Fort Fairfield to live, then to Presque Isle, but Mr. Sincock decided finally to locate in Caribou and they went there the fall of 1873. He bought of Theo- docius Merrill, brother of Luther, the grist mill built by Collins and Vaughan in 1844.
The following spring, April 1874, Mr. Sincock bought a house next to the Blake Roberts house on South Main Street. This house was built in 1868 by Weston Adams who lived in it but a short time before selling it to Mrs. Eliza Pratt, widow of Artson K. Pratt, who died in the south in 1864, a victim of the Civil War. (They were the parents of two daughters, Josephine, the wife of Ai Hardison; Mentora, the wife of Henry Shaw; and three sons, David, Elbridge and Henry B. Pratt). Mrs. Pratt, after making a living in this house as a tailoress for five years, sold it to Mr. Sincock who lived there with his family the rest of his life. The house is now occupied in an enlarged and modernized form by his son, Dr. W. E. Sincock whose office has been in this house more than fifty years.
Mr. and Mrs. Sincock lost the two chlidren who came from England with their mother, but had three children born in this country, Edgar, (the doctor) Louise and Albena. Louise married Warren Runnel's but did not live long afterwards, Albena died unmar- ried, in young womanhood.
John Sincock died in 1890, his wife in 1908.
Dr. Sincock married Sept. 4, 1902, Lora, daughter of Clarence V. King of Fort Fairfield. They have one daughter, Elizabeth, who married Arthur Kirkpatrick ; they have one son, Hugh.
The full history of the Sincock grist mill as an old landmark, only in recent years destroyed by fire,
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might be found interesting right here. The mill, it will be remembered, was built by Collins & Vaughan in 1844, the first activity they entered into. At the time of the division of property in 1857. Mr. Vaughan, it may also be remembered, took the grist mill and Mr. Collins the saw mill. Haskell Farnham ran the grist for Mr. Vaughan, until, in 1861, Mr. Collins bought the grist mill from Mr. Vaughan, and operated it until he sold to Theodocius Merrill, brother of Luther, in 1871. Mr. Merrill sold the property in November, 1873 to John Sincock who operated it until July, 1887 when he sold it to Charles A. Collins, Jr. of Yarmouth (no re- lation to the S. W. Collins family.) Charles Collins, Jr. kept the mill not quite two years, selling it in 1889 to Charles A. Collins of Caribou who sold in 1890 to to the Edwards brothers of Bethel. In 1895 D. W. Edwards sold his interest to his brother, H. A. Ed- wards and removed to Fort Fairfield where he bought a grist mill and there made his home. H. A. Edwards stayed in Caribou until 1905 when he sold out and went to California to live.
("To keep the record straight" the mill was sold to George T. Cox in 1912 and at that time was rebuilt with the latest machinery installed. The old mill, the oldest landmark in the village, was destroyed by fire in 1940 but was again rebuilt on a smaller scale be- because modern mill machinery is more compact. It still goes by the name of the George T. Cox mill though his son James now operates it.
The fall of 1873 W. C. Spaulding of Buckfield came with his wife and two young sons from Fort
WILLIAM C. SPAULDING
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MRS. W. C. SPAULDING
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Fairfield, to which town he had first gone, and where he had found his wife, Lavina Sterling. Mr. Spaulding opened a store devoted strictly to hardware - hither- to the stores had been what were called "general stores" - in the N. Bartlett building on the corner of Main and High streets, the first winter. In the spring of 1874, finding there not enough room for a cumbersome stock like hardware, he moved to a store built by Lowell Hardison, a son of Jacob, on Main Street about half way between Sweden Street and Vaughan Avenue. (This store was later moved around facing Sweden Street, next to the Hackett block of the present day. It is now occupied by Ansel Anderson, dealer in men's clothing.) Mr. Spaulding's business in- creased so rapidly owing to the demands of the farms as to require still more room, so in a short time, he rented the building just across the street built by W. A. Vaughan (so long occupied by Olof Pierson as a men's clothing store). He moved his family into the upstairs rent, and his store, of course, to the street floor. He next moved his stock of hardware to the new three-story King bloock built in 1879 on the corn- er of Main and Water streets. In the same year Mr. Spaulding built a handsome house on South Main Street hill - now occupied by Ansel Anderson. Some ten years later he joined with S. W. Collins in building a block containing two stores on Sweden Street, to which each removed his respective business and where they stayed the remainder of their days.
Mr. Spaulding was a keen business man and a- massed a handsome fortune, for those times. The elder son, John, who entered his father's business as soon as he left school, married Louise Burpee of Fort Fair-
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field. Atwood, the younger son, who also entered his father's business, married Bertha, youngest daughter of Corydon Powers. He lived only to middle age, John died in early manhood.
