USA > Maine > Maine; a history, Volume IV > Part 50
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For over half a century there was waged a con- troversy between the United States and Great Britain over the northern boundary of the State of Mainc. One of the incidents of this dis-
Peter Charles Keegan.
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agreement was the arrest of a man who had been appointed to take the census. One of the of- ficers who took part in this arrest was James Keegan, a constable of the Madawaska region in 1837, the year of the occurrence. Mr. Keegan, the father of the Hon. Peter Charles Keegan, was a prominent man in the local affairs of Van Buren at that day, and it is from this virile and energetic personality that he gained his mental and moral sinew and also the will to use it for worthy purposes.
Born, May 13, 1850, in Van Buren, Aroostook county, the son of James and Lucy (Parent) Keegan, Peter Charles Keegan knew all the hard- ships and rigorous living of the pioneer days. His father was a farmer, but always did his duty as a public-spirited citizen for the community and region. He held offices which were no sinecures, and put the punch into all his work, which his son has done in a wider field. He served as county commissioner of Aroostook county, and as registrar of deeds for the northern district of the county. Besides this he held many town offices, all of which he filled with vigorous and efficient service. The son of such a man imbibes with his earliest ideas the will to win, and it is the heritage which outranks every other. Con- ditions of living in Northern Aroostook county seventy years ago were primitive, and hard in the extreme. There were no schools except such as were maintained by the few scattered people of a community uniting to employ a teacher, and the term lasting as long as the money held out. This was the type of school to which young Peter Charles Keegan was sent at the age of four. The teaching was as rough as the conditions, but it was thorough, and the discipline in a Spartan outlook and courage was probably of more value than the pre-digested educational systems of the present day which stress the information gained and not the manhood developed. When he was nine years old the nearest school to the Keegan home was across the St. John river in New Bruns- wick. There were no ferries in those days, and the boy tramped to the river with his dinner pail and then rowed himself across in a canoe and walked the two miles to the school house, and made the same journey back at night. Three years later the nearest school was three and a half miles away and he walked this distance twice a day. When he was fifteen he was at the Uni- versity of New Brunswick, and his preparation had been so thorough and his fighting qualities so developed that he won the second highest place in his entrance examinations, and also the lead-
ing prize, the Douglas Gold Medal in his junior year, and kept a pace in his studies which grad- uated him with honors in a class which included men who were later to achieve eminence in Ca- nadian affairs.
College was followed by a period of law study and by his admission to the bar in 1869, and then the young lawyer settled in his native town to become a part of its development and progress, and take a man's place in that work. There were certain things which at the first challenged his chivalric spirit, but he was told that nothing could be done to right the wrong as it was a matter for legislation. That would have acted as a quietus to most men, but it did not hinder this young knight, and he decided that he would go to the Legislature, if necessary, to accomplish what he wanted done. The difficulties in his way were serious and would have deterred most men. He was a Democrat in a land of Repub- licans, and he could hardly expect votes enough to man a rowboat. But he drove his way in with the smashing method that is his own, and despite the various conflicts, he passed through and set- tled-he was seated in the Legislature of Maine in the first term of 1870. A personality appeared in that body with his first entrance, which car- ried everything along with it. Year after year he was returned, serving for seven consecutive terms, and also in 1881-82 and 1895-96. Although his faculty for work is tremendous, he mingles a boyishness into it, and attaches others to him by an infectious kindliness, which is as genuine as it is deep and lasting. As a lawyer, from the day of his admission to the bar, and for many years after, Mr. Keegan was engaged in the trial of many cases. He was never, however, con- tent to be a mere lawyer. His notions of duty called for something more. So long as anything remained to be done for the public good or the advancement of the town or the surrounding country, he never tired or faltered in his efforts. Fully one-half of his lifework has been devoted to securing railroad facilities, educational institu- tions and industries of various kinds for the town of Van Buren and the upper St. John valley, gen- erally. Evidence that his efforts have not been wholly unappreciated is to be found in the fact that one of the two villages in the town of Van Buren, as well as the post-office and railroad sta- tion, is named Keegan.
