Illustrated history of Kennebec County, Maine; 1625-1892, Part 73

Author: Kingsbury, Henry D; Deyo, Simeon L., ed
Publication date: 1892
Publisher: New York, Blake
Number of Pages: 1790

USA > Maine > Kennebec County > Illustrated history of Kennebec County, Maine; 1625-1892 > Part 73

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Augustus P. Stevens is the son of Isaac Stevens, who came from Old York, Mass., to Waterville in 1798, and in 1799 bought what is now the corner of Silver and Gilman streets. He married Ruth Jane, daughter of Nathaniel Low, and raised a family of four boys and six girls, of whom Augustus P., born in 1807, is the only survivor. Isaac Stevens bought, in 1803, the farm on Mill street west, on which his son still lives, and was for many years, and till his death, in 1832, a a trader on Main street. Augustus P. Stevens, carpenter and farmer, married Maria, daughter of Colonel Joseph Holbrook, of Boston. Of their three children-Marshall R., Mary and Hellen -- the latter two are dead. Mr. Stevens' second wife was Hellen Hastings, and their children were: Lois L., who married Thomas Smart, a carriage maker, of Waterville, in 1888; Charles, Herman and Perley A.

Frank L. Thayer, born in 1855, is a son of L. E. and Sarah A. (Chase) Thayer, and grandson of Dr. Stephen Thayer. He was edu- cated in Waterville public schools and Coburn Classical Institute. From 1874 until 1885 he was in a clothing store with his father, and from August 11, 1885, to September, 1889, he was postmaster at Waterville. After leaving the post office he was quite extensively engaged in the real estate business. He was elected representative in 1890, and has been city treasurer since 1889. In January, 1892, he began a general insurance business. He has been chairman of democratic city com- mittee. His wife is Nora P., daughter of N. G. H. Pulsifer, M. D. They have two sons-Nathan P. and L. Eugene. Away back, from the beginning of things to about 1820, the northwest corner of Main and Silver streets was an open common, used for a standing place for loads of farmers' produce. Reuben Kidder was at one time the reputed owner, and later, Nathaniel Gilman, whose son-in-law, Milford P. Nor- ton, put a building on it in which the post office was kept in 1824. After many changes and a varied history, the present owner, Frank L. Thayer, purchased the property, and in 1890 erected his commodious

596a

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

block at a cost of $32,000. Of this sum the cost of the ground was one- half.

Charles E. Tobey, born in 1813, is one of eight children of Stephen and Sarah N. (Ellis) Tobey, and grandson of Samuel and Mary Tobey. Mr. Tobey is a cabinet maker by trade and a farmer. He came in 1867 from Fairfield to Waterville, where he has done carpenter work and farming. He married Louisa E., daughter of Elihu and Hannah (McKechnie) Lawrence, and granddaughter of James Lawrence. Their children are: R. A. (Mrs. Rev. R. H. Baker), and four that died- Rinda, Sullivan C., Charles S., and an infant son.

Edwin Towne, born in 1844 in Winslow, is a son of Ephraim and Sarah P. (Flagg) Towne. From 1866 to 1871 he worked in Fairfield, Me., and from 1871 to 1876, in Lowell, Mass. In the latter year he came to Waterville, where he has since lived. In 1881 he became half owner in a grocery business, of which he became sole proprietor a little later. His wife is Lydia A., daughter of John and Matho (Osborn) Gerald. Their children are: Eva M., Fred H., John G., Alva A. and Flora E.

James Trafton, a native of York, Me., married Eunice Parker, and raised ten children: Eunice, Dolly, Harriet, Joanna, Sarah, Clarissa, Joseph, James, Oliver C. and Charles. Oliver C. (1798-1873) was a farmer, and owned and occupied the farm that his father bought when he came to Waterville, being the south part of the Nathaniel Low farm. Oliver C. married Mary B. Lewis, and of their five chil- dren, only two are now living: Ellen (Mrs. G. A. Johnson) and Charles W. Those deceased were: Olive G., who married John Jackson, of Bangor; Sophronia A., who married Gilbert Whitman, of Waterville, and Mary J., who married William Haskell, of Boston, Mass. Charles W. was born in 1835 on the home farm, where he is now a farmer. His wife was Emily R. Gilman, and their five children are: Arthur I., Alice M. (Mrs. L. E. Philbrook), Fannie B. (deceased), William H. and Mary D. Mr. Trafton has been a member of the city council since 1890.

