USA > Maine > Hancock County > Traditions and records of Southwest Harbor and Somesville, Mount Desert island, Maine > Part 10
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Abbie May Holden (afterwards Mrs. William Lawton) was the first telegraph operator and when she went out of town to live, her sister, Mrs. Phebe Holden Ross, took the position which she held until she went West to live; then it was moved to Mrs. Lawton's house and she conducted it until the advent of the telephone put the telegraph office out of business.
The Manset post office was established in 1892 and was to have been called Mansel ; the first English name given to Mount Desert Island. But through an accident or illegible handwriting the office was named Manset and no effort made to change it to the correct name.
There was a post office at Seawall for some years, kept for a long time by Capt. Peter Moore in his house. It was given up and Rural Free Delivery took its place. Clark Hopkins was the
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first postmaster at Manset and Mrs. Susie Haynes King has had the office for several years.
At Southwest Harbor after J. T. R. Freeman, Mrs. Emily Robinson Farnsworth had the office for some time; then J. A. Freeman and William J. Tower held it alternately according to change of political administration for several terms. Then E. S. Thurston was appointed and held office for twelve years until Earl1 W. Gott was appointed by Franklin D. Roosevelt.
The office has changed location with every new postmaster but it is now conveniently located in the Salisbury building which is central and it is likely to be permanently placed there.
PROFESSIONAL MEN OF SOUTHWEST HARBOR AND TREMONT
The first resident physician in the town of Tremont was Dr. William A. Spear, who came before 1844 and settled at Bass Harbor. He practiced for more than fifty years or until inca- pacitated by age. In many families he attended three generations and was highly respected and beloved.
In 1880, Dr. R. J. Lemont, a graduate of the University of New York in the class of 1864, came to Southwest Harbor where he practiced for some years and then established a drug store which he conducted during his lifetime.
Dr. H. E. Abbott and Dr. J. D. Phillips came about 1886; the former remained but a few years but Dr. Phillips is still in practice (1937). He is a graduate of the University of the City of New York in the class of 1886. Dr. Phillips has been very active in the business and development of Southwest Harbor. It was he who was responsible for the water system of the town and he has owned and conducted the Claremont Hotel as a summer hotel for a number of years. He has served his com- munity as representative to the State Legislature and also as State Senator. He has been an official of the public library for many years and president of the board of trustees for two decades. He has always been active in the Village Improvement Association and was its first president. In town affairs his advice has been excellent and his suggestions worthwhile. He has served as president of the Maine Medical Association.
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A Dr. Staples came to Southwest Harbor about the same time, but remained only a few months.
Dr. Elias C. Neal practiced in town when a young man, then went away, returning about 1888 and settling at Bass Harbor. He was in practice about ten years and died suddenly at the home of a patient to whom he was ministering. He was a graduate of the Bellevue Medical College in 1866. Dr. Neal was highly esteemed and his ability as a physician recognized.
His son, Dr. George A. Neal, a graduate of Baltimore Medical College in the class of 1905, has been in practice here since his graduation and has a wide field of labor. He has always been actively interested in town affairs and the various welfare associations. He has been treasurer of the local branch of the Red Cross for many years, has always been a member of the Village Improvement Association and has served as its president as well as on important committees, is a member of the local branch of the Maine Public Health Association and was active in getting a public health nurse here to work in the schools and among the people. He was a member of the school board for six years and was Superintendent of schools for two years. For twenty-one years, Dr. Neal was secretary of the Hancock County Medical Association and served three terms as its president. He is a member of the staff of the Mount Desert Island Hospital at Bar Harbor and is at present (1937) secretary of the staff. He, as well as Dr. Phillips, has had many difficult experiences during the years when attempting to answer the call of duty to the outlying islands in winter.
Dr. Eugene D. Tapley practiced in Tremont for a time and then went to Belfast where he opened a hospital. His brother, Dr. Thomas S. Tapley, took his place at Tremont, making his home at Mckinley. Dr. Tapley is a graduate of the Medical Depart- ment of the University of Vermont in the class of 1899. He practiced for five years at West Auburn and came to Mount Desert Island in 1905.
