USA > Maine > York County > Buxton > One hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the incorporation of the town of Buxton, Maine : held at Buxton lower corner, August 16, 1922 : with additional history > Part 5
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Before the Civil War, and for several years, Samuel D. Han- son & Co. kept store and was employing men and women in the coat manufacturing business at Buxton Center, and Almon H. Cressey and Allen T. Hill were in the same business at Grove- ville about 1870, continued by Sewall Blake and Elwin A. Soule.
The Maine Furniture Company came from Fairfield and bought two water power privileges of the Richard Palmer heirs in March, 1881, and commenced making furniture in September on the Saco River at Bar Mills. They sold to the Centrifugal Leather Com- pany September 24, 1900, and they sold to the Rogers Fibre Company, of Lawrence, Mass., in 1910.
HIGH SCHOOL
The Buxton High School was established at Buxton Center in 1888, and the first principal was George H. Larrabee.
THE OLD BUXTON HIGH SCHOOL, OCCUPIED FROM 1888-1912
GRADED SCHOOL, BAR MILLS, 1912
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Town of Buxton, Maine
The first graduates, class of 1890, were Alton Everett Har- mon and William Henry Cressey. They attended the Gorham High School two years previous. School agents of each district hired the common school teachers for many years.
BUXTON SCHOLARSHIP
Cyrus Woodman, a native citizen of Buxton gave $ 1,500.00 on April 9, 1873, to establish a fund for a scholarship at Bowdoin College, Brunswick, under certain conditions for receiving benefit. Amount of fund, March 1, 1922, $4,246.33. There have been twenty-four men who have received over $3,000.00 in benefits.
Second fund: Dr. Zenas P. Hanson left in his will $ 5,000.00 as a fund for a scholarship at Colby College, Waterville. Check in payment of same dated November 9, 1922.
These are great inducements for the High School graduates of this town.
GOLD HEADED CANE
Inscription on head of cane as follows:
Presented by The Boston Post To The Oldest Citizen of Buxton Me. (To Be Transmitted)
This is in the care of the Selectmen, to be placed with the oldest citizen.
William Owen, cane presented in 1909; died January 7, 1911, aged 90 years, 4 months.
Daniel Huntoon, cane presented 1911; died March 2, 1913, aged 90 years, 1 1 months.
Samuel T. Dunn, cane presented 1913; died May 9, 1915, aged 91 years, 3 months.
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Elias Sanborn, cane presented 1915; died February 10, 1918, aged 91 years, 10 months.
Andrew J. Lombard, cane presented 1918; died June 24, 1919, aged 89 years.
Nathaniel Sawyer, cane presented 1919; died November 23, 1923, aged 93 years, 4 months.
Nathan Lane, cane presented on his 88th birthday, November 10, 1924.
MUSIC-SINGING SCHOOL TEACHERS
Barnabas Sawyer, Barnabas Sawyer, Jr., Daniel Fuller, Peres Waterman, Edmund Flood, Moses Gilpatrick, Leonard Park- hurst, Oren Berry, Elijah J. C. Owen, Oscar O. Owen, U. S. Wight, Cecil Deane.
A native of Buxton, Ernest J. Hill of Portland, has the repu- tation of being one of the best tenor singers in Maine. He also gives private vocal lessons.
BANDS
Bar Mills Brass Band -Director, Andrew L. Berry; played at the Centennial in 1872.
Buxton Cornet Band- Director, George E. Sawyer; played at Presidential Campaigns 1884-1888-1892.
Bar Mills Band - Director, John W. Rankins; played at Presi- dential Campaigns 1904-1908-1912.
An act to incorporate the Saco River Telephone and Telegraph Company was passed in 1889. The promoters were Samuel B. Shepard, Dr. Frank A. Southwick, Freeman Palmer, and others.
The most attractive places for a summer day's rest and lunch parties in Buxton and vicinity are to be found at the "Indian Cel- lar," over the Saco River in Hollis; the "Cyrus Woodman Res- ervation at Pleasant Point" (owned by the Appalachian Club of New York, and one of the world's greatest organizations of moun- tain climbers), and at "Bonny Eagle Pond" where there are sev-
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eral summer cottages, and where many clubs, societies, boy scouts, campfire girls and Sunday School picnics are held with bathing, boating and games for innocent pleasure. .
A woolen mill has operated at West Buxton for many years, now called the Worthrowe Mills.
The George G. Page Box Company of Cambridgeport, Mass., located at Bar Mills in 1893, and the town voted to exempt them from taxation for ten years.