Samuel B. Trafton, born in 1834, is the youngest of four children of Joseph (1792-1858) and Sally (Blaisdell) Trafton, and grandson of James Trafton. He is a farmer on the homestead of his father. His wife is Paulena T., daughter of Dummer and Olive (Trafton) Blaisdell. They have one daughter, Lillie I.

Sebastian S. Vose, the youngest son of eight children of Rev. Eze- kiel and Eliza (Farley) Vose, was born in Orleans, Mass., in 1838. He began photograph business in 1861 at Lewiston, where he continued until May, 1862, when he entered the army in Company I, 16th Maine, serving until June, 1865. In that year he opened a photograph studio in Canton, and in 1869 removed to Skowhegan, where he remained until 1879, when he located in Waterville, where he still continues

597

CITY OF WATERVILLE.

business (firm S. S. Vose & Son). His wife is Sallie E., daughter of Thomas B. Dunn. Their children are: Ellery A. (partner of his father), Thomas E., Nina G., Harry S., Arthur G. and four that died- Julia M., Jennie M., Eva M. and Martha E.

JOHN WARE .- The ancestor of the long-lived race of Ware in this country was Robert, who had lands granted him in Dedham, Mass., February 6, 1642-3. Here, on March 24, 1644-5, he married " Mar- grett Huntinge," daughter of John Hunting, first ruling elder of the Dedham church. Margaret, the mother of Robert's ten children, died in Dedham, August 26, 1670. His second wife, whom he married May 3, 1676, was Hannah, daughter of Thomas Jones, of Dorchester. " Robert Ware, the Aged," as he was known, died in Dedham, April 19, 1699. His fifth son, Ephraim1, born Nevember 5, 1659, married Hannah Herring, lived in that part of Dedham which afterward be- came Needham, and died March 26, 1753. Ephraim2, oldest son of Ephraim1, was born in Dedham February 14, 1688-9, married Hannah Parker, of Needham, December 27, 1716, and died March 19, 1774. Doctor Ephraim, younger son of Ephraim3 (born in Needham, January 14, 1725, died in Concord, Me., September 30, 1792), was father of Abel, whose son John is the subject of this sketch. Abel was born in Dedham February 28, 1766, married July 14, 1788, Sybil Spaulding, of Norridgewock (born May 25, 1762, died March 11, 1852), and removed to Concord, Me., in 1790, where he died in June, 1803.

His youngest son, John, was born in Concord December 5, 1801, and received his early education in the public schools of that town. When about fourteen years of age, John went to Norridgewock, and made his home with a married sister, Mrs. Sarah Fletcher. Here he received instruction from a private tutor for two years, and at the same time worked in the store of his uncle, John, where he acquired the rudiments of a practical business education. In 1817 he went to Athens, Me., and entered his uncle's branch store in that place. At the death of his uncle in 1829, he assumed sole charge of the business, conducting it successfully for twenty-eight years.

January 5, 1842, he married Sarah Maria Scott, formerly of Yar- mouth, Me., who began teaching school in Athens in 1841. She was born July 14, 1814, and still survives, passing an honored old age in Waterville. In Athens all their children were born: John, October 12, 1842; George Homer, July 4, 1844; Henry Scott, April 16, 1846; Frank, September 12, 1847, died September 19, 1862; Sarah Maria, February 18, 1850, died October 13, 1851; Ella Maria, March 25, 1852; and Ed- ward, May 14, 1854.