Mr. Keegan was appointed by Governor Cobb, under a resolve of the State Legislature in 1907, a member of the commission to inquire into the advisability of establishing a State Board of
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Charities and Corrections. The recommendations of the commisison were afterwards adopted, and a new department of the State government cre- ated. Later Mr. Keegan was appointed one of two commissioners on the part of the United States to inquire into the conditions and uses of the St. John river, to whichi commission a num- ber of matters and controversies between the United States and Great Britain, relative to the proper construction of the Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1842, were referred, to put an end to disputes and troubles of long standing on the Canadian border. To this position he was ap- pointed January 12, 1909, by President Roose- velt, and served until March 1, 1916, when the labors of the commission came to a close. Mr. Keegan has been for the past fifteen years presi- dent of the Aroostook bar. He has been since its organization, in 1905, president of the Van Buren Trust Company. He was a delegate from Maine to the Democratic National Convention at Kansas City, in 1900, and again to the St. Louis Convention in 1916. He is a Catholic, and a fourth degree member of the Knights of Colum- bus; also a member of the Catholic Historical Society.
Mr. Keegan married, at Fredericton, New Brunswick, August 5, 1884, Mary Sharkey, born in Fredericton, in 1852, a daughter of Owen and Margaret (McLaughlin) Sharkey, both born in Cumber-Claudy, County Londonderry, Ireland.
WILLIAM HENRY OHLER, treasurer and manager of the well-known Tucker Printing Com- pany, of No. 105 Exchange street, and No. 116 Market street, Portland, Maine, is descended from good old New England stock, his grandfather be- ing a resident for many years of the town of Newburyport, Massachusetts. He is the third to bear the name of William Henry, both his grand- father and father having also been William Henry, the last named having been born at New- buryport, March 6, 1847. From that place he came to Portland, Maine, in 1869, when twenty- two years of age, and made his home in this city during the remainder of his life. His death oc- curred there, October 19, 1914. Mr. Ohler, Sr., was a chemist of ability and was employed by the State as an assayer. He married Annie Barker, a native of Richmond in the Province of Quebec, Canada, and they had two children, as follows: Harriet Ellen, who is now the wife of Harry W. Lovejoy, of Portland, who is as- sociated with the railroad interests here; and William Henry, of whom further.
Born November 3, 1873, in the city of Portland, Maine, William Henry Ohler, the younger of the two children of William Henry and Annie (Bar- ker) Ohler, has made this city his home up to the present time and has grown most intimately identified with its business and mercantile inter- ests. It was there that he obtained his educa- tion, attending for this purpose the local public schools, where he pursued his studies until reach- ing the age of sixteen years. He then left school and applied himself to learning the trade of printing, and after becoming skillful in the craft worked at it as a journeyman for eighteen years. During this whole period he was em- ployed by the Tucker Printing Company and made himself so valuable to his employer, that in 1908, when he was thirty-four years of age, he was admitted to the business as a partner. In 1914 he became treasurer and manager of the con- cern of which A. M. Strout is president, and continues to hold this double office at the pres- ent time. As an officer of this important con- cern, Mr. Ohler occupies a position of prominence in the printing business in Portland, and is very well known among business men generally in this city. His activities are extremely varied in their scope and direction, and Mr. Ohler is probably as well known in several other departments of the community's life as he is in connection with business. He is a very prominent figure in so- cial and club life and is affiliated with many im- portant fraternal organizations in that region. He is very prominent in the Masonic Order, hav- ing taken his thirty-second degree in Free Masonry, and is a member of all the local Ma- sonic bodies, including Hiram Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; Greenleaf Chapter, Royal Arch Masons; Portland Council, Royal and Select Masters; Portland Commandery, Knights Templar; and Kora Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He is also affiliated with the local lodge of the In- dependent Order of Odd Fellows, the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, Portland Rotary Club, and with the Mechanics' Association. Mr. Ohler is something of a patron of athletics, be- sides being an accomplished athlete personally, and is a member of the Portland Athletic Club. He has also been very active in political life, and is a staunch supporter of Republican prin- ciples and policies. In 1906, while residing in South Portland, he was elected alderman of that borough on the Republican ticket. Since that time Mr. Ohler has removed and now lives at No. 216 Spring street, Portland. He is keenly
Charles & Bragday. /
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interested in charitable work and gives liberally of both time and energy in support of move- ments looking to civic betterment of all kinds.