The York County Mutual Insurance Company was incorporated in 1894 at West Buxton by Frank H. Hargraves, Edwin A. Hob- son, Charles Butler, and others.
The first electric lights were installed at Bar Mills in 1894, and the power was supplied by the Maine Furniture Company. The wiring was done by W. H. Chapman, now of Portland, assisted by Walter H. Coffin of Buxton. Since 1914 most of the villages in town have electric lights and the power is supplied by the Clark Power Company and the Cumberland County Power and Light Company.
In 1895 and 1896 there were two big freshets on the Saco River, taking away bridges, two barns, gristmill, and a part of a dam, and other damage at the two villages-also, Ernest Rand was drowned at West Buxton and Daniel Haggerty at Bar Mills.
WAR WITH SPAIN
On February 15, 1898, the United States Battleship "MAINE," lying in the harbor of Havana, Cuba, was blown up, and 266 of her sailors were killed by the explosion of a submarine mine. President Mckinley sent a special message to Congress saying- "In the name of humanity, in the name of civilization, in behalf of endangered American interests which give us the right and the duty to speak and to act, the war in Cuba must stop."
On April 25 Congress declared war with Spain and the Presi- dent called for 200,000 volunteers. A million men came forward, practically saying "Here am I; take me. I'll go where you want
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me to go." The town of Buxton was represented by six volun- teers who enlisted for two years, or the close of the war.
At the annual town meeting March 4, 1912, it was voted to build a Graded School Building at Bar Mills, and a High and Common School Building at Buxton Center. The cost then was about $28,000.00 in bonds.
In 1916 the Selectmen ordered -"That a permit be and here- by is granted to Cumberland County Power and Light Company to erect and maintain posts and string wires thereon for the trans- mission of electricity for the purpose of furnishing heat, light and power on certain named highways." The power plant was built at West Buxton. This Company pays the largest tax in town.
HIGH SCHOOL FUND
At a special town meeting May 19, 1917, voted "to accept of Dr. Zenas P. Hanson's gift of $5,000.00, the interest of which is to be used for the benefit of the Buxton schools, the High School having the preference. The school is to be named for his brother, 'Samuel D. Hanson High School,' and this name be put on a bronze tablet and placed on the High School building." The Treasurer received this amount of money on June 7.
EARLY SCHOOL TEACHERS, SCHOOLHOUSES AND DISTRICTS
The record gives us that Silas Moody was the first school teacher in Buxton, from 1761 for perhaps eight or ten years, after which he went to Kennebunkport to preach in 1771. The early teachers boarded around in different places and kept school in the house where they boarded.
The record also gives us that the first schoolhouse was built at Salmon Falls in 1791. This makes just thirty years without a schoolhouse after the teacher came. One of the early school- houses in Buxton was built and set on shoes, and was moved around once a year or so from the Lower Corner to other parts of that vicinity and back again for convenience of the scholars.
The first districts were: No. 1, Pleasant Point; No. 2, Lower
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Corner; No. 3, Buxton Center; No. 4, Spruce Swamp; No. 5, Bog Mills; No. 6, East Buxton. There have been seventeen dis- tricts with schoolhouses (largest number ) as follows: No. I, Union Falls; No. 2, Scarboro Corner; No. 3, Groveville; No. 4, Salmon Falls; No. 5, Upper Shadigee; No. 6, Chicopee; No. 7, Kimball's Corner; No. 8, Bog Mills; No. 9, Cobb District; No. 10, Scribner District; No. 11, Duck Pond; No. 12, West Buxton; No. 13, Bar Mills; No. 14, Lower Shadigee; No. 15, Dearborn's Hill; No. 16, Buxton Center; No. 17, Lower Corner. The district system was abolished and small schools united, so we have only ten common schools in town at the present time. In 1800 two grammar school- houses were built and in 1830 the Buxton Academy. In 1888 the Buxton High School was established, and in 1912 the new High School and the graded school buildings were built.
Some teachers were: Silas Moody, Barnabas Sawyer, Samuel Cutts, John Woodman, Luther Kinsley, John Hearn, Timothy Ham, Phebe Payne, Hannah Myrick, Joseph Billings, Francis Morrissey, Gen. James Irish, Zenas Payne, Charles Coffin, Rev. Abner Flanders, Rev. Mark Hill, Deacon William Wentworth, Deacon Samuel Elden, Deacon Asa Brown, Eben Wentworth, Colby Tibbetts, Joseph Cressey, Storer S. Milliken, John Henry Harmon, Horace Harmon, Emily O. Webster, Fannie Owen Hill, Mary Cressey Rand, Mrs. D. M. Hutchinson, Fannie Milliken Wakefield, Jere M. Hill, Fannie R. Waterman.