In December, 1857, Mr. Ware removed with his family to Water- ville, living on Elm street, in the house previously occupied by Zebulon Sanger. About 1865 he returned to Athens, where he remained eight years, but in June, 1873, he removed permanently to Waterville, pur-

598

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

chasing of Jeremiah Furbish the house on Silver street, now occupied by his widow. Before leaving Athens in 1857, he had become inter- ested in the organization of the Androscoggin & Kennebec railroad, and was elected president of the company in June, 1856, holding the office, through successive reëlections, until 1862, in the latter part of which year the company was merged with that of the Penobscot & Kennebec Railroad Company. Shortly before his death, October 8, 1877, he was the projector of the Merchants' National Bank of Water- ville, was its first president, and held the office at the time of his de- mise. Mr. Ware was of a kindly, genial disposition, and a remarkably able financier. He was major of a militia company, and was generally known as Major Ware.

John, his eldest son, is now president of the Merchants' National Bank. George, the second son, remained in Athens until 1875, when he came to Waterville, and in August of that year was made cashier of the bank founded by his father. He resigned the position in June, 1879, but is still one of the directors of the institution. Edward, the youngest child of John Ware, was educated in the public schools of Waterville, at the Eaton Family School four years, at the Franklin Family School three years, and fitted for college at Portland and Phil- lips Academy, Andover, Mass. He was assistant cashier of the Mer- chants' National Bank one year. Since 1879 he has occupied the home place of his father at Athens. He now owns and operates a saw mill at Winslow. He married Harriet Prindle Collins, and their five chil- dren are: John, Edward, jun., Phil T., Dorothea and Henry Hastings.

EDMUND FULLER WEBB comes from an English ancestry, both sources of which contain names of historic interest. He is the son of Joseph, the grandson of Benjamin and the great-grandson of Samuel Webb, of Boston, who was in the fifth generation from Christopher Webb, the English emigrant, who was made a freeman of Massachu- setts colony in 1645. His son, Henry, died in 1660, leaving by will to Harvard College the ground on which stands the building of Little, Brown & Co.

Thomas Smith Webb, son of Samuel, established in Boston in 1815 the Handel and Haydn Musical Society and was its first president. He was grand master of the General Grand Masonic Encampment of the United States.

The mother of Joseph Webb was Eunice, daughter of Nathaniel and Hepzibah (Appleton) Day, of Boston, and was of the sixth gener- ation from Robert Day, who was born in Ipswich, England, in 1604, came to Boston in 1634, settled in Cambridge, and was made a free- man in 1635.

The mother of Edmund Fuller Webb was Sarah, daughter of Jona- than Fuller, and was in the eighth generation from Dr. Samuel Fuller, who with his brother, Edward, came to Plymouth in the Mayflower in

John Hand

599

CITY OF WATERVILLE.

1620, and was the first surgeon and physician in the colony. The name Jonathan Fuller appears in the third generation, and then con- secutively to and including the eighth. Sarah (Fuller) Webb was born in Albion July 25, 1809, and died December 20, 1883. Her mother was Hannah Bradstreet, who was of the seventh generation from Simon Bradstreet. governor in 1679, under the first charter of Massa- chusetts colony. Governor Bradstreet was the son of a non-conform- ist minister, who came to America in 1629. Anne Bradstreet, wife of the governor, was the daughter of Governor Dudley, and died in 1672.

There is no more powerful prompter to high resolve and noble act than the consciousness of being an individual conduit in the de- scent of such ancestral blood. Satisfactory proofs that Edmund Fuller Webb has not been unmindful of these sacred trusts are recorded on pages 338-and 339, where his portrait appears in the chapter devoted to the profession to which he belongs. Some further statements of his connection with the history of his times, that do not there appear, should be made.

He was a director of the Old Waterville Bank, both before and after its change in 1865 to the Waterville National Bank. He has been a director of the Merchants' National Bank from its organization, and since 1880 he has been its vice-president. He has been a member of the prudential committee of Colby University since 1877 and for the past twelve years one of its trustees. He has been a solicitor of the Maine Central railroad since 1876, and has been the general coun- sel and a director of the Somerset railway since 1886. He obtained the charter and promoted the building of the street railroad from Waterville to Fairfield, and aided in organizing the Waterville Electric Light and Power Company, and effected the consolidation of these and the Fairfield Electric Light Company in the present Waterville and Fairfield Railway and Light Company, of which he is a director. He also obtained the charter and organized the Waterville Water Company. With no specialty in his profession, the characteristic feat- ure of Mr. Webb's work and of his reputation is that he is a business lawyer, with a practical knowledge of business enterprises and methods and their relations to the law. Mr. Webb has always been a steadfast republican, and in 1892 was a delegate-at-large to the republican national convention in Minneapolis.