Dr. Raymond B. Coffin came to Southwest Harbor to begin the practice of medicine in the early summer of 1937.
Dr. George W. Anderson established his dental practice at Manset in 1882 and for many years he had a wide circle of patients.
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Dr. Charles E. Freeman had a dental office in the Odd Fellows building for a few years from 1897 but later removed to California.
Dr. Phillip F. M. Gilley, a native of Southwest Harbor and a graduate of University of Maryland at Baltimore in the class of 1913, practiced two years in Rockland and opened his dental offices here in 1915.
The first lawyer to practice his profession in the western part of Mount Desert Island was E. Webster French, Esq., who came about 1883 to Bass Harbor where he lived for several years, later coming to Southwest Harbor. He was in practice in the town for about fifteen years.
George R. Fuller, Esq., practiced at Center in Tremont for a few years after graduating from University of Maine, and came to Southwest Harbor to make his home in 1893 where he built up a wide practice. Mr. Fuller served for many years as first selectman and also as supervisor of schools, was always connected with the welfare organizations of the village and served his community in the State Legislature as Representative and as Senator. His experience as civil engineer gave him a valuable and thorough knowledge of property boundaries all over the western part of Mount Desert Island. He died during the summer of 1937. His son, David W. Fuller, born in South- west Harbor, is a practicing attorney in Bangor since completing his studies at University of Maine and at Harvard Law School.
Seth W. Norwood opened a law office in Southwest Harbor in 1906 where he practiced for a few years and then moved to Portland.
MOUNT DESERT ISLAND PHYSICIANS
On reading a report of the Penobscot County Medical Asso- ciation in the Maine Medical Journal, my attention was called to an after-dinner talk by Dr. Mason on reminiscences of Bangor physicians prior to 1850.
The thought came to me that so far as I knew, nothing had ever been said or written of the physicians of Mount Desert Island and so, for a few brief moments it does not seem out of place to give attention to some incidents in the lives of those men
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who went to the assistance of the people of the island in sickness and distress.
The first physician who settled on Mount Desert Island was Dr. Kendall Kittredge who was born at Billerica, Mass., October 19, 1773, who commenced practice in the town of Penobscot in 1798, and moved to Mount Desert in 1799.
Here he had a large practice and had to travel on foot, horse- back or by water for many years. He was a man of strong personality and a successful practitioner of the medicine of the day in which he lived. His practice not only included this island but extended to Trenton, Bluehill and Surry. It was the custom in the last two places when his services were needed, to light a bonfire on a certain point and it was recognized as the duty of some one on the western side of Mount Desert to get the message to the doctor as soon as possible after seeing the blaze. Then by boat or on horseback he would start out for the settle- ment and someone would be stationed along the road or at the landing place on the shore to direct him to the house where he was needed.
He could be seen daily on horseback travelling to the scat- tered homes on the island. He took a deep interest in church affairs and served the Congregational Church as its clerk for many years. His neat, plain handwriting is preserved in the first records of the First Congregational church at Southwest Harbor.
He was a man of considerable business ability, built several vessels and carried on a large farm. It is told of him that no matter how sick the patient was, on his arrival at the house he always asked for a lunch and sat down to smoke his pipe before seeing the sufferer and on his return he would call at some house along the road to have another lunch and a smoke, saying that it was good for his horse to have a rest. He was the beloved physician of high character and charitable even to his own injury. He raised a large family and many of his descendants are still living on the island. He died in 1857. The saddlebags which he carried for many miles are to be seen at the Mount Desert Museum at Somesville and the vials contain some of the medicines which he put there himself.
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The next man who came to minister to the sick was one Dr. Harvey F. Deming, a graduate of Castleton, Vermont, born in Cornish, N. H., in 1809, died at Mount Desert, 1849. I am unable to find the exact date of his settlement on the island but it was sometime prior to 1830. He was a lame man. He did not have the extensive practice that Dr. Kittredge enjoyed, but he was a well educated man and a good practitioner. While he was living at Somesville, Dr. Moses R. Pulsifer settled in the Thomas dis- trict in Eden in 1830. He remained there for three or four years, then went to New York where he embraced the Homeopathic doctrine and settled in Ellsworth where he practiced for many years. He was of a pugnacious disposition and he and Dr. Deming were on the fighting line a good deal of the time while he lived on the island and continued the battle after settling in Ellsworth. A bitter strife also went on between Dr. Pulsifer and Dr. Peck and also with his political opponents, but he was a successful doctor.
