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 44
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FIELD AND GARDEN-LIVING CREATURES-COST OF LIVING- REAL ESTATE-MIGRATORY BUILDINGS-WAYSIDE THINGS
SUNDRY PRODUCTS OF THE SOIL
"Tho' thine ocean-roll of rhythm sound forever of Imperial Rome" * * * "Thou too singest wheat and woodland, tilth and vineyard, kine and horse and herd ; All the charms of all the Muses often flowering in a single word."
Tennyson's Salute to Virgil
If required, precedent is conclusive among the major poets for suitable attention to common products of the soil and homely creatures of the farm yard.
Jonathan Arnold affirmed in 1787 that the soil of the town was good. Other men as time went on have found it so or made' it so, tho the record of productiveness does not indicate anything extraordinary. Researches in this field are far from being ex- haustive ; a few items appear of possible interest to farmers and gardeners.
535
FRAGMENTS
Beginning with 1850, Perley Stone's pumpkin of five feet girth had 60 pounds of pumpkin material, which exceeded by 16 pounds the largest pumpkin reported from the state of Massa- chusetts. Bible Hill in 1868 took the honors from Pumpkin Hill when Otis Hallett's pumpkin attained the 80 pound mark. In 1852 a 52-inch English turnip was turned up in A. B. Tyler's gar- den ; this was lateral measure; William Fuller's turnip of 1869 went down 26 inches longitudinally. Joel Hastings' corn reached an altitude of 10 feet 8 inches in 1853, and David Chapman's corn advanced to 11 feet 4 inches somewhile afterward. Jerry Norton's oats were 44 pounds to the bushel in 1859. Ten years later Philander Adams' rye was waving 6 feet 4 inches in the upper air, and Asa Livingstone's rye was 5 feet on the way to that record mark in early June, 1873. Fine timothy hay was cut 5 1-2 tons to the acre on the Fairbanks meadows along the North Danville road in 1866, and in 1877 Hiram Russell harvested corn at the rate of 280 bushels to the acre.
THE POTATO "The potatoe roote is thicke fat and tuber- ous, some are rounde, some oval or egge-fashion and with knobbie rootes fastened with a number of threddie strings; it groweth naturally in America but I make it to growe and prosper in my garden." Gerard's Herbal 1597. It continued to grow and prosper in the land of its birth. Jonathan Arnold dug a first crop of 564 1-2 bushels of potatoes from his clearing on St. Johnsbury Plain in 1787. From one hill in 1868 Loren Stone turned out 106 new potatoes. Ezra Ide had three California po- tatoes in the spring of 1864; he put them in the ground and in the fall he had three bushels of the same. C. M. Stone from one pound of early rose in 1869 harvested 77 pounds of early rose new potatoes. Judge Ross dug 91 bushels of early rose on half an acre in 1893. The sweet potato has not been wholly foreign to our soil; twelve sweet potato sprouts in 1875 yielded 19 pounds of the tubers in a Main street garden, which averaged three potatoes to the pound-"a foode as also a meate for pleasure equall in wholesomenesse unto any, rosted in embers and eaten with oile, vinigar and pepper." These potato paragraphs may be construed as a local appendix to the Treatise on Potato
536
TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
Culture published in France, January 1, 1782 by our town god- father, de Crevecœur.
FOR PIE SUPPLY This place has a modest title to inclusion within the "perpetual pie belt." Its pumpkin pie product above mentioned was quite surpassed in 1870 by the Center Village squash, which under Edward M. Ide's judicious coaxing went on expanding its girth to 7 feet 4 inches, and accumulated 200 pounds weight of squash pie filling. There was serious question whether in this case squash quality had not been sacrificed for quantity. For those who wanted rhubarb pie Lewis Pierce in 1869 grew pie-plant stalks of six inches periphery and J. Huntley 1896 did the same on stalks of 28 inches length and 26 ounces weight. Stalks of this sort promoted leaf expansion : Dr. Ferrin at the East Village got them 3 feet by 3, and I. J. Robinson on Railroad street got them 3 feet 10 by 3 feet 6 inches, a circuit of about 10 feet.
