Bethel (Don)
Swain Family Farm – First 75 Years
In 1936 Edwin and Leah Swain bought the Burbank farm near Skillingston on Route 2 and with their family moved from Frye near Roxbury, Maine, to their new home in Bethel. Their family included Roscoe, 11; Ruel, 10; Edwin, 6; and Henrietta, a baby.
Ruel’s father Ed and mom Leah had four children to support after losing their farm near Roxbury in 1935. They lived in a camp in the winter of 1935-36 and due to the generosity of family members were able to move to Bethel in the spring of 1936. Ruel said the farm’s price tag was $1,700.
Having the farm was really a means of family survival due to little employment outside of millwork and lack of equipment during the aftermath of the Great Depression.
One of the first memories of the older boys is arriving at the farm with some of the essential furniture just sitting on the porch – Henrietta needed her crib! Ruel remembers his dad driving the “mill horse” to the dowel mill every day as part of his pay of 35 cents per hour – and long, hard days.
Sometimes Edwin, Sr. had to work away to make a living and was slowly able to accumulate a milk cow and work horses to work in the wood lots that went with the farm. Early on he bought wood lots and hired men to help with the harvest.
Henrietta remembers caring for the chickens and being chased by a turkey or a goose. Edwin. Jr. had a work horse and the big event was having a colt born in the pasture. Rocky and Ruel had a pair of yoked steers and spent a whole winter cutting logs for one of the last wood drives down the Androscoggin River.
After an especially bad storm Dad Ed had a job scaling for the government at 60 cents an hour. Ruel remembered it as the Hurricane Pine (maybe the 1938 hurricane).
Henrietta remembers that during World War II she and her classmates worked the fields to collect milkweed fluffs for life jacket material and for parachutes. There was lots of milkweed on the lower Bond Island. Henrietta also remembers skating on the icy Route 2 and skiing at Mt. Anderson (also used by the Gould Academy ski team) just up the road.
Ed and his wife, Leah Taylor Swain, worked together in all ways – Leah made homemade ice cream and lemon tarts for a “Tea Room” operated and staffed by the older boys and cousins Nellie and Marion. The “Tea Room” was the family’s first “stand.” It was built to resemble the one in photo below.
Ruel probably began delivering potatoes in the Rumford area in the early ‘40s. Lots of the Swain’s old neighbors would only buy Green Mountain potatoes – a variety that is not so easy to grow.
Ruel graduated from Gould Academy in 1944 and entered the Army. Edwin graduated from Gould in 1948 and Henrietta in 1953. Eddie and Henrietta went to college through the generosity of Mr. Bingham. Edwin’s career was with DuPont before and after military service. He retired to Aiken, South Carolina. Henrietta went to Bates and Salem State College then into a teaching career in Woburn, Mass. She retired and lives in Otisfield, Maine.
Edwin Swain Sr., died in 1959 and his wife Leah died in 1962. Roscoe “Rocky” had become a trucker; Ruel then became head farmer at the Swain Farm.
Part Two will pick up the Swain Family Farm story after 1962.
Telstar Middle School Summer Reading Challenge:
Last Wednesday afternoon, Telstar Librarian Kelley Fraser held a library open house with free ice cream as a come-on for Middle School students to drop by and take out books to read. Students keep track of their reading minutes then log in to a Read for a World Record website to update their reading minutes.
Despite a passing thunder shower a fairly steady flow of students were being dropped off at the library.
Aim of the contest is to develop a thirst for reading as a young student. The pay-off is improved reading and retention skills – a gold medal key to future learning plus hugely enhancing a person’s career abilities.
At Telstar Middle School the current goal is to accumulate 3,600 new minutes of reading between now and the day school re-opens in September.
At the Website www.scholastic.com/Summer/ students, parents, teachers and the school librarian can see how Telstar Middle School is doing day by day, hour by hour. As of Wednesday afternoon Telstar Middle School’s national ranking was an incredibly high 67 with a total reading minutes count of 243,198. Current student count in the challenge is 104.
Prizes are given for the amount of reading. Students know from just logging into the Website that this program is worldwide and the status map on screen has orange flags showing locations of the top 20 schools. Reading keeps up with Olympic running, swimming, gymnastics, etc., in handing out individual and school recognition as rewards.