The next man to practice medicine on Mount Desert Island was Dr. William E. Spear who came to Tremont before 1846 and who practiced more than fifty years. It is not known that he ever received a diploma from any college, but was a druggist before coming to the island. That he was a man of keen per- ceptions and understood human nature there can be no doubt, for he had a long and very successful life of active work and showed great knowledge gained by long experience. Hardly has there been a man who responded to the calls of his patients at any and all times and through all weathers as he did. He might well be called an island doctor, going at all times and under all weather conditions to the different islands which lie to the south of Mount Desert in boats that were much less seaworthy than those we have today. Many tales have I been told of the ex- periences which he endured when crossing to these islands; such as being wrapped in bed quilts and laid down in bottom of the boat and when reaching his destination finding the wrappings frozen to the planks. He was a small man in stature but tough and wiry and without fear.
On one occasion while crossing in a heavy storm, one of the men who was rowing the boat remarked that "we will all go to Hell this time sure." The Doctor answered that he "had as
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many friends there as any of them." He told me that he had attended more than twenty-five hundred obstetrical cases and it is not known that he ever owned a set of obstetrical forceps ; something for us all to think of when we are over-anxious to use them. His patients had great faith in him and great affection for him.
Dr. Emerson Googins came to Mount Desert in 1849, moving here from Surry where he had practiced for a while. He re- mained here until 1868 when Dr. R. L. Grindle came on the Island.
Perhaps Dr. Googins was one of the most eccentric of prac- titioners that we have known. He was a man of strong prejudices and peculiarities but an honest and faithful physician and spent a busy life on Mount Desert Island. His eccentricities are familiar to many of us. The peculiar way in which he would express himself and his facial expressions were at times most amusing. His great faith in the action of certain drugs was surprising. He was wont to say that with Vetram Verades he could regulate the heart's action to the fraction of a second and the caustic remarks he made were proverbial and often most effectual. Once when meeting Dr. King of Ellsworth on the street of that city accompanied by his brother, who was one of the Justices of the State, they bade him a hearty good morning and with that stiff, frozen way of his he responded coldly, "Good morning, boys", which must have somewhat cooled their ardor. He moved from Mount Desert to Ellsworth where he practiced many years and, I am sorry to say, died a very poor man.
Dr. E. C. Neal, father of Dr. George A. Neal, came first to Tremont in 1867, remained here some two years, went west, returning again in 1887 and successfully practiced until he died in harness. Dr. Neal died at his post of duty being called to a confinement case where the patient was having convulsions and he was delivering her with instruments when he suddenly fell back dead from heart disease. Never has it been my lot to gaze upon a more tragic scene than when I entered that house, being hastily summoned. There lay the good Doctor on the floor dead, the woman on the bed just coming out of a convulsion and every- thing in confusion and distress. Well may a man be proud to die in the discharge of such duties.
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Dr. Neal served his country in the Civil War.
Several other physicians have settled on the island from time to time, but these are the only ones who remained for many years. These men all bore excellent reputations, gave to their patients their very best service and died enjoying the confidence of all the many who had received aid from their hands.
In closing I might remark that it is gratifying to note the progress of medical science and good fellowship which exists today in the profession on this Island and I trust that it may never, through any act of ours, go backward, but advance so that those who come after us may have bright landmarks whereby they may gain encouragement to do still better work for diseased humanity.
(Written and read by Dr. J. D. Phillips of Southwest Harbor at a meeting of the Hancock County Medical Association.)
DR. JOSEPH DANA PHILLIPS
No story of Mount Desert Island would be complete without recognition of the work done by Dr. Joseph D. Phillips for his home town, for the Island, for the County and for the State.
He was born in Orland, Maine, on December 17, 1857, the son of Luther and Lavonia (Noyes) Phillips. When he was four years old the family moved to Hancock Point, near Mount Desert Ferry, where they lived on a small farm.
