carriage and walking trails

The Vaughan Woods, sometimes locally called Hobbitland, is a 160 acre preserve in Hallowell

Vaughan Woods is a popular trail system in the heart of historic Hallowell.

Designed for recreation and nature appreciation by the Vaughans in the early 1900s, classic stone bridges, picturesque waterfalls, and a wild meadow make these some of the most unique walking trails in Maine. Hundreds of visitors come to Vaughan Woods each day, a testament to its popularity. Nicknamed “Hobbitland” by local residents, it is a place of stunning beauty and natural wonder.

Owned and managed by the non-profit organization Vaughan Woods & Historic Homestead, Vaughan Woods is protected by a conservation easement through The Kennebec Land Trust and contains approximately 3 miles of trails that vary in width and degree of difficulty for walking.

quoted from the Vaughan Homestead website.

I have spent countless hours walking and painting in these woods.

artist, Chris Cart

winter walk

This is a painting I did years ago from the little brook next to the stone bridge near the big dam.

artist, Chris Cart

Sunday Walk depicts the Cart’s beloved Labrador Retriever  running in the snow in the Maine woods.  The original watercolor painting was included in art writer Carl Little’s book, “The Art of Maine in Winter” along with paintings by dozens of other Maine artists including Jamie Wyeth, Rockwell Kent and Winslow Homer.

keeping the chisels sharp

Blacksmiths were crucial to Hallowell society and industry. The blacksmith’s skills were needed, as with any other community, for shoeing horses, creating nails, repairing wagon wheels, etc., However, the blacksmith was crucial for the granite industry to keep the granite cutting and carving tools sharp and in form. One source states one blacksmith was required for every three stone cutters to ensure the tools were ready for the days work in the quarries or stone yard.

Note how thin the neck of the handle is on the hand hammer. Tony Masciadri told me this is so the impact of the hammer hitting the chisel and the hard granite does not telegraph up the handle–to relieve stress on the cutters hand after a day of chiseling granite.

artist, Chris Cart

tools

The granite tools here include a Point, Chisel, Hand Plug Drill and a Hand Hammer.

Michael Frett #61 of Hallowell posed as the blacksmith in the mural.

a creative place

Over the centuries Hallowell has been known for its makers—its artists, musicians, potters, chairmakers, shipcarvers…

Malley Weber #60, is one of our contemporary makers in town. She has run a pottery shop and classes for many years.

…loved watching Malley make a simple pitcher. seeing such confident hands is a joy.

artist, Chris Cart

Johnny Stringer

One locally well known maker was John “Johnny” Stringer. He died in 1848 but many Hallowell residents today take pride in owning one of his well crafted chairs. One can be seen at the Hubbard Free Library as well.

historical detective work

Hallowell historian Ron Kley recounts a story of teh connection of Hallowell to our ship USS Contitution, “Old Ironsides”# 57 & 111:

We found a 1796 letter among the Charles Vaughan papers at Bowdoin (Charles was Benjamin Vaughan’s #6 younger brother ) that had been written to Charles, in Boston, from John Sheppard in Hallowell. (Sheppard was a British expatriate who managed a brewery, a warehouse, a wharf and probably a distillery for Charles, all in Hallowell.

This letter reported among other things that “the mast for the frigate” was ready for shipment.

There were six frigates then under construction for the navy at various shipyards, and we had no clue as to which one “the mast” might be intended for.

Several years later I attended a museum conference that was also attended by Anne Grimes Rand, the director of the USS Constitution Museum, whom I knew from work that I had done for that museum years earlier. I asked her if she had any knowledge of where the masts for the Constitution had come from. She didn’t, but said that she would pass the inquiry along to the museum’s historian.,

I had a call from the historian just a day or two later, telling me that the museum had records of the navy having purchased both the mainmast and the bowsprit of the Constitution from somebody named Charles Vaughan.

We have no proof as to just where the trees were cut, but the odds are that if they were awaiting shipment from Hallowell, they would not have been hauled very far to Vaughan’s wharf on what’s still known as Sheppard’s or Shepard’s Point, just south of the confluence of Vaughan Brook and the Kennebec, There’s a good likelihood, if not a probability, that the trees were cut in Hallowell, and perhaps even on the Vaughans’ land, including the present Vaughan Woods, from which it would have been downhill all the way to the Vaughan wharf.

I showed the thick base of a huge eastern white pine and had the top of the tree showing at the top of the mural.

artist, Chris Cart

eastern white pine

I’ve been a sailing ship buff since I was a kid building scratch models of sailing ships. This was good enough for me. How could I not include “Old Ironsides” in our Hallowell mural.

artist, Chris Cart

The eastern white pine was a very valuable tree in the early days of the new nation. The eastern white pine is a very tough and tall tree that was early prized for its use a tall straight masts for ships.

