USA > Maine > Androscoggin County > Wales > History of Monmouth and Wales, V. 1 > Part 23
USA > Maine > Kennebec County > Monmouth > History of Monmouth and Wales, V. 1 > Part 23
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The following is supposed to be a complete list of the preceptors :
Ebenezer Herrick, 1810; John Boutelle, 1810-12: James Weston, 1812; John Davis, 1816-18; Joseph Joslyn, 1820-4; Ezra Wilkinson, 1824-6; Henry W. Paine, 1827-31; Henry A. Jones, 1831; John Baker, 1832; William V. Jordan, 1833-4; Nathaniel M. Whit- more, 1835-7; Nathaniel T. True, 1837-46; William B. Snell, 1847-51 ; Milton Welch, 1851 ; Flavius V. Nor- cross, 1855-6; George W. McLellan, 1856; Abner C. Stockin, 1858-61; George W. Frost, 1863-4; Nathaniel T. True, 1864; William B. Snell, 1866-7 ; James Powell, 1868; J. B. Clough, 1868; James Atwood, 1870; John B. Smith, 1870; F. E. Timberlake, 1871; A. F. Rich-
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Monmouth Academy. FRECTEO IN Ignå, DESTROYED BY FIRE IN 1851
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ardson, 1872; Anthony Woodside, 1872; Giles A. Stuart, 1873; Charles E. Smith, 1875; Nathaniel S. Melcher, 1876; William II. Ilam, 1876; H. M. Pratt, 1877-8; A. M. Spear, 1878; Martin P. Judkins, 1879: C. E. Owen, 1879-80; Wilbur A. Judkins, 1881 ; J. W. Goff, 1886; S. S. Wright, 1887; B. M. Avery, 1888; E. F. Heath, 1891, and E. W. Small, 1893.
The academy building stood very near the road, quite a distance south-east of the location of the present one. Some idea of its position may be gained from the statement that the locust trees from which those that now grow on the side of the declivity near the south- eastern corner of the lot sprouted, brushed so close against the side of the building that those who sat in the back benches near the windows could pick the blossoms without rising from their seats.
The external appearance of the building is shown in the accompanying cut, which was projected from a sketch by Miss Marcia Ellen Prescott, kindly loaned by Mrs. Ann M. Coy, and a memory sketch by Mr. Elias Waterhouse. The interior was furnished with wooden benches standing parallel to a broad central aisle and rising one above another on longitudinal plat- forms to the side walls. At the head of the central aisle was the teacher's desk-a huge, box-like affair, sheathed up from the floor on three sides, with three or four steps on the fourth side leading up to the en- trance.
The trustees of the school were in many instances chosen from among the opulent rather than the crudite. One of the foremost of these patrons of education was noted for his Partingtonian sayings. Shortly before
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HISTORY OF MONMOUTH.
his death he communicated some of the plans he had made for improvements about his premises to his phy- sician. In his own words he had "been thinkin' of buildin' a lorenzo onto the front of the house; and makin' a sister in the suller, and have it fed by an an- ecdote from the spring on the hill." This same trustee, while making a speech before the school, proceeded to draw a comparison between the educational advan- tages of the day and the time of his youth. "Why," said he, "when I was a youngster we scacely knew that tiro and two made six." The merriment that followed was not greater than that which was excited when an- other of the trustees arose in all the dignity of his po- sition and a hundred and eighty pounds avoirdupois to urge upon the youth before him the importance of forming correct moral habits, closing his appeal with the injunction to "obey the precepts of this blessed book," at the same time bringing his heavy cane down with a crash upon a copy of Webster's Unabridged that lay on the desk before him.
The trustees were allowed eight cents a mile for traveling expenses and one dollar per day for services.
Prior to Nov. 17, 1847, members were elected by ballot at the annual or semi-annual meeting; and it was necessary to lodge the nomination (which must bear the names of at least two of the trustees) with the secretary only one month before the election. At the above date, the article controlling the elections was amended so as to make it necessary to place the nomi- nation in the hands of the secretary at least six months before the election.
The first meeting of the board of trustees of which
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any record exists was, it is supposed, held at John Chandler's, May 10, 1803. The following officers were then chosen:
John Chandler, president; J. Belden, vice president ; Matthias Blossom, secretary; J. Boles, treasurer; S. Howard, J. Boles and J. Belden, "a committee to form a code of by-laws and report at the next meeting." A vote was passed to build a school-house, and a com- mittee was appointed to procure subscriptions and ex- pend the amount subscribed. John Chandler. L. Robins, S. Howard, Ichabod Baker and James Norris were appointed to fill the committee.