GROWN UNDER GROUND The beet had no unusual develop- ment, tho in 1864 Ezra Ide lifted a ten pound one out of his beet bed which occupied two feet circuit of the soil; Alexander Stuart's best beet fell two pounds short of this ; there must have been other beets whose attainments are not found on record. John Morse in 1855 considered 17 pounds fairly good weight for his ruta-baga, but Jacob Hovey's ruta-baga went on to 20 pounds in 1864, and the same year W. Lockwood's ruta-baga arrived at 27 pounds. That same year David Chapman one day dug 5 feet four inches into the ground to reach the end of his horse-radish, at which point it broke off, and he seems not to have pursued his researches any further down. No large crops of peanuts have been harvested here; H. Courchaine however got good ones in 1900 out of his Hastings Hill sand patch. An unusual under- ground product was brought to' light on Cliff street July the eighth 1872, by Horace Jackson on his way down for well water. His spade had gone down thro three feet of loam and six feet of clay, at which point nine feet below the surface, he arrived at the home of a family of toads. They were snugly nested in hard clay, content with their environment, willing to be let alone, but denied the privilege. Sunlight and the upper air brought about a
537
FRAGMENTS
transformation from blue clay color to true toad brown, and from age-long inertia to normal toad hop and keen interest in the sum- mer evening bugs.
SMALL FRUITS Formerly the method in vogue with the strawberry was to take a milk pail into the mowing and bring home ten quarts of berries in it. They had the inimitable native flavor of the fields but were not remarkable for size. It was not till 1859 that Sylvanus Graves brought in from his garden a straw- berry that called for four inches of the tape measure. In 1876 the Underclyffe strawberry drew out nearly six inches of the tape, and Victor Harriman in 1889 celebrated by putting a girdle of seven and a half inches around his Fourth-of-July strawberry.
Gov. Horace Fairbanks varied his duties of state in 1876 by bringing out 23 red currants on a small stem, their average meas- ure being one and a half inches or more, making a total super- ficies of three feet of currant on that stem.
BEASTS OF THE EARTH AND FLYING FOWL
Varieties few-information scanty-characteristics ordinary. The catamount entrapped up in the north part of the town in 1847 proved to be only second cousin to the catamount-lynx or bob-cat by name; 28 teeth for poultry, tufts on ears, three feet, three inches length, three inches depth of fur on tail around about. An inquisitive bear indiscreetly sauntered on to John Spencer's premises November 12, 1847, and got shot for it. A seventeen-pound porcupine bristled his quills gracefully in the grove below the south end as late as 1866. The bear that lost his way near the east town line October 7, 1854, was taken care of and sold for nine dollars. A moose took his breakfast in Sylva- nus Owens' cornfield; it was Friday, September 27, 1879, and he took occasion to move on before his measure could be taken. Observatory Knob was carefully inspected by a moose November 12, 1895. The Nova Scotia Bull Moose was piloted into the Museum in August, 1898, where he stands six feet six in height with antlers four feet spread. In his normal state he represented 1200 pounds of moose. It was a fisher cat that came down from Saddleback October, 1886, and did not find his way back home
538
TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
again. Elijah Blodgett's old tabby cat was a fisher cat in 1891 when she fished out a thirteen-inch sucker from Sleeper's river. The seventeenth woodchuck that Perley Hazen got in the summer of 1887 was a cherry colored woodchuck. The bear that scared the women driving on the East Village road October 5, 1886, was so scared a young bear himself that he got out of the way quicker than he got into it and scampered for the nearest woods. The flourishing product of Squire Nichols' government garden seeds replenished one hungry deer in June, 1899, and on the last day of June, 1900, the lawns of Underclyffe kept the attention of another busily browsing most of the day. First and last quite a number of the wild deer family have made occasional neighborly calls in the village, much to our gratification. For thirty years the grace- ful figures of the flock of red and axis deer, confiding enough to take a nibble of something from your hand, gave unfailing at- traction to the Pinehurst Deer Park.