Mrs. Spaulding was born in 1848, died April, 1904; Mr. Spaulding born in 1841, died in 1915.
1874
In 1874 the little old black school-house on South Main Street was replaced by what seemed at the time a grand, new two-story school-house painted a glisten- ing white, with a belfry. This permitted two grades - "downstairs" and "upstairs" - the little ones down- stairs, the large scholars up-stairs, the Third Reader being the dividing line between the two grades. This school-house was a long step forward in educational progress, much needed, as by this time there were some seventy or more scholars in the village district; varying with the seasons. There were now a large number of scholars in the thirteen school districts in- . to which the seventy two square miles of territory had been divided.
The new school-house had a man teacher upstairs for the winter term when the larger boys attended school. In the summer the school was attended mostly by girls, the boys being obliged to help their fathers with the farm work - no agricultural machinery in those days except the primitive plough, shovel and
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hoe. Miss Vesta Page, daughter of James Page taught very acceptably the first term in the upstairs grade of the new school-house the fall of 1874.
(Should there be any curiosity as to what became of this building when the new school building of brick took its place in 1917, it should be told that the I. O. O. F. bought it and moved it across the Caribou stream mill-pond on the ice to its present location on the north side of Herschel Street, west of Aroostook Motors.)
From the first the people of Caribou were very desirous of having as good schools as their means would permit. It must be remembered, always, that no one who came to Caribou in these years had any money to speak of, nothing but hope and ambition, and faith in the future of Aroostook, but they were a fine class of people who took much interest in the education of their children. They did valiant work for good schools in those early days, first as teachers, many of them, afterwards as school supervisors-as they were called then-and in the succeeding years there were many who arose to fill their places as workers for decent educational advantages in the town.
The little village of Caribou was now getting a- head a little but what it really needed was a railroad, toward the getting of which the public-spirited citi- zens of the town had been bending all their energies for some years. The only rails in the whole county were those on the branch from Debec Junction, N. B. to Houlton, only two and half miles of which were on
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Maine soil. And it was a long distance between Cari- bou and Houlton, too-fifty four miles over terrible roads. How the towns of northern Aroostook grew at all is almost incomprehensible to people of the present day. No wonder the settlers spoke of "going outside" when speaking of going to other portions of the state, so shut in were they from the outer world.
Charters had been obtained at different times for a railroad and efforts had been made to induce capital- ists to invest, but without success.
The building of the New Brunswick railroad in the early 70's from McAdam Junction on the Europ- ean and North American R. R. to Edmunston on the upper St. John gave Lyndon new hopes of getting a road. The N. B. R. R. crossed the St. John River at Perth, N. B. which was less than twenty miles from the village of Caribou. The people of that town saw an opportunity to secure railroad connection with Bangor by building a short road from Caribou village connect- ing with the New Brunswick railroad at a point near Fort Fairfield. It was a very roundabout route, going through Fort Fairfield to Aroostook Junction-where the Aroostook River R. R. would meet the N. B. R. R .- then changing cars for Woodstock, Debec Junction, McAdam Junction-all in New Brunswick-thence go- ing westerly to Vanceboro, Maine, just across the boundary line between New Brunswick and Maine. At Vanceboro the N. B. R. R. joined the European and North American R. R. on its way from St. John, N. B. to Bangor, going through Danforth, Mattawamkeag, Old Town and Orono, certainly a long and circuitous route.
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Though a long way around, it was within the means of the Lyndon people more than the building of something like one hundred and seventy five miles of "direct-line" to Bangor which was what they really wanted. It was much better than no railroad at all so they went to work.
A charter for a railroad had been secured in the Legislature the winter of 1873 by L. R. King who was a member that year, as well as the next. (Maine had annual sessions of the Legislature then instead of the biennial sessions of the present day). In the summer of 1873 a preliminary survey had been made and a route laid out. The story of the struggle for a railroad told in the "Souvenir Edition", hereinbefore mention- ed, is repeated here.
"In 1874 a stock company was formed with the following officers W. T. Sleeper (first editor of the North Star) President, L. R. King, Vice President, and a Board of Directors, (the majority of whom lived in Lyndon) was elected and work was commenced at once. Of course the first requirement was money and a town meeting was called which was holden on August 15th 1874, when it was voted that the town of Lyndon loan its credit for a railroad to connect with the New Brunswick R. R. near Fort Fairfield to the amount of 5% of its valuation if required. Mr. Sleeper soon re- signed, as he was about to move away, and at a regular meeting of the directors, L. R. King was elected Presi- dent, so remaining until the road passed into other hands, Mr. King took an active part with many others in the building of the road and pushing it through to completion, being aided by the people of Lyndon in every way.