The names of those who have served on the board of trustees, with all that is known of their respective terms of office, are supposed to be included in this list:
Rev. Jonathan Belden, elected in 1803; resigned in 1808; Dudley B. Hobart, 1803; John Chandler, 1803- 1828; Matthias Blossom, 1803; Ichabod Baker, 1803; Joseph Norris, 1803-1823; Luther Robins, 1803-1821; John Boles, 1803; Seth Howard, 1803-1822; Dr. James Cochrane, 1809-1832; Abraham Morrill. 1810-1843: Dr. Issachar Snell, 1810-1822; Benj. Porter, 1810; Rev. Thomas Francis, 1812; Simon Dearborn, Esq., 1815-1841; Josiah Houghton, 1821; Rev. David Thurston. 1822; Oliver Herrick, 1822; Joseph Norris (re-elected). 1826; Benj. Alden, 1828; John Neal, 1828; Arthur Given, 1828; Rev. John Butler, 1828; Hon. Benj. White, 1829; Isaac S. Small, Esq., 1829; Francis J. Bowles, 1831; John A. Chandler, Esq., 1831-2; Ichabod B. Andrews, 1833. 1849; John Andrews, Jr., 1833-1849: John Dennis, 1833; Edward Fuller, Esq., -; Dr. Alford Pierce, 1831-1860:
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HISTORY OF MONMOUTH.
Stillman Howard, Esq., 1834-1860; Nehemiah Pierce, Esq., 1834-1849; Asa Bachelder, 1831-1846; Col. Jon- athan Marston, 1831-1849; Hon. Samuel P. Benson, 1837-1876; Hon. Isaac S. Small, 1849; Ebenezer S. Welch, 1849-1851; Jonathan M. Heath, Esq., 1849- 1851; Washington Wilcox, 1851; Charles T. Fox, 1858, 1875; Augustus Sprague, 1861; G. H. Andrews. 1866; Wm. G. Brown, 1875-1878; Henry O. Pierce, 1878; Albert C. Carr, 1878; Virgil C. Sprague. Seth Howard, 1892.
In 1809, the name of the institution was changed by act of the General Court to Monmouth Academy, and arrangements were made this year to build a belfry.
In 1815, the land granted by the General Court was sold to General John Chandler. This tract contained 10.020 acres. It was situated on the Sebasticook river in the county of Somerset, and was the westerly half of Township No. 5, in the second range easterly of Kennebec river. It was incorporated in 1828 as Chandlerville, taking its name from its distinguished owner. In 1844 the name was changed to that which it still bears-Detroit.
Under the direction of Dr. Nathaniel T. True, who came to the school in 1837, and inspired by that noble teacher's energy, the students built a sidewalk running from the corner north of the academy to the village, and set out quite a portion of the double row of shade trees with which it is for some distance lined. During Dr. True's tutelage the school rose, it may be, to the zenith of its glory. A catalogue of the institution for the year 1842, which has fallen into my hands through the courtesy of Mrs. Davis Emerson, contains much
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that will be interesting to those who have known it only in recent years. One hundred and twenty-four scholars are registered, of whom twenty-two elected the classical, seventy-one the high English and thirty- one the general English course. Of the one hundred and twenty-four only fifty-seven were residents of Mon- mouth. The instructors named are Nathaniel T. True, principal. Albert Thomas and Perez. Southworth, as- sistants. The text books used in the general English course were: "The Bible, IIall's Reader's Guide, Greene's English Grammar, Olney's Geography, Smith's Arithmetic, Goodrich's History of the U. States, Parker's Exercises in Composition." The high English course comprised "Colburn and Smyth's Al- gebra, Geometry, (Davies' Legendre,) Trigonometry, Surveying. ( Flint's,) Navigation, Lessons in Perspec- tive, Foster's Book Keeping. (Spring Term.) Rhet- oric, Critical Examinations in Prose and Poetry, Comstock's Chemistry. ( Fall Term, commenced.)
Chemistry continued. Mineralogy and Geology.
