Western Union office, corner of North and Main Streets Calais
The Calais Western Union Telegraph office is shown above on the lower right corner of Main and North Streets in the 1920’s. When this photo was taken the telegraph was becoming an outdated technology but in the early days of the telegraph Western Union put Calais and the St. Croix Valley on the map, so to speak. In 1849 the telegraph line was completed connecting Calais to the major cities on the east coast and Calais became a critical connection for all the traffic from New Brunswick. which meant all the news from Europe passed through Calais. The Western Union office at the corner of North Street was a very busy place and had a large staff.
In those early years most Americans still had more family in Europe than they had in America so the latest news from Europe was, in today’s jargon, easily “monetized”. All sorts of schemes were devised to get the European news first. Ships passing the northeast coast of Nova Scotia threw canisters containing European newspapers overboard to be picked up by boats in the employ of the wire services. A Pony Express was instituted and even carrier pigeons were used but more on that later. Calais residents were often the first in the country to know of momentous international events. Unlike today when the St. Croix Valley is rarely in the national news, St Croix Valley news often went over the wire in 1910 and found their way into hundreds of local and national papers. Many described odd, bizarre or humorous goings on by Downeasters. I decided to select a year, 1910 came to mind purely by chance, and see what the rest of the country was reading in their local newspapers about Downeasters.
Eastport had three visitors in 1910 which warranted attention nationally. The most interesting was the visit of a moose who was, it appears, a prodigious swimmer. Americans were fascinated by this large and ungainly animal although few had ever seen one. This may explain why headlines such as “Sportsmen Fish For Moose” (Cedar Rapids Gazette) and “Fishermen Land Big Cow Moose” (Muncie Indiana Gazette) and “Maine Fisherermen Land A Moose (Los Angeles Evening Record) found their way into the nation’s newspapers.
The story itself, as published in the Bangor Daily, described the visit:
POSING FOR HER PICTURE
Eastport, July 15, 1910
The original home of Eastport was Moose Island, and it is stated that less than a century ago plenty of moose, deer and similar large animals were found on the four miles, but it has been many years since any of the denizens of the eastern Maine woods have made a call to the island city. Wednesday the residents of the northern part of the city observed a strange looking animal swimming down the Saint Croix river towards Eastport and soon the animal came into Passamaquoddy Bay and close to the wharves. Several Quoddy boatmen who were near noticed that the animal, a cow moose, was almost exhausted and seemed to be nearly drowned, so they towed her ashore and soon the crowds collected.
A blanket was provided and it was not long before the moose was enjoying a rest on the grass, eating choice food out of the hands of those who came near, and seemed to be enjoying the hospitalities of Moose Island, the most easterly city in the United States. By strange coincidence the moose came ashore and was photographed near Todd’s Head, which is known as the extreme tip end of the state and remained near until about 10:00 PM, when she started off at a rapid gate for the Bay and after entering struck out up the Saint Croix river in the direction it had come earlier in the day, and was soon lost to view. It is supposed that the moose came over the boundary from Saint Andrews, New Brunswick, 12 miles from Deer Island, N.B. closer to Eastport, while it may be that the animal was in the water for many hours and came from further away.
At any rate there are none here who cared to molest her, and even the local dogs kept away, while the stray moose was enjoying a well needed rest with plenty of food and water and then back to its wild life again.
The visiting moose was strong, healthy and graceful and gave several thousands of the residents their first glimpse of this large sized animal, while nearly every camera about Eastport was pointed at the stranger and there were many novel poses owned here now.
This moose spent a day visiting Calais.
Moose visits were not that uncommon. The above photo was taken in Calais. In the winter of 1858 Mr. S. W. Smith drove a pair of moose broken to harness through the streets of Calais. They afterwards were sold in Philadelphia.
PRESIDENT TAFT VISITS EASTPORT
Grand Forks ND Herald
Taft’s visit to Eastport was brief
The second visit was neither as exciting nor as long as the visit of the moose. Taft, visiting all four corners of his empire, made a very short and uneventful stop in the northeast in the presidential yacht before casting off to spend some quality time in Bar Harbor. It is quite possible the locals recall the moose with more fondness than the President.
The third visitor was Senator Frye of Missouri who, according to the Craig Missouri Leader, was taken to a nearby lake for a picnic and some fishing. When a local exclaimed “But, man alive! There are no fish in that lake” the retort was “Well, Frye doesn’t know it.” Returning hours later, much bitten by mosquitoes he was asked “Get any bites, Frye?” he responded indignantly “Get any bites! Look at my face!”
