USA > Vermont > Caledonia County > St Johnsbury > The town of St. Johnsbury, Vt. ; a review of one hundred twenty-five years to the anniversary pageant 1912 > Part 10
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THE OLD. DISTRICT SCHOOL
them bounding vitality ; fights were frequent, cowards were few, and do you remember
" The bragging and betting and boasting Over our sleds in those bygone days;
And the marvelous speed of the coasting ; The lusty shouting of the boys, The half-scared daring of the girls,
The grand, tumultuous, healthful joys, The flash and flutter of wanton curls
When plumb into snow drifts like lightning we flew, With a thud and a whirl
And for two glorious minutes we none of us knew Which was a boy and which was a girl ;
" And do you remember the spelling-school bees, And. Marshall's old speller, our pride,
When phthisic and heifer and victuals and frieze Were the stunners so few could abide, And so we all went down on each side. And the penal inflictions we bore- One, refined, but most hard to endure
Was, to seize us poor wights with a whirl And set us plumb down with a girl !
"At nooning our baskets had ample supply, Of goodies a plentiful store ; Doughnuts and sausage and pie, pumpkin pie, And when empty we all wanted more."
This insatiable desire for more, was no new thing in the ju- venile history of the town. The boys and girls of the old Middle District years before used to carry potatoes and milk to school for their dinner, and when that had been devoured they were hungry for more of the same sort.
A party of soldiers returning from the war of 1812, were quartered for a night in the old Branch Bridge school house; it is related that they used the blocks of hemlock wood for pillows and the handkerchief of the mistress for bandages.
SPAULDING NEIGHBORHOOD SCHOOL
4
In 1817 Cromwell Leonard began teaching this school. Forty-seven years after he wrote, "I am now an old man, but
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among the sweetest remembrances of former days are those when I taught school in the Spaulding district; where too we used to sing together, and friendship seemed to run from heart to heart. Those three winters in that school, I reckon as the pleasantest in all my years of teaching. I am pleased to see that Fred Bug- bee has been a justice in St. Johnsbury and Nath. Lee in Water- ford. I should love to hear about John Lee and Capt. Stiles and Moses Hill and George Keach and Aaron Farnham, and others of the old friends."
THE FAIRBANKS VILLAGE SCHOOL
The small schoolhouse was set a short way up Mt. Vernon street, on what was then the only road to Danville, by Pumpkin Hill. Bill Ryan's big dog used to scare the children and not infrequent- ly some of the smaller ones had to have an escort on the way to school. The wrestling contests were not all done by the boys outside the school house; Colburn's mental arithmetic was an antagonist that floored most of them inside. It was in the wood- shed near by that Charles Fairbanks found an axe one bitter cold morning in 1831. The axe was new and the coating of frost on it looked so nice he thought he would like to find out how it tasted. He gave it a smart lick with his tongue; this fully satis- fied his curiosity.
A popular place of resort for the boys was an old horse shed down by the river side. One summer evening a lad who lived where the Fairbanks Office now stands, started up after supper to go out doors. "You won't go out beyond the gate, Edward," said the father. "No sir." Presently however the call of the boys down in the shed seemed to eliminate from remembrance the paternal word, and he suddenly found himself joyously with them inspecting an old rusty straw cutter. "Stump you to put your finger in the cog-wheel," said one of them. The finger promptly went in ; it promptly came out, shorter than it went in- the crank had been given a whirl. Of that event the writer of this paragraph retains a vivid remembrance and a stumped fore- finger.
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RELATING TO RELIGION
DETERMINED IN THE NEGATIVE-TEN YEARS' AGITATION-FINAL VOTE FOR TOWN AND MEETING HOUSE-BUILDER'S CONTRACT -A GREAT RAISING-VENDUE OF PEWS-A HISTORIC STRUCTURE-FIRST CHURCH ORGANIZED-USAGES AND DOINGS -CHRISTIAN NURTURE-RELIGION OF SERIOUS TYPE-INCI- DENTS-THE UNIVERSALIST SOCIETY-CONSTITUTION-PROM- INENT MEN-NEW HOUSE AT THE CENTER-FIRST CHRISTMAS OBSERVANCE.
THE OLD MEETING HOUSE ON THE HILL
"It was among the functions of a town in those days to raise the minister's salary, to build the meeting house, to vote money for bass-viols and singing schools, and other similiar necessities." New Eng. Mag.