Language Arts teachers, Lindsay Luetje, Lori Davis, and Mary Learned are involved in this reading initiative. Without their help, this program would not be successful.
To see the latest reading status go to the Website listed above enter “Telstar Middle School” or “Telstar USA”
Alan Taylor lecture at BHS
Pulitzer Prize winning history author Alan Taylor spoke at the Bethel Historical Society last Thursday. Seventy-seven attended the talk and slide show at the Moses Mason House. Mr. Taylor’s presentation was based on his latest book “The Civil War of 1812.” In many ways this war had more impact on Maine in terms of commerce and coastal enterprises than the Revolution. A larger-than-usual audience showed the interest Bethel residents and visitors had in the speaker and topic. Gould Academy’s new Head of School, Matthew Ruby, and his wife Kathy also attended, giving them a chance to witness a first-class historical society program and meet the crowd.
This lecture was the first time that the Bethel Historical Society has been able to obtain a speaker of Alan Taylor’s caliber, which speaks well of the summer lecture program’s future prospects.
Carlee Beatson – Summer Intern’s Outlook
Carlee Beatson of Bethel is this summer’s intern at the Bethel Historical Society. When asked what impressed her the most, Miss Beatson said learning about the business side of museum and society operations. She has also learned how the museum’s collections, archives, and reference library are managed. Her academic interest is history and she hopes to pursue this interest in college. Carlee will be a senior at Telstar this year.
New home going up on Philbrook Street
Eric and Janet Stephenson are building a new Maine Passive House following a Jesper Kruse design behind their present home on Philbrook Street. The house plan calls for three bedrooms to better accommodate the growing Stephenson family.
Besides the design, which includes 11-inch thick walls with super insulation all around, the “Kruse Plan” also calls for the owner to do much of his or her own work plus hunting for the most economical building components such as windows. In this case Mr. Stephenson is happy to say that he has been able to find windows costing only a third of the regular list price.
Todd Davis is the concrete contractor for the job – keeping work local.
Read more - to see the photos which accompany these news items open www.thebetheljournals.info/NeSwain Family Farm – First 75 Years
In 1936 Edwin and Leah Swain bought the Burbank farm near Skillingston on Route 2 and with their family moved from Frye near Roxbury, Maine to their new home in Bethel. Their family included Roscoe, 11; Ruel, 10; Edwin, 6; and Henrietta, a baby.
Ruel’s father Ed and Mom Leah had four children to support after losing their farm near Roxbury, Maine in 1935. They lived in a camp in the winter of 1935-6 and due to the generosity of family members were able to move to Bethel in the spring of 1936. Ruel said the farm’s price tag was $1,700.
Having the farm was really a means of family survival due to little employment outside of millwork and lack of equipment during the aftermath of the Great Depression.
One of the first memories of the older boys is arriving at the farm with some of the essential furniture just sitting on the porch – Henrietta needed her crib!! Ruel remembers his dad driving the “mill horse” to the dowel mill every day as part of his pay of 35 cents per hour – and long hard days.
Sometimes Edwin, Sr. had to work away to make a living and was slowly able to accumulate a milk cow and work horses to work in the wood lots that went with the farm. Early on he bought wood lots and hired men to help with the harvest.
Henrietta remembers caring for the chickens and being chased by a turkey or a goose. Edwin. Jr. had a work horse and the big event was having a colt born in the pasture. Rocky and Ruel had a pair of yoked steers and spent a whole winter cutting logs for one of the last wood drives down the Androscoggin River.
After an especially bad storm Dad Ed had a job scaling for the government at 60 cents an hour. Ruel remembered it as the Hurricane Pine (maybe the 1938 hurricane).
Henrietta remembers that during World War II she and her class mates worked the fields to collect milk weed fluffs for life jacket material and for parachutes. There was lots of milk weed on the lower Bond Island. Henrietta also remembers skating on the icy Route 2 and skiing at Mt Anderson (also used by the Gould Academy ski team) just up the road.
Ed and his wife Leah Taylor Swain worked together in all ways – Leah made homemade ice cream and lemon tarts for a “Tea Room” operated and staffed by the older boys and cousins Nellie and Marion. The “Tea Room” was the family’s first “stand”. It was built to resemble the one in photo below.