John Webber (1810-1882), son of John Webber, of Danville, Vt., was a moulder by trade, and was in the employ of the Fairbanks Scales Company until 1843, when, in company with F. P. Haviland, he bought of that company their plant in Waterville, and was engaged in the manufacture of plows and machinery until 1873, when they sold the business. He was a director of the A. & K. railroad in its early days, and was for several years president of the People's Na-

600

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

tional Bank. He married Sophia G., daughter of Francis and Sophia (Grant) Bingham, and their children are: Ellen R. (Mrs. Captain H. S. Blanchard), Eliza (deceased), Frank B. and John N. Frank B. is one of the present owners of the business of his father, and John N., who with his mother occupies the homestead, is a member of the hardware firm of Hanson, Webber & Dunham, and a director of the People's National Bank.

Elwood T. Wyman, born in Sidney, graduated from Farmington Normal School in 1884 and from Colby University in 1890. He began newspaper work while in college, was one year local editor of the Waterville Sentinel, and since October, 1890, has been Waterville agent for the Associated Press. April 17, 1891, in company with Henry C. Prince, he bought the Waterville Mail, which they own and publish under the firm name of Prince & Wyman. Mr. Prince is a native of Buckfield, Me. He attended Hebron Academy and in 1844 graduated from Coburn Classical Institute. He took one year at Colby, after which he was four years in the West, prior to 1891.

Alexander R. Yates, a native of Bristol, Me., is a member of the firm of Yates Brothers & Shattock, commission and African merchants, of Boston. In 1888 he bought the F. P. Haviland residence, at the corner of Silver and Grove streets, which is very appropriately named " Silver Lawn." He spends a large part of his time in Africa looking after the firm's interests there. When at home he gives special atten- tion to fine horses.

Ira E. Getchell is the son of Edmund Getchell, of Pownalboro, whose father's name was Edmund, and whose grandfather, Dennis Getchell, came from Massachusetts, and was of Scotch-Irish descent. Edmund Getchell was born in 1795 and came with his father to Vas- salboro in 1807, where he became a farmer and lumberman. and mar- ried Desire Priest. Their children were: Williams, Mary, Leonard and Ira E., who was born in 1832, and became and has continued to be a farmer. He also acquired a thorough knowledge of civil engi- neering, in which profession, with an office in Waterville, he has had for years a wide practice and reputation. Mr. Getchell has been president of the North Kennebec Agricultural Society and is a mem- ber elect to the legislature of 1893-4. He married in 1857, Cornelia, daughter of Williams Bassett, of Bridgewater, Mass. Their only child, Will B. Getchell, is a civil engineer, of Augusta.

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE CITY OF GARDINER.

Settlement .- First Comers .- Incorporation as a Town .- Statistics .- Early Mills. -Present Manufactories .- Sonth Gardiner .- Old Settlers .- Lumber Firms. -Old Stores .- Civil Officers .- Incorporation of City .- Banks .- Gas Com- pany .- Water Company .- Churches .- Schools. - Libraries. - Cemetery .- Lodges .- Societies -Personal Paragraphs.

C ITIES, like events, are the results of causes. Gardiner city is the natural product of the water power of the Cobbosseecontee river. It was organized by the laws of nature, and is run by the force of gravity. Its aggregation of people is due to the opportu- nities here afforded for employment. Mills and manufactories are the bee-hives of civilization, and fortunate is that locality which furnishes the necessary conditions under which men and women can come in swarms and find work and wages.

Mr. Emerson has said that "every institution is the lengthened shadow of one man." With some unimportant modification that re- mark may apply to this city. If ever a town had a founder, this city was begotten by Dr. Sylvester Gardiner, many of whose lineaments it still perpetuates. Industry, economy, order, thrift, thoroughness, de- spatch, education, morality, were qualities whose seeds Dr. Sylvester Gardiner certainly planted wherever he lived.