Fourteen years passed after the organization of the town be- fore the erection in 1804, of a building for public worship and for town meetings. The result was arrived at by a ten year process of recession and advance of the town meeting tide; the votes run- ning, no, yes, no, yes, no, no, no, yes, no by default, yes. It would gratify us to be assured that this beating off the question merely signified disapproval of the principle of taxation for reli- gion ; it is rather to be feared however that a spirit of indifference was prevalent.
At the March Meeting of 1794, "on the question being put- will the town raise money by a tax to pay for preaching of the gospel, it was determined in the negative." Three years later,
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March, 1797, it was voted to raise money for this purpose, but be- fore adjournment the vote was rescinded. The next year, March 1798, it was voted to raise $60 to pay for a minister of the Gospel and Joel Roberts, Alex Gilchrist, Jeriah Hawkins, were appointed to hire the minister. This meeting also voted to build a house for public use, 56 x 46 feet dimensions, enclosed with rough boards and shingles. The meeting adjourned till June 18, to hear the report of the committee having the matter in hand. At this adjourned session it was voted not to build a meeting house. Another meeting was called and held on the 6th of July, at which a committee of seven was appointed to consider the business and report, which they did an hour later, as follows : "Your committee beg to report that it is their Opinion the Town ought to hire a Minister to preach the Gospel, and therefor to raise $230, payable in wheat, rye, corn, pork and beef, for his yearly salary." "On motion, voted to hire a minister." Two months later, Sept. 4, "on the question being put, will the town build a Meeting House or Town House, determined in the negative. It was put to vote to see if the town would raise money to pay for further preaching, and determined in the negative. Voted to raise $15 by tax as soon as may be, to pay the Expense of Preaching already in- curred."
We would like to know who this first preacher was, and where he stood when giving his message. It may have been on the Green at the head of the Plain, or in one of the few houses then on the street. The next year, July 15, 1799, it was again put to vote to see if the town would raise money to hire a minister of the Gospel and as usual, determined in the negative. Here the matter rested nearly two years, when on May 25, 1801, it was voted to raise $100, payable in grain by the 1st of February next, to pay for preaching. The first of February came, but no record of grain or preacher. Meantime the report of the Committee of Seven of July 6, 1798, was still on the town records, viz: "that the Town ought to hire a minister, and to raise therefor $230;" but the increasing need of a building for town meetings seems to have had more weight in arriving at final action, than any recom- mendation of what ought to be.
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While reviewing the action of the town on this question, it should be added that repeated efforts were made to secure volun- tary subscriptions as well as a tax. In 1797 a committee of three was appointed for this purpose, and in 1795, J. L. Arnold, Joseph Lord, Stephen Dexter, John Ladd and Jona. Adams, were made a subscription paper committee. Of the result of their efforts no record is found.
At last, on a warrant set up by "18 substanshal Freeholders," a town meeting, held Sept. 29, 1802, took the following action which in due time was carried out.
"On motion, Voted, to Raise $850 Payable in good wheat at the market prise, for the purpose of building a House for holding Town Meet- ings. * * On motion, Voted, to erect said House on a certain Peace of Land given by Lieut. Thos. Pierce for the Publict use near his house in said Town. On motion, Voted, to choose a Committee of three to superintend building said House, and that Joel Roberts, Asquire Aldrich, & Thomas Pierce be the committee, who accepted the appointment. On motion, Voted, that this Committee have Liberty to Dispose of the floors of said House to individuals in such a manner as they in their Wisdom shall Judge best, the Availes of which to be appropriated in order to finish said house Sutible and Convenent to attend Publict Worship in, and for a Town House. On motion, Voted, that the said Committee prosead as soon as may be in the Line of their appointment. On Motion, Voted, to dissolve said meeting."
Said Committee proceeded, and on the 11th day of January 1803 closed a contract with Capt. John Stiles, which is here copied from the original :
CONTRACT FOR BUILDING THE MEETING HOUSE
"An agreement between Thomas Pierce and Joel Roberts on the one part, and John Stiles and Nahum Stiles on the other part.
Agreement as follows-That John Stiles and Nahum Stiles do jointly agree to frame a Meeting House and attend in fixing and raising said House; said House to stand near Thomas Pierce's ; 62 feet long and 44 feet wide; to be framed acc. to the plan which is now presented, except some alterations in the roof. The whole of the work to be done in a good workmanlike man- ner by the first week in July next, for the sum of One Hundred and Eighty Dollars ($180) to be paid in wheat at cash price the first day of January next. Åll the timber to build said house to be on the spot by the 20th day May next, so as not to hinder said Stiles in framing.