William Henry Ohler was united in marriage, March 18, 1896, with Della May Jewett, a native of South Portland, a daughter of Turner and Rachel J. (Perkins) Jewett, of that place, now both deceased. To Mr. and Mrs. Ohler two chil- dren have been born, as follows: Harriette Gertrude, born December 6, 1897, and a graduate with the class of 1917 in the Portland High School; and Margaret Etta, born October 12, 1900, a student in the Portland High School and a member of the class of 1919.
In no part of the world do we find in great abundance men who combine a strong sense of practical, every-day business affairs with a re- ligious idealism of a high order, but if it be our purpose to seek for such we should find New England as fruitful a field for our search as any quarter of the globe. It is apparent even to the casual observer that in few regions do we find such extremely efficient management of practical affairs going hand-in-hand with so general a prac- tice of religious observance, and if New Eng- land shrewdness is proverbial it is not more so than the New England conscience. However this may be, it is certain that an example of such a character is to be found in Mr. Ohler, who is one of the most prominent merchants and citizens of Portland, Maine.
PHILIP FOSTER TURNER, the senior mem- ber of the well known insurance firm of Turner, Barker & Company, with offices at No. 40 Ex- change street, Portland, Maine, comes of an an- cient New England family, is a descendant of Elder William Brewster, who came to America in the Mayflower in 1620, and who became so prominent in the affairs of the Pilgrim colony at Plymouth, and also of Edward Doty, another of the Mayflower passengers. His ancestor, Hum- phrey Turner, came to Plymouth in 1628, and in 1636 became one of the settlers of Scituate, and was long a useful and enterprising citizen. About the time of the Revolution some of the family came to Maine, engaging chiefly in shipbuilding, among them being Consider Turner, whose son, George Turner, was a very active man in this line, many of his ships being built where the Marine Hospital now stands. A son of George Turner was George William Turner, born in Fal- mouth, Maine, in 1822, who died in Portland, February 4, 1900. He married Eliza K. Springer, of Portland, a descendant of the Foster and Reed
families of Topsham, Maine. Six children were born to them, three of whom died in infancy.
Their son, Philip Foster Turner, was born in Portland, and has always lived here. At sixteen years of age he began his long association with the insurance business as a clerk in the agency of Lorenzo S. Twombly. Since 1892 he has been special agent for Maine and New Hampshire of the German-American (Fire) Insurance Company of New York, and is now the senior member of the firm of Turner, Barker & Company, his part- ners being Ben Barker, Edward C. O'Brion, Harlan Turner and R. Cutler Libby. Mr. Tur- ner is also active in other business and so- ciety affairs, being president of the Cumberland Loan & Building Association, treasurer of the Home for Aged Men, director of the Maine So- ciety for the Protection of Animals, director of Maine Bible Society, governor of the Maine So- ciety of Mayflower Descendants, member of the Society of American Wars, the Society of Co- lonial Wars, the Order of Washington, Maine Society of Sons of the American Revolution, which he has served as president and is (1916-17) the New England vice-president of the National Society, Sons of the American Revolution; mem- ber of Maine Historical Society, trustee of Unity Lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and of Westbrook Seminary, and is connected with various other local organizations. He is a lead- ing member of the First Universalist Society (Congress Square), of which he was clerk and treasurer for many years, and is now its moder- ator and has been superintendent for six years of its Sunday school.
Mr. Turner's first wife was Ada L. Bean, to whom he was married, November 2, 1882, and who died December 17, 1889. His only child is a son, Harlan, graduate of Tufts College in the class of 1907, who, on graduation, entered into business with his father. January 6, 1892, he was again married to Mrs. Nellie (Lord ) Fur- bush, daughter of John N. Lord, long an honored merchant of Portland.
CHARLES JACOB BRAGDON, D.D .- One of the prominent dentists of Gardiner, Charles Jacob Bragdon is justly held in the highest es- teem by his fellow citizens. By his skill as a dentist, his reputation for integrity, and by his public spirit, he has won his way to the place he has made. It is no small achievement for a man to come to a town as a stranger, and in the course of a few years identify himself with all the best elements of the community, and hav-
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ing done this Dr. Bragdon is to be accounted one of its most successful men.