The history of Gardiner properly commences with the incorpora- tion of the Proprietors of the Kennebec Purchase, among whom was Doctor Gardiner, born in Rhode Island in 1707. He chose the medi- cal profession and settled in Boston, where as a physician and drug- gist he became rich. The fact that his father and his grandfather were born and raised in New England would tend to a reasonable belief that the English blood of his great-grandfather, Joseph, had become fairly Americanized, but after eight years spent in England and France completing his professional education, he returned home, socially, politically and religiously, a thorough Englishman. He had a clear, active mind, exact observation and information, a compre-

602

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

hensive ambition, and a high degree of energy and business talent. These qualities were recognized and endorsed by his associates, who made him moderator at all their meetings, and the manager and ex- eentive officer of the company.

It had been very difficult to obtain actual settlers. So efficient did Doctor Gardiner prove in finding and inducing new families to try the new region, that the very next year he was granted a large part of what is now the business portion of Gardiner city, including the famous Cobbosseecontee falls and water privileges. In honor of his services the locality was named Gardinerston and more land was granted him till his possessions in 1770 amounted to over 12,000 acres. His energy is shown by the following list of practical, valuable me- chanics and others collected at Falmouth, Me., in 1760, and brought by water to Gardinerston: Mr. Thomes, a builder of grist mills; Ben- jamin Fitch. a saw millwright; James Winslow, a wheelwright, and Ezra Davis, James and Henry McCausland and William Philbrook- the last four men bringing their families.

The next spring these men built the Cobbossee grist mill, so long and so widely known as the only place to get grinding done in all the Kennebec valley. The same summer they built the Great House, that for the next fifty years-as a tavern-was the most noted build- ing in town. Among its first landlords were: James Stackpole, Ben- jamin Shaw, Pray, Bowman, Randall, Widow Longfellow and E. Mc- Lellan. The upper part contained a hall where religious meetings were often held. The building of mills of various kinds-saw mills, a fulling mill, potash works, brick kiln, stores and many dwellings- soon followed. Samuel Oldham received one hundred acres of land as an inducement to build and burn a kiln of brick.

In 1762 Solomon Tibbitts was induced by Doctor Gardiner to bring his family of nine children to the west side of the river, where they settled on Plaisted hill. Abiathar Tibbitts, one of the first native children in town, was born there. Ichabod Plaisted came in 1763; Benaiah Door from Lebanon, N. H., settled on Plaisted hill a year or two later. Samuel Berry was another early comer. . His house was near dam No. 1. Captain Nathaniel Berry, a great hunter. was a permanent settler; William Everson, the first schoolmaster, came in 1766; Paul and Stephen Kenney also came in 1766, and Nathaniel Denbow, James Cox, Peter Hopkins, William Law, Dennis Jenkins and Abner Marson in 1768. John North was one of the first Irish settlers. In 1774 his son Joseph purchased the old post office. Joseph North represented this section in the provincial congress in 1774-5. He was an able, worthy man.

The revolutionary war came on and Doctor Gardiner's love of England took him off with the British army. He was a tory and never returned to enjoy his possessions, but settled after peace was

603

THE CITY OF GARDINER.

declared, in Newport, R. I., where he practiced his profession till his death in 1786. His real property, which was confiscated, was finally restored to his heir and grandson, Robert Hallowell, to whom the doctor willed his Kennebec estate on condition that he should take the name of Gardiner, which he was allowed to do by act of the legis- lature in 1802. Robert Hallowell Gardiner was born in England in 1782, and upon arriving at suitable age took possession of his estate.

Eleazar Tarbox came in 1774 and raised seven sons and two daugh- ters. He married Phebe, daughter of James Stackpole, who kept the Great House. Andrew Bradstreet and his sons, Joseph and Simon, came in 1780, engaged in lumbering and soon had a saw mill and a store near the upper dam. Captain Samuel Grant, a revolutionary soldier who fought at Bunker Hill, came to Gardinerston at the close of the war. He was the father of Peter Grant and died in Clinton and was buried here. Benjamin Shaw came to Gardiner in 1783 and was proprietor of the Great House. He settled at New Mills in 1790, where he had a saw mill and a store.