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Said Stiles to be boarded at Mr. Thomas Pierce's and his men that work with him, exclusive of said sum. N. B. The alteration in the roof to be acc. to Mr. Elijah Houghton's plan. Said Stiles agrees to weight till the 15th day of the foresaid January, if not collected or convenient to pay said wheat before, and is to have it at the price it goes at Jan. 1, 1804. Ten gallons of Rum to be allowed said Stiles. Exclusive of the above price."
Note. Ten gallons of rum for building a Meeting House in St. Johns- bury may be considered a modest allowance; for a similar job in Medford it required five barrels of rum, one barrel of good brown sugar, a case of lemons and two loaves white sugar. Medford, we infer, could afford to be liberal with her own peculiar product.
On Sept. 6, 1803 an additional $80 was voted from the town treasury, for the said purpose of defraying the expense of
RAISING THE MEETING HOUSE
The Great Raising came off in the summer of 1804. The timbers had been hauled on to "the said Peace of Land for Pub- lict use," the high plateau a short half mile west of the Center Village, a commanding and central location. To this high place everybody was flocking, for the event was of more general inter- est than any in the previous history of the town. All the men and boys of the town were there to put up the timbers, and women and girls to give cheer and mix the toddy. The crowning event of the day, as reported to me by an eye witness, then in his ninety-first year, was the balancing of Zibe Tute on his head at the end of the ridge pole, swallowing the contents of his flask, and descending head downwards to the ground. This was ac- cording to approved usage of that period ; probably in the mind of Mr. Z. Tute, the building was simply a Town House, not yet given over to the purposes of religion.
Presently, however, the floor of the house 62 x 44 feet, was divided into 51 square pews, and the galleries into 25. These 76 pews became private property, bought at a vendue held the pre- ceeding year Dec. 29, 1803. The original draft of this sale, in- cluding plan of pews, names and prices paid, was given to the writer 40 years ago ; it is now preserved in the Athenaeum. The first choice, pew number 35, was struck off by General Joel Roberts, first town representative at $135 ; the second at
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$132, went to Lieut. Thomas Pierce ; these were the two front pews on the main aisle under the pulpit. Capt. Wm. C. Arnold and Capt. Samuel Barker bid off the next two, directly behind these, at $128 and $130 each. The sale was a success; all but three of the 76 pews were bought, the lowest price paid being $14 for number 5 on the North Gallery. The total amount realized was $836, which nearly doubled the sum appropriated by the town on the original vote of Sept. 1802.
A HISTORIC OLD BUILDING
The first assembly that met in this building was the Free- man's meeting of Sept. 1804, tho the work of construction was not then completed. Sunday services of worship were irregular; denominations had no exclusive control; the majority of pew owners were Universalists, including most of the leading men of the town. There was no bell tower, no bell, no chimney; the idea of heating a meeting house was as yet unborn. Women however brought their foot stoves that were replenished with fresh coals from the burning logs in Lieut. Pierce's kitchen fire-place. The big door fronted the road on the west side of the building; the pulpit was ten feet high up on the east wall with winding stair- way. As time went on conditions called out the following action by the town :
"Voted, that Capt. John Barney be employed to keep the Meeting House clean, and that he sweep it at least twice during the year.
"Voted, that no person or persons shall be allowed to enter the Pulpit on town meeting Days, unless speshely Directed by the Town.
"Voted, that Five persons be appointed to Expel Dogs from the Meeting House on Sundays, and that they be authorized to take such measures as they think proper, and that the Town will indemnify them for so doing."
Gen. Joel Roberts, Capt. John Barney, Gen. R. W. Fenton, Simeon Cobb, Abel Shorey were appointed Dog Committee and accepted the delicate responsibilities of the office.