The Crow Hill owl of 1857 carried six feet spread of wings ; the Owens' Hill eagle in 1863 exceeded this by eighteen inches. There was a blue heron heading for Canada in 1864 that spread six feet of wing over Passumpsic river; her successor of 1873 on the same trail had a wing-spread of six feet three inches, a height of four feet six inches and projected six and a half inches of beak.
CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE HEN No king has been known to mount a domestic fowl on the royal standard, but it is recorded by Gibbon, that one imperial poultry man converted his hens' eggs into crown jewels ; "When Vateces, the Nicene Emperor, presented to the Empress a crown of diamonds, he informed her with a smile that this precious ornament was from the sale of the eggs of his poultry." This introduction of the hen's egg into the History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, justifies some notice of it in a less ambitious historical work. Postmaster Barney's hen used to produce good democratic eggs under Polk's administration to weigh a quarter of a pound. On the other hand Hiram Pierce's hen yielded an independent egg to weigh a quar- ter of an ounce. In June, 1877, C. P. Carpenter's mature hen de- posited in twelve days' time twelve eggs the size and caliber of robins' eggs. Between Dorking and Wyandotte up at the Four
539
FRAGMENTS
Corners there was a one-inch variation one way of the egg and none the other way ; Wm. C. Arnold's Dorking being nine inches, Guy C. Wright's Wyandotte ten inches the long way. A biddy be- longing to Mrs. White started in on a day in February with one egg followed by ninety more the next ninety-three days ; then a week's vacation and on to business again. A fully developed frog of dimensions suited to his environment was liberated from an egg at the Cross Bakery one October day in 1893, and in August, 1878, Ezra Hawkins' hen presumably a Bang-kok, achieved a brace of Siamese-twin eggs, one for yolk and one for white, with provision for distributing the same thro a pipe-stem canal of one inch length uniting the two.
SHEEP There was a time when sheep had distinction in the town ; they alone shared with the human family the honor of mention in the New England Gazetteer of 1837, "about 2000 people and 4546 sheep" constituting the population as there re- corded. It will be noticed that the numeration of sheep was exact, that of men, women and children stood in an indeterminate or round figure. Sheep had a way in former days of more than doubling their number. Moses Huntley in the spring of 1862 had 34 "middling likely ewes," each likely ewe of the bunch had twin lambs, a flock of 68 likely young sheep. Sheep had value as well as number; Leonard Shorey wintered 17 sheep in 1854 and realized $5.70 on each ; in 1863, A. H. Wilcox sheared 19 pounds of wool from his Spanish Merino buck, and was not dis- posed to take the $500 offered for him. For nearly half a century Bela S. Hastings dealt in sheep, handling as many as 30,000 in a single year ; he took them down the road on foot and estimated that if all he had marketed were in line it would make a continu- ous string of sheep populating the road from here to Boston.
LIVE STOCK. A COW OR TWO "The cow has been the merited theme of eulogium in all ages." From a nine-year old farrow cow Chauncey Spaulding in 1849, besides all supplies for family use, marketed 413 pounds of good butter ; this was one of the common old-fashioned red cows. During the year ending May- 1881, the Jersey Queen bred by E. and T. Fairbanks and Co. yielded 700 pounds of butter ; she was then sold to A. B. Darling
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TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
of the Fifth Avenue Hotel, New York, and in May, 1882, her record for the year was 12,854 pounds of milk and 851 pounds of butter. New York regarded the Vermont cow with favor.