It is said that early precolonial forests contained eastern white pines that grew to more than 70 meters or 230 feet in height.

Mast pines

During the 17th and 18th centuries, tall white pines in the Thirteen Colonies became known as “mast pines”. Marked by agents of the Crown with the broad arrow, a mast pine was reserved for the British Royal Navy. Special barge-like vessels were built to ship tall white pines to England.

By 1719, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, had become the hub of pine logging and shipping. Portsmouth shipped 199 masts to England that year. In all, about 4500 masts were sent to England.

The eastern white pine played a significant role in the events leading to the American Revolution. Marking of large white pines by the Crown had become controversial in the colonies by the first third of the 18th century. In 1734, the King’s men were assaulted and beaten in Exeter, New Hampshire, in what was to be called the Mast Tree Riot. Colonel David Dunbar had been in the town investigating a stock pile of white pine in a pond and the ownership of the local timber mill before caning two townspeople. In 1772, the sheriff of Hillsborough County, New Hampshire, was sent to the town of Weare to arrest mill owners for the illegal possession of large white pines. That night, as the sheriff slept at the Pine Tree Tavern, he was attacked and nearly killed by an angry mob of colonists. This act of rebellion, later to become known as the Pine Tree Riot, may have fueled the Boston Tea Party in 1773.

After the Revolutionary War, the fledgling United States used large white pines to build out its own navy. The masts of the USS Constitution were originally made of eastern white pine. The original masts were single trees, but were later replaced by laminated spars to better withstand cannonballs.

In colonial times, an unusually large, lone, white pine was found in coastal South Carolina along the Black River, far east of its southernmost normal range.[citation needed] The king’s mark was carved into it, giving rise to the town of Kingstree.

excerpt from Wikipedia about Pinus Strobus, the eastern white Pine.

our own BIG DIG

Over the summer of 2018 and into the spring of 2019 Hallowell’s Water Street was completely dug up as Maine’s Department of Transportation rebuilt the road of Route 201 through town #54.

This was a major disruption to the downtown area businesses and residents. The construction removed the steep crown of the road that at times made driving and parking difficult.

During the construction traffic was at times down to one lane and part of the traffic was rerouted south on second Street.

In the end Hallowell came out with a much nicer downtown road and beautiful new brick sidewalks.

This being Hallowell the town made the best of a rough situation. They closed Water Street the day before construction was to begin for a street party where many people gathered to paint the streets, literally, before the rad was to be broken up. Artists in town created small murals to decorate the construction fencing.

This is a small reference, comparatively in the mural to an event that dominated Hallowell for almost 2 years.

artist, Chris Cart

Road Construction workers

Artist Jen Greta Cart did the Old Hallowell Day poster in 2018, the year of the construction upheaval on Water Street. She shows Hallowell’s undaunted spirit, dancing in spite of the downtown chaos.

Down with the Crown logo

A logo designed by Sam Webber and Chris Cart for use on information about the major road construction project.

keeping things cold

For over 100 years, from the 1820’s onward, an important Hallowell industry was cutting ice blocks from the area lakes and river. The blocks were stored in huge warehouses, packed in sawdust and then shipped by schooners down the coast and as far as the Caribbean and Cuba.

At the peak over 9000 people and 300 horses were employed in the cutting and storing ice. One account tells of 1000 schooners being on the river shipping ice to southern climes over just one ice cutting season.

Arthur Moore, Jr., #38 a Hallowell resident who died in 2018 at 94, remembered cutting ice in the 1930’s for storage in the huge Moore ice house on Summer Street. His great-grandfather had started the Moore ice business in 1867.

a life on the river

Arthur Moore Jr. #38, a lifelong Hallowell resident who died in 2018 at age 94 was a direct descendant of the midwife, healer Martha Moore Ballard, #10 as well as, Deacon Pease Clark, #109 the first European settler of Hallowell, in 1762.

Moore began working at the family ice cutting business in the 1930’s His great-grandfather William Moore II had started the ice company in 1867.

Moore attended the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy at King’s Point, Long Island, N.Y., graduating in February, 1944. During WWII he served on various merchant ships as a Deck Cadet, Third Officer and Second Officer in the North Atlantic, Mediterranean Sea and South Pacific war zones. Following the war, he worked on various freighters and tankers.

excerpt from obituary on legacy.com

I find it fitting that the last person to pilot a real ship up the Kennebec to Hallowell was Captain Moore, who was a direct descendant of the first settlers who arrived by the same river route.

artist, Chris Cart

Kennebec pilot

Capt. Moore held an Unlimited Master of Ocean’s License issued by the U.S. Coast Guard in Boston, and later added 42 First Class Pilotage Endorsements for various harbors and rivers between the Kennebec River and Washington D.C. He was most proud of his license for the Kennebec River from its entrance to Augusta, which he obtained in November, 1949.