From its high and bleak location, this building, for more than 20 years the only meeting house in the township, overlooked the valley of the Passumpsic, from Lyndon Falls past the mouth of Moose River and Arnold's Mills to the meadows at the mouth of
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the Sleeper. On its doors were posted public notifications; warn- ings of town meetings, of vendues and sales; publications of marriage ; copies of new laws or other important announcements. Within its bare and spacious walls were heard debates on all mat- ters of town business and sermons by preachers of all denomina- tions. Forty-one years it remained on the original foundations, till in 1845 it was taken down and re-erected where it now stands in the Center Village ; the upper floor was occupied by the First Congregational Church, the lower floor used for town meetings till the Court House and Town Hall was erected in 1856. For some years preceeding its removal, religious services had been discontinued in it, as they were provided for in other places. Shocks of corn from surrounding fields at the harvesting stood in the old square pews, and huskers made themselves comfortable in the seats of former worshipers. The only relic of old times now remaining on the greensward of the original site is the pro- jecting end of a ledge which was known as "Whig Rock" when it served as a rostrum for political oratory. At the annual March Town Meeting, Lieut. Pierce usually managed to have a sugaring off, at which the hungry voters were served with new sugar and barley cakes at ninepence each.
TOO POOR TO LIVE WITHOUT THE GOSPEL
Seventeen years was a long time for a New England com- munity to survive without a place for public worship, and five years more without an organized church. The cold and colorless entries on the town records, with their repeated "determined in the negative," seem to indicate that religious institutions were not eagerly demanded. But between the lines we may read that some persons were continuously agitating the question; and once, viz. in the report of the Committee of Seven, July 6, 1798, a sen- timent, shared undoubtedly by many, came to utterance, in the words "that the town ought to hire a minister." Perhaps however the town was unconsciously waiting for some organized Christian body to lead off independently of town action; and this did not come till 1809.
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Then, one day, into the cold and spacious emptiness of the town building on its wind-swept site under the bleak November sky, came six men and thirteen women to be united in the cove- nant of a Christian church. Few in number and with no exhilira- ting prospect, but animated with firm, intelligent and serious pur- pose. Unquestionably true to the spirit of the occasion is the often quoted story that has come down to us, viz : that the Council finding what a feeble flock they were, questioned the wisdom of proceeding to organize. "But," said one of the six men, "this business must go on; we are too poor to live without the or- dinances of the gospel."
Many will say that this declaration deserves to be perpetuated as among the cherished traditions of our town. It reflects withal a state of things in the community which had no minister, no Sabbath, no visible sign of any sort of religion. Here is an illus- trative case. Across the street from where the South church now stands, adjoining "the little old Aunt Polly Ferguson house," lived the mother of a family. Anxious thoughts were upon her for the welfare of the children. One forenoon while at the house- hold work, her feelings swelled so strongly that she broke away from her task, saddled the family horse and rode out some dis- tance beyond Arnold's Mills to the home of Mary Bissell. The two passed that day reading the Bible, talking and praying to- gether. Some three years later when thirteen women were stand- ing together in the covenant of the church, these two were of the number, and their names stand recorded on the first page of the old church record book.
It was the few women and fewer men of this sort who felt they could not longer live without the ordinances of the church, and who covenanted, Nov. 21, 1809, to do their part in maintaining them. Their names were :
Hubbard Lawrence David Stowell
Stephen Ayer
Mary Lawrence
Rebecca Stowell
Nancy Ayer
Mary Bissell
Andrew Putnam
Sarah Ayer
John Barker
Lucy Putnam
Martha Aldrich
Ruth Barker
Rebecca Houghton
Rebecca Brown
Susanna Mansfield
Aphia Wright
Susanna Baldwin
Samuel Eaton
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On foot or on horseback, that day, they were coming up from their scattered farms, nineteen only out of some 700 population ; resolute in their determination to establish in the town an or- ganized religious body in covenant with God and with each other; but little forseeing that this was the first act in the history of four Congregational churches whose rolls united would number nigh a thousand some future day.
EARLY CHURCH USAGES AND DOINGS
For nearly sixteen years the old First Church was the only one organized in the township. No historical survey of the town would be complete without some notice of its usages and doings in the midst of those years. The leading men at the start were Hubbard Lawrence, moderator and David Stowell, clerk, both of whom were chosen deacons ; men of solid quality and honorable standing, tho not prominent in public affairs of the town. Stowell was tall and slender, a striking figure as he stood in the aisle, his iron-gray hair done up in the old fashioned queue; his farm was high up on Bible Hill, as it came to be called, and the name still survives. Lawrence was a man of business, a farmer by trade, whose hides were strictly marked G and B according to their quality, whether good or bad ; his vats were on the sandy slopes which in the next generation were transformed into the park- like grounds of Pinehurst. On these two men fell the charge of sustaining the public worship: for whether by reason of poverty, or remoteness, or other cause, it was six years before a minister could be had ; and, excepting the two years of Mr. Thurston's ministry, 1816-17, the church had no pastor for the first twenty- four years.