OXEN The Carlos Pierce ox was a native of Stanstead but he came to distinction in this place at the Caledonia Fair of 1864, ticketed as follows: "General Grant, six years old, largest ox in the United States will be presented to Father Abram on the eighth of November next on his re-election to the Presidency, unless Richmond falls before that date, in which case he will report to the successful General and await further orders." In 1873, Asa Livingston had at the Fair what was then considered a heavy ox for a four-year-old at 2508 pounds. For the benefit of future generations who would like to know what was the prevailing style of farmer-ox-talk of that period, a few of the sixty-eight expres- sions overheard by this writer and penciled on the spot, are here given :
"My, what an ox-say, ain't he big-marster big ox-that's what I call an ox-swanny he's a big one-ain't no question 'bout that-well, I never did see such an ox-he's awful fat, ain't he-there ye see what meal 'll do- I sh'd like a meal out o' him-fat laid right on even-too fat, wouldn't give much for him-can't feel any ribs on this ox-he's so fat he's homely-can't kick very spiteful-ain't much excited is he-I tell ye he's an ox-some big roasts in him-say Major, stand here an' look at that ox-hip bones don't stick out much on him-consid'ble heft on him-weighs 2508 and hain't drink'd today-sh'd think 'twould make his legs ache to stand-big ox ain't he-just about the pret'st ox yet."
This ox could hardly have elicited such complimentary re- marks a few years later. L. D. Hazen brought on a yoke of oxen in 1886 believed to be the largest in New England, 6187 pounds weight, 9 feet 4 inches girth. Bela Hastings bought them for $500 and some while after was offered $100 a week for the privi- lege of exhibiting them ; they were finally sold for exhibition pur- poses in New York and ultimately brought their owner $2000. Moore and Hastings' Durham oxen, ten years old in 1889, weighed 8030 pounds, reputed the largest in the world and George C. Cary's largest-in-the-world yearling steer stood at 3300 pounds in 1906. Twenty-six oxen and steers from the Fair- banks herd registered 39,700 pounds on the Fairbanks scale in
.
541
FRAGMENTS
1888 and were thereupon shipped to England. In the Hazen string of oxen at the fair of 1886, there were 24 yoke carrying along 99,489 pounds of ox; an expert ox-man remarked that "Vermonters never saw so much good beef tied together in one lot before and it is doubtful if anyone ever did."
PRICES CURRENT
1821
3 lbs. shugar
64 cts.
103 1bs. cheese
64 cts.
42 lbs. butter
57 cts.
1 1b. talow
17 cts.
142 lbs. beef
58 cts.
11 lbs mackeril 77 cts.
12 1bs. flower
30 cts.
5 lbs. pourke
35 cts.
15 lbs. lamb
61 cts.
1 pig
1.00
1 bushel potatos
25 cts.
1 lode wood
25 cts.
1837
Butter, 1b.
12 cts.
Potatoes, bu.
15 cts.
Hay, ton
5.50
Eggs, doz.
10 cts.
Oats, bu.
25 cts.
Wood, cord
1.20
1842
Beef
4 cts.
Potatoes
12} cts.
Molasses
10 cts. qt.
Butter
122 cts.
Oats
20 cts.
Rum
8 cts. pt.
Alcohol
10c pt.
Onions
90 cts.
Honey
12 cts.
Opodeldoc
20c bottle
Hens
16 cts. each
Tobacco
2 cts. a pl'g
1856
Butter, 1b.
21 cts.
Potatoes, bu.
25 cts.
Hay, ton
10.50
Cheese, 1b.
11 cts.
Flour, bbl.
10.50
Wood, cord
2.50
Beef Steak
11 cts.
Eggs, doz.
18 cts.
Brick, per M.
5.00
1884
Eggs, doz.
35 cts.
Potatoes, bu.
45 cts.
Honey
22 cts.
Cheese, 1b.
17 cts.
Flour, bbl.
8.00
Onions, 1b.
3 cts.
Butter, 1b.
30 cts.
Apples, bbl.
1.50
Cranberries, qt. 20 cts.
Oatmeal
6 cts.
Oysters, qt.
40 cts.
Lemons, doz.
30 cts.
REAL ESTATE VALUES
The items that follow have appeared in print and are here recorded to illustrate the changes in values.
1787 The present price of good land for farms in St. Johns- bury, uncleared, is one dollar per acre ; $20 on 100 acres in hard money down, $50 in neat cattle in six months, $30 in neat stock or grain in 18 months.