The teachers were hired by the school agents under the old district system.
THE WORLD WAR
The United States entered the greatest war of all time on April 6, 1917. Congress authorized and directed President Wilson to employ the entire naval and military forces of the United States and the resources of the Government to carry on war against Germany. The cry at Berlin had been, "Paris in three weeks, London in three months and New York in three years." Self
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OUR DUTY
"The great world's heart is aching, Aching fiercely in the night, And God alone can heal it, and God Alone gives light; And the men to bear that message And to speak the living word,
Are you and I, my brothers, and the Millions that have heard."
ADDRESS BY KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN
"I have tried to make clear to the committee that I have no real right to be on the platform of this One Hundred Fiftieth Anni- versary of the Town of Buxton.
"By one of those accidents that will happen in the best regu- lated families, I was not born in Buxton; indeed, I went further and fared worse, for I was not even born in Maine, but in Phila- delphia. The damage to my reputation was repaired very early, for my younger sister and I were brought back to Maine when we were about three and six years old, respectively, returning, not to the land of our fathers, but of our stepfathers; for Dr. Albion Bradbury belonged to Hollis, and there we lived all the days of our childhood in the cottage made historically noteworthy by the present residence there of Mr. and Mrs. Algernon Dyer, whose family trees fairly bloom with Buxton's most illustrious ancestors.
"There was a long interval in California and from thence we came back to Hollis, where we have spent twenty-eight summers. The history of Hollis is always submerged by that of Buxton, which has more distinguished ancestors than any other village of its size on the map, and the Common at this moment is crowded with their descendants, good, better, and best.
"Buzzen beasts of the beautiful old burying ground at Salmon Falls with the unmarked graves die tary Www. . ..
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wrought with plow and axe and musket, too, to build up this town- ship. Very likely there may have been a few women among its heroes and martyrs! (History is a trifle brief on this point! ) but it is something to bring forth sons and daughters-spin, weave, sew, mend, cook, milk cows, make butter and cheese, and mind the house and children. (The Pilgrim mothers, you remember, were always overshadowed by the Pilgrim Fathers, but my heart goes out in sympathy to the 'men folks' who are to struggle for su- premacy in the coming fifty years!)
"I don't know what we were doing in Hollis when they were making history in Buxton. Perhaps our early settlers adventur- ously went West and helped out the other states. (Maine energy, wit and good judgment were always at a premium.) Apparently, however, most of them were too clever to be killed by the In- dians and, in fact, except for historical purposes, it is better to be a live humming-bird than a dead eagle!
"Buxton has its own half of the glorious Saco, but Hollis has the other half. There is no rivalry between these 'twin cities' on opposite banks of our beloved river. Where a river is spanned by bridges, friendships always grow.
"Buxton has its Woodman Reservation, its hallowed site of the earliest meetinghouse, also this fine hundred-year-old building on the Common. It has its 'Pleasant Point' on the river near Salmon Falls where the children the other day strewed the unmarked graves of the first settlers with flowers-but Nature in a gener- ous geologic impulse, or what may have been a burst of envy, made a magnificent rift in the solid rock of the river bank and gave Hollis the famous Indian Cellar!
"It is clear, then, that I am here only as a lover of the Saco and the State of Maine. Of the twenty-five or twenty-six books of my authorship, not counting the nine volumes of anthologies (poetry, prose, and educational essays), written in collaboration with my sister, eight have been given to the attempt to portray the life of the little villages along the banks of our river -not by
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name, and never by characters drawn from life. If I had ever de- scended to making portraits of my neighbors, I should not now be blessed with so many friends. If the people of my books seem lifelike, it is because I have passed many months and years among their prototypes or counterparts. I have know them, loved them, laughed at, and with them, and learned their manners of speech. Here and there I have preserved some precious specimen of their homely wit, so quaint, so wonderful in its sharp home thrusts!
"The background is always as real as I can make it; all the rest is fiction. They are homespun tales. The Saco has always flowed through all of them, and
'So waved the pine trees through my thought They fanned the dreams their fragrance brought.'
"I can never give the atmosphere of New England's rugged cliffs, or the tang of her salt sea air, but I wish I might believe that when you open one of these books of mine, you might say, 'That writer knows and loves the State of Maine.'"
ADDRESS BY GEORGE L. EMERY, EsQ.
Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen:
Although I am not a native of the town of Buxton I spent a great many years of my life in this town and first began to prac- tice my profession in the village of West Buxton, having been as- sociated with the Honorable Charles E. Weld, an old honorable and learned practitioner of the York County Bar. Although cir- cumstances have called me from this town to the city, yet I have never lost my interest in this country community, and have spent a great portion of my time in your midst and hope to spend more in the future.
As I look over this audience and see the faces of the men that went away, and perhaps have acquired fortune and fame; and also look into the faces of the men who have stayed at home, each
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carrying on their humble vocation, I cannot help but believe that there has been more contentment, more happiness and more real success attained by those who have stayed by their town and have walked the paths of a simple life.
To the younger generation who are still in this town, allow me to urge that there are great opportunities even in a small place and it will be very satisfactory in the years to come to realize that you remained with your native town and have helped bestow on it honor and success. Don't be afraid to be called a countryman. The greenest person in the world is the city person in the country. The most helpless person in the world is the city person who has to depend upon the grocery store for all they eat and are tied and bound to many luxuries which are, on the final analysis, useless.
If a boy goes from your midst and graduates with an academic degree, or studies and becomes a doctor, lawyer or minister, he is honored and looked upon with more or less awe by his fellow citizens upon his return, but when a boy goes from your com- munity and studies and learns the most useful and basic of all occupations, agriculture, no mention is made of him and he is practically unnoticed upon his return to his community. However, the time will come when a man that is learned in agricultural science, which is the basic principle of all business and all life, will be reverenced and honored by the world.
I certainly appreciate the honor of being allowed to address you for a few minutes and shall recollect in years to come that this was one of the most pleasant occasions of my life.
REMARKS BY A. L. T. CUMMINGS
Mr. Chairman, Neighbors and Friends:
I speak as a representative of that class known as summer resi- dents of Buxton. We cannot claim kinship to the town, as can
الادارة
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most of those who have spoken from this platform today, but we maintain that our loyalty is no less than theirs. In fact we are willing to admit that our devotion to the town exceeds, in a measure, their own. They first came to Buxton, not from choice. They couldn't help it. They were born here. We are not even adopted sons and daughters. We came of our own free will and accord.
We came, and we continue to come each year, because we appre- ciate the pleasant relationships, the spirit of friendliness and neigh- borhood good will; because we love the view of these grand hills, "whence cometh our strength"; because of the nearness to the old Saco River, which ever flows "with chainless pride," its crystal waters reviving delightful and sacred memories of youth.
It seems to me that Buxton has sent out into the world enough sons and daughters to people the earth. Stop on the street any stranger who appears to have come from old New England stock, and if you casually mention the name Buxton, his eyes will light up and he will tell you that at least one of his parents, or grand- parents or great-grandparents was born in Buxton, or that he had some near and dear one who is buried in the ancient churchyard yonder.
In a country ungraded school the teacher gave out as the topic of an essay, "What makes Cities?" The class was allowed ten minutes in which to write the essay. One little girl nervously chewed the end of her pencil eight minutes; then she seemed to come into possession of a bright idea, and she performed the al- lotted task in the remaining two minutes. Curious to see what had been written the teacher opened the folded sheet. On the outside was written the child's name; at the top of the inside, the title "What Makes Cities?" and then followed the text of the es- say, the single word, "Folks."
She was not so far out of the way. That may be true of the big cities, but it requires something more than "folks" to make a couri- try town. It requires fertile fields, happy homes, sunny skies,
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ambition, devotion to community interests, industry, an abiding faith in brotherhood.
Those early settlers of Buxton, long ages ago, builded well. Their judgment and their ethics were sound. Under their lead- ership and service the town prospered and its influence became widespread.
May we, both permanent and summer residents, continue to cherish the ideals of honesty, integrity and good neighborliness for which they stood and wrought.
ADDRESS BY HELEN MARSHALL DOLLEY
Ladies and Gentlemen:
I have been invited by your Chairman of the Day, Rev. Mr. Sargent, to give some sketches of early happenings in Buxton, as related by my father personally, or chronicled in his Scrapbook in which he has preserved many interesting bits of local history not obtainable elsewhere.
As reference to the military activities of a town seems fitting on their anniversary occasions, perhaps the following incidents re- corded in this book may be of interest today.
In the summer of 1814 several detachments of the Buxton Light Infantry were called to military duty at Saco and Bidde- ford after the British brig Bulwark came into Saco carrying off one of Colonel Cutts' vessels and cutting down another.
They were stationed 30 days at Jordan's Point, Biddeford, then called Fort Nonsense.