His father, who was born at Castine in 1801, was descended from a sister of Sir William Pepperell and his great-grandfather was with Pepperell at the taking of Louisburg in 1745.
Luther Phillips held town offices and represented his district in the Maine legislature. He was a deacon of the Baptist church and a very religious man, never neglecting family prayers, Bible reading and grace before meals.
Lavonia Noyes was born at Norridgewock, Maine, the same year that Queen Victoria came into the world and she was often told that she resembled that royal lady in face and character. She began teaching school at the age of sixteen and always read eagerly the books and papers that came her way. She was a member of the Congregational church at Ellsworth and her minister, Dr. Sewall Tenney, performed the ceremony which united Luther Phillips and Lavonia Noyes in marriage.
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Both of these worthy people died in Hancock and are buried in the Ellsworth cemetery.
Their son grew up on the farm, assisting in the work of the home, caring for the farm animals and enjoying life and its sim- ple pleasures until he was eighteen years old, when he made his first trip to the Grand Banks of Newfoundland in a fishing vessel. For the next four summers he followed the sea in this way and earned enough money to attend the Maine Central Insti- tute at Pittsfield, Maine, from which he graduated in 1883. His older brother, George, had graduated from a medical college and was a successful practitioner and this influenced the younger brother to follow the same line.
He completed his course in 1886, graduating from the Medi- cal Department of the University of New York City. He spent one year in his brother's office and then came to Southwest Har- bor which ever since has been his home.
The young doctor endured many hardships in his early prac- tice. The roads were almost impassable in the muddy seasons of spring and fall and through the deep snows of winter. The outlying islands had a large population at that time and Dr. Phillips had many hazardous journeys across stormy waters in winter. Before the advent of motor boats he has been marooned for several days on distant islands before it was considered safe to launch a boat in the rough seas to bring him home. He has many times been called to Outer Long Island, to Swan's Island and to Mount Desert Rock, twenty miles out at sea, besides many, many trips to the nearer islands, often in stormy weather and he never failed to heed the call for help. He has attended cases for twenty-eight consecutive hours with no chance for rest and but little time for food.
A doctor's life such as Dr. Phillips experienced for the first twenty-five years of his practice was vastly different from the present, with good roads, automobiles and motor boats, to say nothing of better medical facilities.
In 1917 Dr. Phillips was elected as Representative to the State legislature. He was active in securing an appropriation to build a free bridge connecting the Island of Mount Desert with the mainland in place of the old wooden toll bridge built in the 1830's.
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In 1923 and 1925 he was elected to the State Senate and in 1930 he was one of the Presidential Electors.
He has served as president of the Hancock County Medical Association and in 1927 he was honored with the presidency of the Maine State Medical Association.
In recent years he has taken time to travel to California, to Panama and Bermuda and to take an extended trip to European countries.
One of the greatest benefits brought by Dr. Phillips to South- west Harbor was the organization by him of the Southwest Harbor Water Company in 1893 which obtained the use of water from Long Pond and brought the supply to the town. This company operated successfully until 1928 when it sold its rights to a larger corporation. The bringing of a supply of pure water to the community improved the public health and marked the beginning of greater prosperity, as many summer cottages were built as soon as this necessity was assured.
More than thirty years ago (1938) Dr. Phillips purchased the Claremont Hotel from Mrs. Jesse H. Pease and has since con- ducted it successfully as a summer hotel. He has enlarged and improved it and his son, Lawrence D. Phillips, is now manager.
Dr. Phillips has been actively interested in the Village Im- provement Association since its organization, has always been a trustee of the public library and for the past twenty-five years has been chairman of the Board. He was a charter member of the Odd Fellows lodge and has been treasurer of the order ever since the local lodge was established.
His advice in town affairs has been sought for and found to be based on sound principles and he has often been called upon by his friends and acquaintances for counsel in business matters which has proved wise.