CARRIER PIGEONS
Rolfe Store Princeton
In April 1910 Charles Rolfe published this notice in the Bangor Daily News and it was surely transmitted throughout New England and the Maritimes. While carrier pigeons are not much in the news these days, they were very valuable in 1910. Carrier pigeon racing was a very serious sport in 1910. Hundreds of such races occurred annually and according to the Kennebec Journal “First-class carrier pigeons are very expensive with some “stud birds” costing as much as 60 pounds. The paper also said ” They can obtain the remarkable speed of nearly 1,500 yards a minute.” Stud birds were even more valuable overseas where the rich and famous paid enormous amounts for the fastest birds.
We don’t know if this bird was returned to its owner, but we do know carrier pigeons played a role in local history. In the fierce competition to get the European news from the European ship landing at Halifax to the news markets in Boston and New York Craig and his competitors chartered fast steamers raced one another to Boston. Daniel Craig bought the fastest carrier pigeons in the country and before the racing ships arrived in harbor, he had released his birds and his organization, the Associated Press, was hours ahead of its rivals. When the telegraph line reached Calais in 1849 but was as yet not connected to Halifax, Craig organized a Pony Express from Halifax, across Prince Edward Island to Digby, thence across the straits by express ferry to St. John and on to Calais where the telegraph transmitted the news to the newspapers in the major cities on the east coast. This enabled Craig to charge extravagant fees for his news service.
PEMBROKE STORIES
Fall River Evening News
A Post Office in Pembroke but perhaps not the one in the article
Pembroke made the national news in 1910 when villains dynamited the safes in the Pembroke Post Office and destroyed the building in the process. Their take was certainly meagre and as far as we know they were never caught. How they managed to get “away without attracting attention” is certainly a mystery for although the Post Office in 1910 may not have been the building pictured above, it would certainly have been located near the center of town.
The other news from Pembroke in 1910 which the nation found interesting was the town’s generosity to widows. From the Buffalo Evening news October 13, 1910:
Widows In Favor
In one place in the United States at least widows are in favor. There is talk of a tax on bachelors.
One hundred of the largest and most tender herring is the annuity offered to all widows residing in the town of Pembroke Me.
It is a time-honored custom beyond the oldest inhabitant’s memory. At the end of the year’s run about 50 women claim the share allotted to widows.
The weirs are town property and the law providing those 10,000 herring to be taken from each season’s catch and returned to the lake is rigidly observed. But whoever of the 1850 residents may find himself deprived of his share, the widows are certain of obtaining theirs.
John LeFarge is in charge of the fishing, and he sees to it that every householder gets all the herring he is entitled to, always with an eye to see that no widow is overlooked on the extra 100.
“It is not charity” he says “The way we look at it is that large tender herring are about the best the town can offer without charge and in the old days it must have been quite a help to a woman whose husband died to have such a quantity of ever-ready food on hand. The custom is honored, and no one cares to break it, and to tell the truth the herring are mighty tender.
“With the present supply of herring we see no reason why we should worry about widows becoming numerous.”
COUNTING PEAS IN MEDDYBEMPS
Folks from away must have thought Downeasters had a lot of spare time
Meddybemps about 1910
The Chico Enterprise in California and other national newspapers found this bit of news interesting and may well have given the impression folks Downeast have a lot of time on their hands.
March 14th, 1910
To win a wager of $2.50 Henry Parish, of Meddybemps, spent nearly a month counting peas. His eyes are in such a condition that whether open or shut he sees peas and quart cans. When he sleeps, he dreams of peas and quart cans, and he’s well-nigh crazy.
About Thanksgiving time Parish and a neighbor named Wainwright became engaged in an argument.
“Bet you $2.50 I can count 1,000,000 peas between now and the middle of January”, said Parish. “I’ll take the bet”, said Wainwright. “You count them and put them in glass fruit jars.”
Parish began, and before the week was out, he had peas on the brain. He took all his wife’s empty fruit jars and all the peas he could borrow, and by Saturday night he had counted 100,000. This gave him hope, and he began to boast to Wainwright.
“I’ll tell you what. I’ll do” says the latter. “If you count those peas without making a mistake, I’ll eat them all in two weeks. If you overcount or undercount you eat them.”
Parrish took the bet and counted the first batch over again, to be sure he had made no error. Finding that he was three peas out of the way he got nervous.
A couple of days ago Parish finished in a rush and took all the cans over to Wainwright’s house. “There are the peas”. “Now you eat them” he commanded; “Also fork over the $2.50.”
“But how do I know that you’ve counted correctly?” protested Wainwright. “You don’t, so, count ’em yourself” chuckled Parish.
“Well, I guess I’ll take it for granted if you let me off on eating them”, said Wainwright after thinking it over. “I’ll pay you the $2.50 and call it square.”