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TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
1814 Joseph Fairbanks paid Pres West $300 for five acres on the east side of Sleeper's river with mill privilege, where the scale works now are.
1818 Ephraim Paddock bought his homestead lot of four acres, on which the first brick building in the town was placed, of John Taylor for $300. Of this land Samuel Jewett bought in 1874 the adjoining lot south for $2500, on which he built the house now owned by Hon. Henry C. Ide.
1828 Polly Furguson paid John Barney $25 for the 30 rods of her house lot opposite the burial ground ; her quaint bit of a cottage sat where she put it for 75 years, long enough to become an interesting old relic, on the site of which Lambert Packard built the house owned by N. R. Young, now appraised at $6000.
1840 The Harris farm now included in Summerville was listed at $1700. In 1873 its valuation was $55,000.
1850 Geo. C. Barney bought the house north of the present Union Block for $1000, put up the narrow building south of it, used for Post Office 1853-1861, and in 1867 sold the property to B. D. Burnham for $6000.
1854 Col. Merrill built the octagon and on removing to Rut- land sold to Samuel Moore for $7500. Some years later Moore sold $3000 of the land and the remainder of the place to Dr. Bul- lard for $9000. There was a contract at one time pending with Dr. Perkins for the sale of this property including four acres of the Sleeper's river meadow, for $16,500, but Dr. Bullard decided to retain the place, which is still held in the family.
1860 Dickinson and Butler bought the George Downing place at east end of Prospect street for $1750. The same was bought by Dr. Perkins in 1868 for $3800, and sold in 1892 for $6000 for St. Johnsbury Hospital site.
1870 Moses Kittredge held his house on Prospect street at $7500, and sold it the next year at that price to Father Boisson- nault for the Notre Dame rectory.
1884 The highest price paid for real estate in the history of the town was $250 for a space of one inch depth. James S. San-
543
FRAGMENTS
born took a deed for the lot adjoining the Walker block on the Plain on which to erect the Masonic block. It was found that the granite coping of the Walker block was laid to the line and the brick wall withdrawn one inch. To leave this space open to the weather would result in serious damage. Walker's price for it was $300, generously reduced after a while to $250, which sum Sanborn paid, and the two blocks stand so snugly together that no disturbing element can get in between them.
BUILDINGS THAT HAVE TRAVELED
The old Town and Meeting. House of 1804 did not make its transit in recognizable form. It was taken down, packed on to wagons, carried across Passumpsic river and re-erected at the head of the Center Village burial yard, in 1845; now occupied by the First Congregational Church.
Isaac Wing's house, built about 1880, was high up on Wing Hill, a mile or so east of the Center Village. Some thirty years later it was braced with iron rods, lifted on to wooden shoes and brought down Wing Hill by forty yoke of oxen; twenty yoke pulled and twenty yoke held back on the descent. It was owned by Reuben Hallett, and is now the home of his son Erastus.
The Meeting House built on the Plain in 1827, was mounted on rollers in 1847 and trundled down the street to a vacant lot beside the old burial ground, where it now stands, adjoining the Court House.
The most restless traveler of early times was the district school- house on the Plain. First it was on Main street, north of the Meeting House ; then down some distance near the burial ground ; then up to the foot of Mount Pleasant; then down below the Meeting House ; then up over against Arnold Park; then down again near the point it started from, where it was attached to a dwelling house, thus ending its migrations.
Pres West built a house in 1813 for Groom the hatter directly opposite the burial ground. Some 30 years later it was owned and occupied by Emerson Hall till 1876 when it was moved up to the head of the Plain and set into what thereafter became a lane for traveling houses, Green street.
544
TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
The large white house built by Joseph Fairbanks in 1817, where Western Avenue turns down to the Scale Works, was re- moved by his grandson Franklin in 1860 across the Sleeper's river and built into the new boarding house, where its original front appears very much out of place, wholly shorn of all its former dignity.