Dr. Bragdon comes of the old American stock which furnished pioneers and fighters to the set- tlements scattered up and down the New Eng- land States. Forty-one of the name enlisted from the State of Massachusetts alone during the Revolution, and some of these took part in the battle of Bunker Hill. The branch of the family from which Dr. Bragdon traces his descent was identified closely with the settlement and devel- opment of York, Maine, and in Goodwin's Rec- ords of the Proprietors of Narragansett town- ship No. I, now the town of Buxton, York county, Samuel Bragdon, Jr., is given under date of De- cember 12, 1743, as one of the subscribers to a petition to the proprietors of the township called Narragansett No. I, in the County of York, to call a meeting to transact certain necessary af- fairs. It is to this Samuel Bragdon that Dr. Charles Bragdon traces his descent through his grandfather Levi Bragdon, who was the son of this Samuel, and through his father, Edward P. M. Bragdon, the son of Levi Bragdon.
Charles Jacob Bragdon was born in Gorham, Maine, February 8, 1870, son of Edward P. M. and Elizabeth (Brown) Bragdon, the former born in Deering, Maine, and the latter in Gorham. They were married in Gorham, Maine, and had three children, all still living. Mr. Edward P. M. Bragdon, who followed the trade of a stone cut- ter, is now living retired from business. He en- listed at the outbreak of the Civil War in the First Maine Volunteer Infantry, and was later transferred to the Tenth, and still later to the Twenty-ninth. He served in all three years and there contracted chronic disease which incapaci- tated him from active business pursuits. He is a member of the Grand Army of the Republic. Mrs. Bragdon, Sr., died December 25, 1912.
Dr. Bragdon went as a boy to the common schools of his native town, including the Gorham High School. He then took the dental course at the University of Maryland, at Baltimore, graduating in 1899. While there he joined the Xi Psi Phi fraternity. Immediately afterwards he came to Gardiner and opened an office where he lias built up an extensive and lucrative prac- tice.
Dr. Bragdon is a Republican in his political affiliations, and he has always taken an active interest in all municipal affairs. He was elected mayor of Gardiner, November 27, 1917, for a term of three years, having for six years previous- ly, served in the city government. He is the
secretary and treasurer of the Republican City Committe and a member of the Kennebec County Republican Committee. Dr. Bragdon was also a member for two years of the National Guard of the State of Maine, serving as corporal.
He is a member of all the Masonic bodies, and is a past commander of Maine Commandery, No. I, Knights Templar, the oldest Commandery in the State, and also a member of Kora Temple of the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. He holds membership also in the Society of the Sons of Veterans, and in the Elks Club. He attends the Congregational church. Dr. Bragdon is a trustce of the Gardiner Public Library, for which he has done much in bringing it to its present high standard.
Dr. Bragdon married, January 24, 1900, Maud H. Dudley, daughter of James H. and Flavilla (Clark) Dudley, both of them natives of Augusta, and now deceased. Mr. James H. Dudley was a lumberman by occupation, and for many years was identified with the lumber interests along the Kennebec river.
RT. REV. THOMAS FRANCIS BUTLER- It is doubtless due to the strange dual character of men, an immortal soul which would be deal- ing with infinite things, and a very finite intelli- gence to grapple with them, that some of the profoundest truths of life appear to us in the form of paradoxes. One of the distinctions of the Catholic church is that it faces these para- doxes frankly and without illusion, candidly ad- mitting its own inability and the inability of any finite agency to explain what is only reconcilable in God. Not the least striking of these para- doxes is that which forces itself more and more upon the conviction of every earnest man so long as he lives, the paradox that the way to reach the most desirable things is not to strive for them. How true this is of happiness we are often assured by the wisest and taught by that still more convincing preceptor, experience An- other form in which this may be stated not lack- ing in suggestiveness to us is that the best road to fulfillment is through forebearance. We have not to seek far for examples of this truth, which are afforded us in great numbers by the priesthood of the very church we have already mentioned. For these men, in giving up all things that the earth holds precious, even the praise that would normally attach to such self-sacrifice, meet with a deeper and surer realization. It is with them, be they sincere in their ministry, that peace dwells most constantly; they are the meek that
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inherit the earth. In the brief sketch which follows, the career of such a one is traced in out- line, marking rather the effect of his religions experience upon his career and through him upon his fellows, than the achievements which in a man of the world would be the theme most dwelt on.