“Oh, no you don’t” gurgled Parish; “a bet’s a bet and you’ve got to count them. “Then bet you have to eat them.” Wainwright is now counting peas to see whether he does or does not have to eat them.
BARING WOMAN FINDS SARSAPARILLA A MIRACLE CURE
Today Inez would be known as an “influencer”
Undoubtedly the most well-known Downeast personality in 1910 was Inez Lewis of Baring. For years Inez was the primary shill for Hood’s Sarsaparilla which she claimed cured her child’s eczema. Hundreds of national papers carried ads such as the above for many years. We presume she was compensated in some way for her endorsement but we can’t say for certain. Perhaps it actually cured her son’s eczema.
Oklahoma Capital News
She became a national personality in 1909 with the ad above and continued to tout Hood’s sarsaparilla for many years. Downeasters may well have had a national reputation for being trustworthy sorts because several other patent medicine companies used them in ads. Tom Cleland of Robbinston was quoted for years in ads for Johnson’s Anodyne Liniment claiming it cured “colds, coughs, sore throat, stings, cramps, sore stomach, rheumatism, lameness, colic, toothache and neuralgia.”
1910 saw many papers reprising an oft repeated article pointing out that the sun never sets on American soil. Eastport figures prominently in the article.
From the Modesto California Bee: September 1910
The farthest Aleutian Isle acquired in the purchase of Russian America is as far to the West of San Francisco as Eastport Maine is to the east of it. With their slight deduction our territory extends 16° more than halfway around the globe, and when the sun is giving his good night to our westernmost isle, on the confines of the Bering sea, it is already flooding the fields and forests of Maine with its morning light and in the extreme eastern part of the state is already an hour high. When the Aleutian Islander is pulling his canoe ashore for the night the wood chopper of the Pine Tree State is waking the forest with the music of his axe.
St. Stephen Bank Goes Under
Boston Evening Transcript
The most important local story of 1910 and one reported in nearly all the U.S. and Canadian newspapers was the failure of the St. Stephen Bank. The business communities on both sides of the border were deeply intertwined and suffered a good deal of anxiety although, in the end, the losses were not as serious as first feared.
ANDREW WHEATON, JACK QUIGLEY OR SOMEONE ELSE ENTIRELY?
Finally, there is the mysterious affair of Andrew Wheaton, Jack Quigley or Wheaton- Quigley using several other aliases. In 1910, then once again Andrew Wheaton, Wheaton was found in Federal Court in Duluth, Minnesota charged with pension fraud for attempting to collect Andrew Wheaton’s Civil War pension some 45 years after the war ended.
Of Andrew Wheaton, we know a good deal. He was born in 1843 in Lincoln, New Brunswick and moved with his family to Calais as a child. His parents were William and Harriett Wheaton, and he was the 6th of 8 children. In August of 1862, then living in Crawford, he enlisted in the Union Army where he served with distinction, was for a brief period a POW and mustered out in August 1865 at the war’s end. After returning to Crawford briefly he disappeared, and his family lost contact with him for over 40 years.
Wheaton, then using the name Jack Quigley, reappeared in Michigan decades later and remained very reluctant to discuss those 40 years. He claimed to have moved to Pennsylvania, married in 1874, abandoned his wife after a couple of years and relocated to the Black Hills of North Dakota. He then moved to Minnesota and lived under a couple of aliases “in order to hide his whereabouts.” He never provided an explanation of why this was necessary but given his determination to keep his identity secret some person or authority somewhere must have been very interested in locating him.
By a somewhat improbable coincidence he was hired in Minnesota at a sawmill owned by his nephew who had relocated to Minnesota from Crawford. The nephew noticed his resemblance to his family and asked him if he were not Andrew Wheaton, the lost son of the family. He denied it and during a visit from the nephew’s mother, Andrew’s putative sister, he again denied he was Andrew Wheaton. However, before she left to return to Maine, he reluctantly admitted he was Andrew Wheaton and had been lying because he feared being found. He remained unwilling to explain the reason for this fear.
The family was reunited and would perhaps have lived happily ever after had not Andrew Wheaton decided it was time to claim his pension from the Civil War, some 40 years after he was entitled to it. The government was suspicious and became more so when it was discovered that a woman from Cheboyan, Michigan was then receiving a widow’s pension based on Andrew Wheaton’s service.
At trial the government, having failed to prepare or produce any witnesses, asked for a continuance, which was denied by the Judge. Wheaton on the other hand had family from Maine and even a childhood friend prepared to testify that he had convinced them he was indeed Andrew Wheaton. Wheaton received his pension although at 67 had very little time left to enjoy it.
Final reflections on 1910:
Haley’s Comet arrived and left and did not, as was widely predicted “Snuff out life on earth” but Typhoid Mary snuffed out more than a few lives in New York City.