( Spring Term.) Smellie's Natural History. Astron-
omy. ( Spring Term.) Lincoln's Botany. (Summer Term.) Upham's Intellectual Philosophy, Kame's El- ements of Criticism, French-Longfellow's Grammar, Hentz's French Reader, Histoire des Etas Unis, Tele- maque, La Henriade, Boileau-Spanish, Italian." The classical course embraced "Weld's Latin Lessons, An- drews and Stoddard's Latin Grammar, Andrews' Latin
Reader, Andrews' Latin Exercises, Cornelius Nepos, or Cæsar's Commentaries, Leverett's Latin Lexicon, Ramshorn's Latin Synonymes, Abbott's Cicero's Select Orations, Sophocles' Greek Grammar, Anthon's Greek
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Exercises, Jacobs' or Felton's Greek Reader, Cooper's Virgil. Anthon's Sallust, Greek Testament, Donnegan's Lexicon."
The curriculum is given in detail that the reader may compare it with the course of study prescribed by our modern classical schools. The classical course covered three years of three terms each; the spring term beginning the first Monday in March, the summer term the first Monday in June, and the fall term the first Monday in September. Courses of lectures on scientific topics are advertised to be given by the in- structors, and lectures also "on various literary subjects by gentlemen from abroad."
In addition to the time-honored Clionian Society an organization known as the Acernian Society was supported, the design of which was to improve in ar- boriculture. To this society is due the extensive im- provements to the academy grounds already mentioned. Students were "required to attend public worship on the Sabbath," and to participate in alternate weekly ex- ercises in composition, declamation and elocution.
Probably many a reader will be struck with the sim- ilarity of these regulations and the curriculum to those of Kent's Hill Seminary, and, without stopping to think. will conclude that they were borrowed from our larger neighbor. With as great humility as pride we must remember that Kent's Hill is, in a sense, the off- spring of Monmouth Academy, virtually founded, erected and established by a native whose methods were the development of ideas gained within the walls of the latter; and while the daughter has. it must be admitted, outgrown the mother, there is scareely a de-
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partment in the Maine Wesleyan Seminary which had not its prototype in Monmouth Academy. It was here that the idea of an art department in connection with a classical institute had its origin; and if the school of fine arts under the tuition of Miss Hamlin, a sister of Hon. Hannibal Hamlin, was a failure, it was only be- cause the idea was in advance of the times. The up- per story of the building was finished and furnished for this school at personal expense and risk by one of the trustees, but the enterprise was abandoned at the close of the second term. The school exhibitions, held in the old yellow meeting-house, with musical selections by a brass band brought from Brunswick for the oc- casion, were in nowise inferior to a modern commence- ment; and it is doubtful if in many respects the school was inferior to our modern institutes except in the meagre advantages it afforded for development in the higher scientific attainments of base ball and lawn tennis.
On the 21st day of September. 1851, the old academy building was burned to the ground. It was not gener- ally supposed that the "mouse and match" theory ad- vanced by one interested gentleman was sufficient to account for the origin of the fire, and adverse opinions were current when the old " Fogg school-house" on High street, to which the school was removed, suffered the fate of the academy. The principal, Milton Welch, who had not secured his position without some rivalry and opposition, was not to be easily defeated. Taking up quarters in the Centre school-house. he placed a secret night-guard in the building and prepared to re- ceive the one who had twice manifested such warm
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friendship with open arms. By turns the young men and boys took up their vigils until well along toward winter. At last it became so cold that they were com- pelled to keep a small fire to prevent freezing. Week after week they stood inside the windows and strained their eyes out into the darkness. At last their patience was rewarded. Late one night a team drove up Maple street, turned the corner and slowly approached the school-house. When opposite the building it stopped. and the occupants of the vehicle gazed cautiously and critically around.
Apparently dissatisfied with the appearance of a thin column of smoke that was ascending from the chim- ney, they whipped up and disappeared; and thus closed what might have proved an exciting and fruit- ful episode.
The new building, erected by Owen and Ham. and first occupied in 1855, though less pretentious, is far more substantial and symmetrical than the academy of historic days; and, standing as it does, at a greater dis- tance from the street, the general effect is vastly su- perior ; but the eyes that drank in the beauty of the old in youth can see nothing desirable in the new. A poem freighted with this sentiment, composed for this work by Mrs. Salina R. Read, of Auburn, will set many a heart-string vibrating with its tender memories.
PICTURES OF MEMORY.
OLD MONMOUTH.
With mental vision pictures fair I see, Limned by the brush of faithful memory. Mellowed the tints, but fadeless. Autumn's glow Floods ripening nature as in long ago.