It does not appear however that there was any thought of surrender ; if they were a feeble folk they persisted all the same in keeping alive, walking four and five miles over rough roads to have their service of worship in the great meeting house. Both the Sabbath and week-day meetings were regularly kept up, min- ister or no minister. Davies' Sermons or Hunter's scripture bi- ography or other appropriate selections were read from the pulpit by the deacons, and, said one, who used to listen, they bore the
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best of fruit. The quarterly communion service was reverently observed; Rev. Leonard Worcester coming down from Peacham, or Mr. Goddard from Concord or the stalwart Scotchman, Father Sutherland from Bath, to officiate. Instead of dwindling down, drawing nigh unto death, the little flock made increase; by the tenth year one hundred and thirteen had been added to the orig- inal nineteen, and more than a hundred children were memorizing Scripture verses ; the Sunday school had not yet arrived.
CHILDREN OF THE CHURCH
Particular attention was given to Christian nuture. The families of the church almost without exception brought their children for- mally under its covenant watch-care. On the twelfth day, Dec. 3, nine were brought forward for consecration to God in baptism, one of whom lived to ripe age and honored service in the Congre- gational ministry. This was the beginning of a quite remarkable record. In the third year twenty-seven, and in the fifth year fifty children were, as the record says, "given up to God in baptism ;" and during the first ten years one hundred and fifty-seven in all, sixteen of whom, older ones, had been received to church mem- bership. Five of one family were brought the first year, six of one family the second year, nine of one family the third year; dur- ing the first decade thirteen other families presented, each-four, five, six, seven, eight children in family groups. The following is a sample record from the church book :
"Then-Arethusa Wing, Suky Wing, Betsey Wing, Barnabas Wing, Apollos Wing, Fanny Wing, David Wing, Lewis Wing, Luthera Wing, re- ceived the ordinance of baptism." Sixty years later, this Luthera Wing, Mrs. Abel Shorey, then in her eighty-fourth year, wrote "You will readily see why I am so much endeared to the dear old church where I was baptized. From my earliest recollection I used to meet with others weekly for recitation of Scripture and Catechism. When I review the religious training, instruc- tion and discipline, and the satisfactions I there received, my heart says, praise the Lord that the lines fell to me in pleasant and profitable places."
This touch of grateful remembrance lets us in to the prevail- ing sentiment of the time ; the warmth of parental solicitude, the fellowship of kindred minds made the cold, gloomy old meeting house a place of pleasant and hallowed associations.
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HOUSEHOLD RELIGION
In the fifth year and for several years thereafter the church "met as households, small and great, to entreat the God of Abra- ham to be their God, and to bless their children forever." In a letter from one of those same children, replying to my inquires in 1876, the writer says :
"I well remember those days and scenes, especially the household meet- ings. On Saturday afternoons we boys, your father was one of us, would be at our ball play on the street. Toward 5 o'clock our parents would be seen going toward someone's house for the evening meeting. We knew what was then to be done. The play was to stop and we were to go with them. But this was so in keeping with all other arrangements that it be- came to us a part of the course of things, easy because regular and reason- able. * * *
"I have never seen a church that came so near the New Testament standard as the early members of that one did in covenant-watch, mutual helpfulness and simple consecration to Christ. My father died when I was eight, and I remember how much they were to my widowed mother after that event, helping and comforting her. I left St. Johnsbury at twelve years of age, and the night before going, the neighbors were invited in, and in the midst of this circle of praying friends I was committed to the care of the covenant keeping God."
This widow was the wife of Dea. Hubbard Lawrence, and the boy of twelve years lived to become widely known as the Rev. Dr. Edward A. Lawrence, Professor of Theology in East Wind- sor, now Hartford Theological Seminary. Ancestral influence went yet farther down the line, to her grandson, Edward A. Law- rence, D. D., Jr., a man of distinguished usefulness, "a leader of men, magnanimous and chivalrous." The brilliant promise of his life went out suddenly in his early death in 1893, but not until he had left his mark as a preacher, an author and a citizen, whose name is lovingly perpetuated in the social settlement founded by him in the city of Baltimore-"The Lawrence Home." Some strain of spiritual quality embodied in that Baltimore institution may be traced back to the true hearts and warm fellowships that were keeping the little St. Johnsbury church alive during the early years.
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