Father Butler is a member of a race which has given of its sons, perhaps more freely than any other, to the high ministry which he has taken upon himself, and is both by birth and parentage an Irishman. He is a son of Patrick and Ellen (O'Connell) Butler, both of whom were natives of County Limerick, Ireland, where Mr. Butler had charge of the workmen employed on the pub- lic roads in the neighborhood of the town of Galballey. Eventually he and his wife and their seven children came to the United States, and settled in Boston, Massachusetts. Of these seven children but two survive, namely, Father Butler and Mary P. (Butler) Sheppard, the widow of one of the editorial writers on the New York Times. The five children who are deceased were as follows: William, James, Patrick, Garrett and Ellen.
Father Butler was born at Galballey, County Limerick, Ireland, August 15, 1846. The first six years of his life were spent in his native country, but in 1842 he accompanied his parents to the United States, and for a number of years lived in Boston. He was the youngest member of his family, and as soon as he came to an ap- propriate age he entered the public schools and there continued his studies for some ten years. At that time he had not felt the call to the priest- hood very definitely, and after completing his studies was engaged in several different kinds of work for various firms, continuing thus until 1872. He was becoming more and more influenced by the thought of the religious life, however, and finally in that year decided definitely upon enter- ing the priesthood. Accordingly he matriculated at Holy Cross College, Worcester, Massachusetts, where he studied for five years and was graduated with the class of 1877. In order to complete his studies, he then went abroad and entered the seminary of St. Sulpice, one of the most famous ecclesiastical schools in the world. Here he re- mained as a student until May, 1880, and then was ordained a priest at the famous chapel of St. Sul- pice by the archbishop of Paris. After his ordi- nation Father Butler returned to the United States and came to Portland, Maine, where in the month of August, 1880, he was made an assistant at the Cathedral. He was then appointed assist-
ant at St. Dominick's Church, where he remained until May, 1881, when he was given his first charge as rector of a Catholic church at Ells- worth, Maine. Here Father Butler remained for some thirteen years and a half, doing a work of great value in that town and making himself most beloved by his parishioners. During his stay in Ellsworth, he also had charge of the chapels at Bar Harbor and some thirteen other neighboring towns. In the month of November, 1894, he was appointed to the parish of St. Joseph in Lewis- ton and came to that city to take up his new duties. As rector of St. Joseph's church he had the same experience as attended his efforts at Ellsworth, becoming one of the best known fig- ures in the city as well as one of the most be- loved. He gave every energy to the interests of lis church and flock, and worked to advance the cause of the one and assist the other during the years of his pastorate. The present membership of the church is about two thousand.
FRED DANIEL GORDON, general manager of the Androscoggin Electric Company of Lewis- ton, Maine, is without doubt one of the influen- tial citizens of Lewiston. He is a son of Daniel Gordon, and a member of an old Maine family, his grandfather, Steve Gordon, having come to the "Pine Tree State" many years ago from Scot- land. This worthy gentleman was a farmer, and made his home at Readfield, Maine. He married and was the father of nine children, three of whom still survive, as follows: Steven, Sarah and Mary. One of his children, Daniel Gordon, the father of Fred Daniel Gordon, was born at Read- field and died in 1913 at the age of sixty-seven years. He was an oil cloth manufacturer. He married Annie Gilman, who was born at Mount Vernon, Maine, and died when Fred Daniel Gor- don, their only child, was but an infant.
Fred Daniel Gordon was born at Readfield, Maine, October 1, 1876, but his early associations were not formed in his native place, as he re- moved with his parents while still a child to the town of Winthrop, and it was here that he at- tended the public and high schools. He graduated from these institutions, and immediately there- after applied himself to learn the trade of printer with the firm of Merrill & Webber. He remained in this establishment for two years, after which he worked at this craft for some six years. In January, 1897, he first became associated with the Lewiston Auburn Electric Light Company, which has since become the Androscoggin Electric Com- pany. With this concern he rapidly worked his way
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