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The lovely lakelet with its belt of green, The sunlight glinting on its breast serene, Bears no white sail upon its waters bright- A tiny row-boat only meets the sight. The quaint old church, with square, ungraceful tower, From which no bell peals forth the passing hour, O'erlooks the spot where friends beloved repose- No flowering shrubs a tender care disclose. Within the church, the long "broad aisle" I see, Where worshipers, with solemn dignity, Walk the unmatted floor, with thoughts intent On the sweet service of the sacrament. High, midway 'twixt the vaulted roof and floor, Is placed the pulpit, where, exactly o'er The "preacher's" head, a "sounding board" appears, Cansing in childish hearts repeated fears, Till by our elders told the slender rod That held the burden was upheld by God. This gave us peace, for childhood's faith is pure- Oh, would to heaven, such faith might long endure ! Upon the summit of yon rising ground Stands Academic Hall. The cheerful sound Of the familiar bell calls forth the young To the sweet spot whose praises oft are sung By unfledged poets. 'Tis the very soul Of proud old Monmouth, famous as the goal From whence men known in Physics, Law and Art, Teachers, Divines, go forth to act a part In life's grand drama. Men of good renown Date their ambition from this ancient town. O, precious memory ! The scenes I view By thy kind aid nought ever can renew. Around the lake silence no longer reigns ; Of ancient church there's nothing now remains ; The tangled glebe wildness no longer shows; That sacred spot now "blossoms as the rose." Where our old seat of learning stood for years To aged eyes obtrusively appears
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Another structure, less imposing. Still, Its architecture shows progressive skill, And modern pupils here a fitness find, Which ancient builders never had designed. Full well I know the wondrous changes wrought- The finished aspect by improvement brought
To this old rural town. which, as a guest, I much admire-but love the vanished best !
The academy stands a mile and a quarter from Mon- mouth Center, on the old stage road from Augusta to Portland. Only a portion of this once lively highway remains. Shorter cuts have been made, and the old line, in the main, has been abandoned; but for a short distance we may drive over the very course that was traveled by the fathers of our government in their jour- neys to and from the legislative assemblies, in the days when Maine was a part of the Commonwealth of Mas- sachusetts.
The rapidity of the steam-car gives it favor in the heart of the ever-hastening American, but the delights of travel were forever lost with the doing away of the rumbling coach. The pure air, the piping of birds among the foliage that arched the highway, the greet- ings and signals from doorways that occasionally flashed into view and as quickly disappeared as the coach, drawn by two or three spans of flying steeds, dashed around a wooded curve, and the pizzicato crack of John Blake's ever-swinging whip were charms that do not greet the traveler in the close apartments of the monotonously jarring steam-car.
At the verge of the level plain that stretches north- ward from the Academy, overlooking a long reach of undulating woodland, with a hazy outline of the White
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Mountains in the distance, stands the oldest relic of coach thoroughfare-the old "Prescott Tavern." Square as a block house, hip-roofed and crowned with a chimney large enough for a city tenement, it would, but for the new clapboards and modern windows that replaced the original ones about ten years ago, challenge the beholder to believe that he had taken a backward step of nearly one hundred years. Everything about it is like the historic mansions that we read about but seldom see. There is the old tap-room, a thing of which many of our younger readers who were born, and have always lived, under the reign of prohibition never heard. For their benefit we will explain that it was to the days of 1800 what the little place behind the screen in the modern eating house is to the present-the place where Poland water, Moxie Nerve Food and other tonics are kept for sale. An interesting feature of this apartment is the tally of P's and Q's placed against the name of a young man who is said to have become one of Portland's most brilliant legal lights; and if he drank the amount of alcohol charged to him and came in contact with a friction match we see no reason why he should not have been.
The doors leading from the tap-room to the narrow side hall are double, a fact that is suggestive of the large puncheons that often found entrance there. Through this entrance the troops were marched in double file when they came from the muster-field near by to wipe the dust from their throats with Capt. Pres- cott's "West India and Molasses." Then there is the spacious dining hall, lately used as a summer kitchen and furnished with the trappings of a former century.
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Two large front rooms with their massive fireplaces and long mantles, and finished with jointless hard pine dadoes nearly two feet in width, are separated by a small front hall with a steep winding stair-case, at the top of which a door on the right opens into another large room, finished, like the one below it, in broad wainscots and recessed window seats. On the left we enter a room that is very similar in appearance to each of the others, except that three of the walls are fur- nished with bench seats running the full length and width of the apartment, and that it is frescoed on all sides with the most inconceivable landscapes that ever tortured the eyes of man. Here we find giant trees, beside which the wonderful redwoods of California would have to stand on tip-toe, in close proximity to houses so infinitesimal that they might be wrapped in one of the fallen leaves. Broad rivers are here, em- anating from sources that resemble puddles of milk left for the cat to lick up. "Such was the artist's dream of nature," writes one who had better ideas of euphony than of perspective and congruity in describ- ing these mural decorations. If this were a dream how that artist must have suffered with the nightmare! This was the hall of the olden time. A plain board partition now divides it in the center, but an open door shows that it originally ran the full length of the build- ing. It was in this room that the swains and frolicsome damsels of four-score years ago used to meet to "trip the light fantastic toe;" or, if no fiddler was to be had, to while the long winter evenings away in such sports as "Blind man's buff" and "Puss in the corner."