Ruel probably began delivering potatoes in the Rumford area in the early ‘40s. Lots of the Swain’s old neighbors would only buy Green Mountain potatoes – a variety that is not so easy to grow.
Ruel graduated from Gould Academy in 1944 and entered the Army. Edwin graduated from Gould in 1948 and Henrietta in 1953. Eddie and Henrietta went to college through the generosity of Mr. Bingham. Edwin’s career was with DuPont before and after military service. He retired to Aiken, South Carolina. Henrietta went to Bates and Salem State College then into a teaching career in Woburn, Mass. She retired and lives in Otisfield, Maine.
Edwin Swain Sr., died in 1959 and his wife Leah died in 1962. Roscoe “Rocky” had become a trucker; Ruel then became head farmer at the Swain Farm.
Part Two will pick up the Swain Family Farm story after 1962.
Telstar Middle School Summer Reading Challenge
Last Wednesday afternoon, Telstar Librarian Kelley Fraser held a library open house with free ice cream as a come-on for Middle School students to drop by and take out books to read. Students keep track of their reading minutes then log in to a Read for a World Record website to update their reading minutes.
Despite a passing thunder shower a fairly steady flow of students were being dropped off at the library.
Aim of the contest is to develop a thirst for reading as a young student. The pay-off is improved reading and retention skills – a gold medal key to future learning plus hugely enhancing a person’s career abilities.
At Telstar Middle School the current goal is to accumulate 3600 new minutes of reading between now and the day school re-opens in September.
At the Website www.scholastic.com/Summer/ students, parents, teachers and the school librarian can see how Telstar Middle School is doing day by day, hour by hour. As of Wednesday afternoon Telstar Middle School’s national ranking was an incredibly high 67 with a total reading minutes count of 243,198. Current student count in the challenge is 104.
Prizes are given for the amount of reading. Students know from just logging into the Website that this program is worldwide and the status map on screen has orange flags showing locations of the top 20 schools. Reading keeps up with Olympic running, swimming, gymnastics, etc. in handing out individual and school recognition as rewards.
Language Arts teachers, Lindsay Luetje, Lori Davis, and Mary Learned are involved in this reading initiative. Without their help, this program would not be successful.
To see the latest reading status go to the Website listed above enter “Telstar Middle School” or “Telstar USA”
Alan Taylor lecture at BHS
Pulitzer Prize winning history author Alan Taylor spoke at the Bethel Historical Society last Thursday. Seventy-seven attended the talk and slide show at the Moses Mason House. Mr. Taylor’s presentation was based on his latest book The Civil War of 1812. In many ways this war had more impact on Maine in terms of commerce and coastal enterprises than the Revolution. A larger than usual audience showed the interest Bethel residents and visitors had in the speaker and topic. Gould Academy’s new Head of School, Matthew Ruby, and his wife Kathy also attended, giving them a chance to witness a first class historical society program and meet the crowd.
This lecture was the first time that the Bethel Historical Society has been able to obtain a speaker of Alan Taylor’s caliber which speaks well of the summer lecture program’s future prospects.
Carlee Beatson – Summer Intern’s Outlook
Carlee Beatson of Bethel is this summer’s intern at the Bethel Historical Society. When asked what impressed her the most, Miss Beatson said learning about the business side of museum and society operations. She has also learned how the museum’s collections, archives, and reference library are managed. Her academic interest is history and she hopes to pursue this interest in college. Carlee will be a senior at Telstar this year.
New home going up on Philbrook Street
Eric and Janet Stephenson are building a new Maine Passive House following a Jesper Kruse design behind their present home on Philbrook Street. The house plan calls for three bedrooms to better accommodate the growing Stephenson family.
Besides the design which includes 11-inch thick walls with super insulation all around, the “Kruse Plan” also calls for the owner to do much of his or her own work plus hunting for the most economical building components such as windows. In this case Mr. Stephenson is happy to say that he has been able to find windows costing only a third of the regular list price.
Todd Davis is the concrete contractor for the job – keeping work local.
Read more - to see the photos which accompany these news items open www.thebetheljournals.info/News/Bethel080612.htm