The Kennebec valley charmed General Henry Dearborn as he was passing through it during his eight years' service in the revolutionary war, and in 1785 he purchased land of William Gardiner and made this village his home till he was appointed secretary of war in 1801, when he removed to Washington. He represented the Kennebec dis- trict in congress two terms, and was the most distinguished citizen who ever lived in Gardiner. There was at that time a whipping post back of the Great House, to which the general, who acted as a local magistrate or judge, was obliged to consign many unruly culprits. In 1785 Doctor Gardiner's son, William, was a noted man here, and boarded at the Great House. He was a jolly fellow, who cared more for hunting and fishing than for business. Henry Smith, who became the noted tavern keeper at " Smithtown," on the east side of the river, then lived near General Dearborn. R. E. Nason was captain of the first military company and was succeeded by Major Seth Gay. Wil- liam Barker, Samuel Norcross, Ezekiel Pollard, William Wilkins, a school teacher, and Sherebiah Town, the miller, were early settlers.

Simeon Goodwin, an active, able man, then lived at New Mills, from whence he soon removed to Purgatory, which soon became known as Goodwin's Mills. Gardiner Williams, Noah Nason, a mill man, and Nathaniel B. Dingley were also here at that time.

Major Seth Gay built the first wharf and General Dearborn estab- lished the ferry, in 1786. He loved to draw a seine near the mouth of the Cobbosseecontee, where shad, herring, salmon and sturgeon were more than abundant. Jonathan Winslow loved to tell how he caught sixteen big salmon one Sunday morning before breakfast. Ebenezer Byram came from Bridgewater to build General Dearborn's house, which stood where the Library building is. David Young came in

604

HISTORY OF KENNEBEC COUNTY.

1781; Leonard Cooper, Jonathan Jewett and Burnham Clark in 1783; Daniel Jewett in 1785; David and Reuben Moore, Jedediah Jewett, Dominicus Wakefield in 1787, and David Dunham in 1788.

Within the next five years the new comers were: Ebenezer Thomas, Abiel Pitts, Joshua Little, Jonathan Moody, Andrew Har- low, Jonathan Redman, Hubbard Eastman, Seth Fitch, David Blair, Daniel Evans, Bolton Fish, Samuel Little, Peter Lord, Asa Moore, Robert Shirley, Timothy Clark, Isaac Hatch, Jere. Dudley; John Butler, Allen Landers, Charles Witherell, Richard Davis, Elijah Clarke, Edward and Thomas Palmer and James Pickard.

In 1792 the small pox became epidemic here, but the people de- cided by vote that inoculation was not expedient. Mr. Hallowell brought the first wheel chaise to town and General Dearborn brought the first wagon. In 1806 Rufus Gay paid $135 for a new chaise.

INCORPORATION .- The legislature was petitioned in 1778 to incor- porate the plantation of Gardinerston, and in 1779 an act was passed incorporating it into the town of Pittston. In the year 1803 all the territory of the old town of Pittston lying on the west side of the Ken- nebec, with the inhabitants therein, was by act of legislature " incor- porated into a distinct town by the name of Gardiner." By the pro- visions of the act Jedediah Jewett was directed to issue his warrant to some principal inhabitant of said town to notify the people to assemble for the purpose of choosing town officers, "and to transact such other matters and things as may be necessary and lawful at such meeting." The warrant was issued to Dudley B. Hobart, who called the first town meeting in the old Episcopal meeting house, March 21, 1803. Some of the offices as then designated sound a little queer now. They elected tythingmen, hog reeves and a fish committee. April 1st the town voted to raise $800 for highways, $200 for preach- ing, $500 for schooling and $500 for debts and expenses of the town .* April 4, 1814, it was " voted not to raise any more money for preach- ing," and after the next year " tythingmen " were not included in the list of town officers.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

Illustrated history of Kennebec County, Maine; 1625-1892, Part 73

Author: Kingsbury, Henry D; Deyo, Simeon L., ed Publication date: 1892 Publisher: New York, Blake Number of Pages: 1790

Author: Kingsbury, Henry D; Deyo, Simeon L., ed
Publication date: 1892
Publisher: New York, Blake
Number of Pages: 1790