The first parsonage of the South Church, directly opposite the meeting house, was in 1867 rolled up thro Main, Central and Spring streets to where it now sits in pillared dignity at the head of Autumn street.
Dr. Calvin Jewett's little pink pill shop was picked up from its place near the South church in 1854 and set down amongst a nest of small buildings on the north side of Maple street.
Judge Paddock's old yellow law-office which for 40 years was a landmark on the edge of the sidewalk, retreated to the rear, exchanged its old sheep-covered law books for fresh dairy products and when its day was done retired quietly from the scene.
The white store of Emerson Hall, over which was Gage's Daguerrotype Gallery, was removed to make way for the Athe- næum in 1868. It now stands next to St. Andrew's church, out- wardly unchanged except in color.
The little Dr. Stevens house used successively as a grocery, post office and express office before the brick block was built, had an easy trip across the street to the west end of Union Block, where it has continued to accommodate shoemakers and hair dressers.
The old Caledonian Block built by Benj. Gilson, 1850, was rolled down Eastern Avenue in 1869 and up Prospect street in 1892 and is now the office building of the Electric Company.
J. P. Fairbanks' house was built in 1841, on the site of Dr. Lord's old red house at the south end, and for forty-two years its vine-covered pillars were a landmark in sight as far up as the Bend. In 1883 it was seen receding over the hill into the narrow pass of Pine street, bereft of its familiar features of pillars and trailing woodbine.
545
FRAGMENTS
The Academy of 1843 had an upward trip in 1871 into the bosom of the new brick Academy where it still keeps securely the original pine and birch benches of seventy years ago.
The Judge Poland residence on Prospect street-transformed in 1896 into the Home for Aged Women-was taken down after 21 years' occupancy and transported to the Center Village ; this made way for a modern, commodious and comfortable haven of rest-the new Sunset Home.
WAYSIDE OBJECTS
BAND STANDS For some years the only band stand was on the Green, now Arnold Park, which had been from time immemo- rial the one-sided center of open air functions. Occasional band concerts would be given on the hotel veranda or other convenient place. A permanent stand was erected by subscription, W. J. Bray builder, front of the railroad station in 1889; and some years later the one that is near the Court House. The Don't Worry Club provided the Summerville band stand at an expense of $174.15 ; other similar stands have been erected at East and Center Villages, the latter by initiative of James R. Stevens.
WATER TROUGHS The first stone water trough was planted front of the Court House in 1874 ; this was afterward removed to the head of Summer street and a new one was set in its place. Barre granite water troughs costing $328 were erected by the Woman's Club in 1896, also the iron drinking fountains at the head and at the foot of Eastern Avenue, and in 1905 the stone water trough in Summerville. The East Village granite trough was set in 1903 as a memorial to Calvin Morrill by his daughter, Miss Charlotte Morrill; about the same time a similar one was erected and donated to the Center Village by Myron D. Park.
WAYSIDE CLOCKS The Village clock in the bell tower of the South church was purchased by individuals and installed in 1853. Its original cost is not known but its meritorious action is dis- tinctly announced every hour of the twenty-four; after sixty years' continuous attention to duty it still tolls the hours with promptness and precision. The street clock erected by H. W.
546
TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
Randall in 1910 at the head of Eastern Avenue was at that time the only one of the sort in the state. It stood in the price list of Howard clocks at $700; and it was none the worse for having been many years looked at by the crowds that frequent the grand central station of New York. It gives out the hours of day and night, nineteen feet above the pavement, from forty-inch dials en- closed in glass and illuminated after dark by revolving electric lights. The Lurchin suspension clock, near the foot of Eastern Avenue, gets more attention maybe than others, being hard by a most populous business corner and very handy for everybody on the way to take a train. When the Citizens block was a-building in 1893, there was a project to put up a high tower clock with night dials and a fire alarm attachment. The estimated cost was $1200, of which amount the bank would assume $500 but the requisite balance was not secured. Two years later the Gamewell fire alarm was installed in the tower of the Court House.
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