In 1954, he took over the Kennebec River pilotage operating tankers, tugs and barges delivering oil, grain and coal to Hallowell, Farmingdale and South Gardiner. Capt. Moore piloted the last tanker up the Kennebec River to Hallowell in May, 1966.

excerpt from obituary on legacy.com

fabric, fabric, more fabric

The 252 foot long, four story Cotton Mill #34, built in 1844, still stands in Hallowell. In its heyday of production, around 1866, the mill employed 200 textile workers making fabric for curtains, jeans, dress, coat linings, a vast range of fabrics for daily use.

In the late 1880’s the southern states that provided the raw cotton, built their own textile mills and this led to the close of Hallowell’s textile industry. The Cotton Mill was shut down in 1890.

From 1909 to 1915 the first floor was occupied by Electrophone, producing one of the world’s first electric automobile horns.

Then from 1920 to 1966 the building became a shoe factory.

One story I was told was that during World War II the shoe factory made boots and factory workers would add notes of encouragement in the boots for the soldiers.

artist, Chris Cart

In 1979 the building became The Cotton Mill Apartments when the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation in participation with the Department of Housing and Urban Development approved the conversion of the mill into housing for the elderly.

Johnson Brothers Shoes

Twin brothers William C. Johnson and Richardson M. Johnson opened their Johnson Brothers Shoe factory in 1887 in Hallowell.

The original building, which faced south on Central Street, was constructed of wood with a brick foundation. The building was expanded by two wings in 1894, extending it to the railroad tracks on the west and to Second Street on the east. The factory, which produced ladies’ shoes of various styles, was very successful and was a major employer in Hallowell. The Johnson business was closed in April of 1927, and the building was occupied by the Kennebec Shoe Company from 1934 to 1953. The abandoned building was torn down in May 1955.

One story I was told was that during World War II the shoe factory made boots and factory workers would add notes of encouragement in the boots for the soldiers.

artist, Chris Cart

12,000 boots

The factory made 10,000 to 12,000 pairs of boots and 7,000 to 8,000 pairs of shoes per year with thirty to forty people.  In July 1964, new machinery was installed, which made shoemaking faster and easier.  As a result, there were 300 people employed.

The factory’s weekly payroll was $6,000, and annual sales of ladies shoes was $1,600,000. These were quality all leather shoes using “2,000 leather sides, seventy five dozens of calf skins, three to four tons of split leather, and ten to twelve tons of sole leather.”

In 1920 the Cotton Mills building also became a shoe factory. It was a thriving shoe business until 1966.

local models

Olympia Farrar #35, is shown as a young girl working in the textile mills.

Murky Lester #37, is shown at a factory sewing maching.

It was great having so many local models for the various figures in the mural.

artist, Chris Cart

Vaughan and Hallowell families

abridged timeline

Based on full timeline from Vaughan Homestead website.

Prior to the 1600’s the lands of Hallowell were the home of the Wôban-aki people, also variously called the Abenaki, Wabanaki and locally the “Cussenocke”

1600-1660. Kings of England stake claim to lands of the Kennebec Valley and grant rights to the lands to wealthy European man and Plymouth Colony.

Plymouth Colony eventually sells its lands to group of 4 wealthy businessmen, a deal known as the Kennebec Purchase.

1640. William Hallowell comes from England to work in Benjamin Ward’s Boston shipyard. Hallowell eventually takes over and it is the Hallowell Shipyard for 140 years—one of the most successful shipyards.

William Hallowell’s grandson Benjamin takes over the shipyard and uses enslaved laborer to build ships, including some ships for slave trade.

Benjamin Hallowell becomes successor to Kennebec Proprietor , inheriting lands along Kennebec River.

1736. Samuel Vaughan established with first plantation in Jamaica. He becomes very wealthy with several sugar plantations worked by over 700 enslaved people.

1750-60’s. Samuel Vaughan and Benjamin Hallowell form partnership. Hallowell providing ships and lumber for barrels to ship Vaughan’s sugar from his plantations.

1751. Samuel Vaughan marries Sarah, Benjamin Hallowell’s daughter and their first some Benjamin Vaughan is born.

1753. The descendants of original Kennebec Purchase, reincorporate and become the Kennebec Proprietors, Benjamin Vaughan one of the largest shareholders.

1750’s. Most of the indigenous people of the area by this time have been driven upriver to Norridgewock and Canada.

1762. Deacon Pease Clark and family purchase land from Kennebec Proprietors and are first to settle in what is now Hallowell.

1771 Hallowell incorporated as a town on April 26, named for Benjamin Hallowell.

1780-90’s Charles and Benjamin Vaughan, Samuel and Sarah’s sons settle in Hallowell.

1852. Hallowell incorporated as a city on February 17.