He has been a trustee of the Congregational church, was in- strumental in forming the Larger Parish of Southwest Harbor and Tremont, was foremost in the affairs of the Y. M. C. A. when that organization functioned here, has always been con- nected with the Chamber of Commerce, is President of the Board of Trustees of the Public Library, assisted in organizing the Country Club and purchasing the property it now owns and has
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always been identified with all movements for betterment of the community.
Dr. Joseph D. Phillips has been for many years the leading citizen of Southwest Harbor, a personal friend to his towns- people as well as "the beloved physician."
LIBRARIES AT SOUTHWEST HARBOR AND MANSET
The Southwest Harbor Public Library had its beginning in 1884 when Mrs. Annie Sawyer Downs gathered a number of discarded books from the hotels, mostly paper covered volumes, and placed them on a shelf in one corner of Dr. R. J. Lemont's drug store, which was the building now occupied by Spurling's Restaurant. Dr. and Mrs. Lemont acted as librarians and the modest collection received additions from time to time.
Albert W. Mathews of New York was interested and contrib- uted books and generous checks. The books were in great de- mand by the people of the town and the task of looking after them soon became too much to be done in the store, so, in 1886 the books were moved to the small building which stood where the Allen store now is and which was built by John D. Lurvey as a coffin shop. Here the books were housed for several years during which time the building was moved twice; once a few . rods to the north of its first site and then to the corner lot where Thomas Lawton's Variety Store now stands.
For many years Mrs. Lemont served as librarian. A small fee was charged for use of the books until money was appropri- ated by the town and then the books were made free. The Library Association was formed March 17, 1888, and the name was The Tremont Public Library Association as at that time Southwest Harbor was a part of Tremont. It was incorporated and Dr. R. J. Lemont was the first president and Miss Mary E. Redlon, daughter of Rev. Amos Redlon, the Congregational minister, was secretary and also librarian for a long time.
The first committee appointed for the selection and purchase of books was composed of Dr. Lemont, Dr. Phillips, W. W. A. Heath, Mrs. J. B. Mason, Mrs. Viola E. Newman, Mrs. Julia Lemont, Arthur T. Richardson, Mrs. Seth W. Lurvey, Mrs. J. G. Parker, J. B. Mason.
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The librarians served without pay until November 1888, when it was voted to pay fifty cents for each half day the library was open. The first magazine which the library subscribed for was The Century and later, by the advice of Mr. Albert Mathews, Harper's and The Atlantic Monthly were added to the list.
In 1893 the Association bought of Mrs. Rachel C. Allen of Waltham, Mass., the lot of land where the library building now stands. Money for this purchase was partly raised by Mrs. J. B. Mason through "Dollar Socials"; the people of the town volun- teering to earn a dollar each, in some unusual way and then meeting to hear their efforts celebrated in rhyme. The sum of $100 was paid for the lot.
In May of 1895, the building where the books were kept was sold to John C. Ralph, who wished to occupy it and the Associa- tion was notified that the books must be taken out. Funds had been slowly accumulating in the bank for the purpose of building a library and it was voted to borrow more and build at once as there was no available place for the books which could be secured. Mr. Ralph kindly allowed the occupation of the shop until the new library could be completed.
Melvin Norwood was the lowest bidder on plans contributed by Prof. Eleazer Homer and he was instructed to begin work.
The Owl Club was organized in 1894 by Miss Nellie R. Car- roll and it turned in $115 as the net proceeds of a fair which the club held that winter. This club continued for some years to work for the library and earned considerable money for the building and the purchase of books.
The contract price for the library building was $898. The furnishings were purchased with funds raised by Mrs. Nathan Clark and Mrs. Arvilla Clark, both of whom were actively inter- ested in the library and served as officers until their deaths.
The committee to arrange for the dedication of the new build- ing was composed of Dr. J. D. Phillips, Mrs. Nathan Clark, Mrs. Arvilla Clark, Mrs. O. W. Cousins and Mrs. William Mason.
Dr. Phillips presided over the meeting giving a brief outline of the history of the library association, there was singing by a male quartette composed of Rev. Mr. Brewster, Whitcomb Rich- ardson, E. L. Higgins and Galen Young, an essay on Books by Mrs. J. B. Mason, an address by Rev. Powesland, pastor of the
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