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1875
"At the regular town meeting on March 22nd 1875 it was voted to loan the credit of the town to the extent of 5% of the taxable property of said town and the selectmen were authorized to issue bonds bearing interest at 8% for twnty years.
"On November 20th of the same year it was voted to further loan the credit of the town to the extent of 2% of the valuation of 1870, the bonds bearing inter- est at 8% for twenty years.
1876
"At the March meeting of 1876 it was voted to still further aid in the construction of the Aroostook River R. R. by an additional issue of bonds to the ex- tent of 21/2% of the valuation of 1870, said bonds to run twenty years at 6% interest.
"In the meantime working surveys had been made, rights of way secured, and the work of grading, bridg- ing, etc. was pushed as fast as possible, and with such success, that the road was completed in the fall of 1876. The station was built on the east side of the riv- er, opposite the village, (to eliminate the expense of building a railway bridge across the river). It was
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then leased to the N. B. R. R. (now the Canadian Paci- fic R. R.) for a term of ninety years. In the construct- ion of the road from Fort Fairfield to Caribou no man put in more personal effort than Mr. King and but for his strong determination and perseverance it never would have been built."
When one reads the history of these town-meet- ings held in a little town of only fifteen or sixteen hun- dred inhabitants voting steadily for loans and bonds to build a railroad one is filled with admiration of their courage. But their courage was repaid when "the iron horse steamed into town one glad day, December 12th, 1876"-as a newspaper of that time said when describing the event. It was amply rewarded when the next census (1880) was reported showing that the population had increased from 1410 in 1870 to 2856 in 1880-doubling the population of the previous decade- or it might better be said, in the previous five years. The town, at long last, had a railroad.
In the meantime the business section of the village had been building up. About 1875 L. R. King put up a building just south of the present Powers filling sta- tion on Main Street. The ground floor was occupied for many years by the Sherwood store, with its gen- eral variety stock, forerunner of the modern chain stores like Woolworth's or Newberry's, with offices on the second floor ; was destroyed by the fire of 1918.
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C. B. Roberts built a small one-story building to serve as an office for himself a little farther down on Main Street. Also a little one-story shop occupied by Mrs. Bartlett as a millinery store had been built across the street, beside Lowell Hardison's little building which he occupied as a book store, incidentally containing the first (circulating) library in town, as all first things are being mentioned. By this time the blacken- ed stumps, left from "clearings", which had long dis- figured the landscape outside of the village had dis- appeared gradually, and their places had been taken by "green fields and pastures new." And board side- walks were now appearing on Main Street.
1877
In 1877 the name of the town of Lyndon which had been officially given to Plantation H in 1870 was officially changed to Caribou by the Legislature, which stopped the annoying distinction between the town of Lyndon and the village of Caribou which the residents insisted upon giving, and which created so much con- fusion. The town forged ahead more rapidly now and a very valuable class of citizens were coming into the village, most of them with the idea of going into busi- ness, the most desirable farms now having been taken.
Another doctor came this year (1877) Dr. Jeffer- son Cary of Houlton, accompanied by his wife and
Main Street, looking toward Vaughan House on hill
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little daughter. He was highly educated both as a man and physician, and he was much needed in the commu- nity as Dr. Thomas, the only graduate physician up to this date was sadly overworked. Dr. Cary at once bought the house built by Alden Green in 1870, now standing at the rear of the Cary Memorial Hospital, an adjunct to it.
Dr. Cary will be and should be forever remember- ed by Caribou people for bequeathing to the town a sum of money which enabled it to build a fine hospi- tal, as he requested, on the site of his former home, both his daughter and her mother having passed on before him. Dr. Cary was born in 1840 and died in 1912. A long and useful life. The good that he has done lives after him in the hospital erected to his memory in 1924.
Others among the good people now coming were the Clarks and Oaks of Garland in Penobscot County and George I. Trickey of Bangor, the fourth lawyer to come to Caribou. Joseph A. Clark opened the first store devoted exclusively to boots and shoes, in the Bartlett block (corner of Main and High streets) which had by this time been much enlarged from the original size to that of the present day.
1878
Mrs. Clark's brothers, Charles, Will and Fred Oak came the following year: Charles, a graduate of the
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University of Maine, teaching the village school up- stairs, at first, while establishing himself as survey- or and draughtsman. He later married Edith, S. W. Collins youngest daughter. Their home while in Cari- bou was the house now occupied by Dr. Gregory on High Street. They moved from Caribou to Augusta where Mr. Oak served in several State offices, then the family moved to Bangor where Mr. Oak passed a- way in later years, and his wife is now living in Orono with her daughter Zelma. The Oak children were Zelma, Gertrude, Edson and Donald, all married, the three last mentioned are scattered from Massachu- setts to Oklahoma.
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