While we writhe helplessly in the grip of high cost of living today it is intersting to note two items in the bill for rations, etc., sent by the town of Buxton to Boston headquarters at that time:
"To furnishing 669 rations of provisions to a detachment of 12 soldiers, 30 days, under the command of Lieut. Seth Fairfield, ordered for the defense of Biddeford and Saco in July last at
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20€ per ration, $72.00."
"To transportation of Baggage for the same to and from the mouth of the Saco river, 30 miles, $ 1.00."
Following this I find a complete list of officers and privates serving in the companies of Capt. Dan'l Appleton and Capt. James Woodman.
In 1842 a general muster was held here at Buxton Lower Corner.
The Limerick Artillery dined at our house at Salmon Falls, then Captain Marshall's Tavern, and brought their brass cannon and powder cart with them. The mounted cannon stood in the middle of the road in front of our house.
They were met here by the Saco Light Infantry and proceeded to the muster. It was a great day for the small boys and I have often heard father speak of happenings there though he was only eight years of age at the time.
About two years after this the Salmon Falls boys organized a military company of their own; father was chosen captain and Gibeon E. Bradbury, lieutenant. These officers faithfully drilled their men according to the rule of "Steuben's Exercises."
The privates were:
WALTER AND DAN'L BRADBURY FRANCIS AND TOM DENNETT
JOHN B. AND BENJ. LOWELL TOM MERRILL
WILLIAM MILLIKEN TRISTAM ELDEN
on Buxton side of the river, and
ROBERT BRADLEY AND CHARLES AKERS on the Hollis side.
Their uniforms were home made, consisting of white trousers with a red strip down the side, most any kind of a coat with brass buttons sewed on it, and three-cornered newspaper hats.
Their wooden guns and swords were made by their fathers or some kind neighbor.
They fought many valiant battles choosing sides for the op- posing party - American and British. One terrible battle was
£
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fought in Hill Elden's old house across a broken down door where father says he was wounded and lost his sword.
Father maintained his keen interest in military affairs through- out his life. In 1913 he entered in this scrapbook a complete list of Revolutionary soldiers from Buxton.
He states that he had been twenty years compiling this list from every available source. Terms of service are given when known, also brief sketches of their activities.
It was the desire of his heart to see a monument erected to their memory in Buxton. He interested a number of people in the pro- ject, but as yet no definite action has been taken.
Doubtless some of you recall sketches of Buxton's early days, legends of the Saco, etc., which father published in the Biddeford Journal and Portland Argus at various times during the last thirty years or so.
In 1894 or 1895 he was asked to settle some disputed points regarding Cochranism, that strange religious craze that so stirred the people of this section for several years, as he was possessed of much first-hand information concerning it; so he wrote a series of articles then printed in the Biddeford Journal.
Jacob Cochrane first appeared at Salmon Falls in April, 1816, stopping at the old Warren Tavern. He is described as a man of commanding appearance and a magnetic personality.
He possessed great oratorical gifts and an hypnotic power that swayed his large audiences at will. Strong men and women became as children under his spell and followed him blindly, many to their ruination, for his doctrines promulgated a laxity of moral obliga- tion incompatible with the divine inspiration he professed to re- ceive direct from the Almighty.
There was much singing and dancing at these meetings and their wild and weird incantations could be heard a mile away it is said.
On one occasion the meetinghouse was not large enough to ac- commodate the crowd and they adjourned to a shady grove in Capt. Gibeon Elden's pasture. Horses were hitched to trees and
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fences along the road as far as one could see, and over three hun- dred teams were counted, which probably represented more than a thousand people in attendance.
Father writes: "Cochrane's beat seemed to be from Broad Turn in Scarboro thro' Nonesuch, North Saco, Salmon Falls, Hollis, Limington and Limerick thro' to Effingham and Freedom, N. H."
Time will not permit relating the many interesting and hu- morous incidents connected with this strange fanaticism which continued until the final arrest and imprisonment of its leader about three years later, in 1819.
ADDRESS BY ALGERNON S. DYER
Berkshire School, Sheffield, Mass. Mr. Chairman, Sons and Daughters of Buxton, and Friends:
Two of the gentlemen who have preceded me in addressing you have virtually confessed some embarrassment on this occasion because they could not claim to be sons of Buxton. If that be a disqualification I must share it. We are all in the same boat; and I am reminded of the story about a man who recently presented himself for an examination to qualify for the position of deck- officer in the new United States Merchant Marine. The examiner eyed him up and down, and then said:
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