Such times as those were! With the roaring open
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fire on one side, spreading a golden carpet over the well-scrubbed floor, its luminations met by the light of a dozen tallow dips set in stands of polished brass; hearts lighter than the hot air that rushed and roared up the black-throated chimney. and cheeks redder than the "no-name" apples that sputtered on the cleanly swept hearth-with such accompaniments who would not join the festivities?
This old landmark was built in 1801, by Capt. Sewall Prescott. The following summer it received a christening that immortalized it, when Francis Asbury, the "Pioneer Bishop," sat in the upper hall, at the head of a handful of Methodist circuit riders, and conducted the proceedings of the second New England Confer- ence held in Maine, and a congregation supposed to represent one-sixth of all the Methodists in New Eng- land gathered outside the doors to listen to a discourse from his venerable lips.
The captain's first house stood a little north of the new building, and at one end of this was his blacksmith shop. At about two o'clock one morning, soon after the new house was completed. fire was discovered coming from the shop. It was but a minute, seeming- ly, before the whole building was wrapped in flames and the hot tongues were reaching out toward the new house. All hands, with the exception of the captain, were outside in a trice, fighting the demon with wet blankets and sheets. That worthy official would have been with them. but, in the excitement of the moment, while dressing, he had got his vest on wrong side out, and, in the excitement of the moments following, he found it no easy matter to get it righted. If he got one
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arm in right the vest was sure to take a half-turn be- hind his back and bring the other side wrong end up. If good luck and a helping hand had not come to his aid, the first who came to view the ruins the next morning would have found him on the side of the bed wrestling with that "tarnal weskit."
After the Academy became an educational institu- tion of considerable importance, Prescott's Tavern be- came the boarding place of many men who have won laurels in the political arena. Embryo governors and senators learned to decline "mensa" and read _Esop's Fables within its landscaped walls, and more than one orator, whose eloquence would now command the at- tention of a more intelligent audience, bombarded the helpless images with his furious rhetoric.
Tenantless and dreary, the "old fort" still stands like a ghost of the festive historic days.
CHAPTER XIII.
A DECADE OF DEVELOPMENT,-CONCLUDED.
The mercantile history of Monmouth dates from 1802, when a store was opened at Ellis Corner by the firm of A. & J. Pierce. John Pierce, the junior part- ner, lived near the store, which stood in the field south of the residence of Rev. J. B. Fogg. Business was conducted by this firm only one year, when Alexander, the senior partner, purchased his brother's share, and became sole proprietor. At the end of another year, he, in turn, sold the business to Samuel Cook. a young gentleman who had served as clerk from the time it was established. Mr. Cook was from New Salem, Mass. In 1807 he removed to Woodstock, Me,, and a little later to Houlton, of which he was one of the pioneers. For his wife, Sarah Houlton, whom he married before emigrating to Maine, the town of Houlton evidently was named. William Cook, a son of Samuel, who was born during the brief residence of the family in Monmouth, was, before his decease in 1890, the last of the pioneers of Houlton. If "straws
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show which way the wind blows", the fact that as prominent a man as Esquire Abraham Morrill named his oldest son for Samuel Cook is all the information we require concerning the character of the latter.
Yankees have been Yankees in all ages since that peculiar race was invented. Who ever knew one to develop a new scheme without being flanked by a dozen imitators? Before the Messrs. Pierce came into town no one had attempted to start in trade. A little more than two years later, John Chandler and half-a- dozen others had erected stores and swung their shingles to the breeze. John Chandler had his "shop." as it was then called, in the corner north of the acad- emy. The peregrinations of this building have been mentioned in another connection. Joseph Chandler had a store at the outlet of South pond: Greenleaf R. Nor- ris and James F. Norris had another in that vicinity, which they closed after a few months, and Joseph P. Chandler one at North Monmouth. The building in which he traded has been moved and remodeled, and is now serving as a dwelling-house for "Doctor" H. S. Folsom.
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