THE WHEELS OF CHANGE
Steamer J.T. MORSE of the Eastern Steamship Line at the North Haven freight shed, circa 1920
One stormy summer evening in 1873, President Ulysses Grant visited North Haven when the boat he was traveling upon sought shelter from a storm. While the visit was accidental, it brought the island to the attention of the nation’s elite and essentially marked the beginning of the long tradition of wealthy summer visitors coming to North Haven. Throughout the late 1800s, North Haven became a destination for the nation’s wealthy who traveled by yacht along the Maine coast. For them, North Haven was a secluded and quiet escape from urban life and the perfect spot to buy land and build a summer retreat.
The arrival of summer visitors to North Haven occurred just as the island’s economy was hit hard by the devastating crash of the mackerel fishing industry. Many islanders who gained at least part of their living from the sea were devastated by the financial loss. Consequently, many left land and homes on North Haven in search of income elsewhere. By 1890 the island’s population had declined to 552 residents (down from the all-time high of 951 in 1860). When the wave of wealthy visitors came to the island in search of summer homes, they found plenty of available land, either abandoned or with only the elderly owners in residence and much of the younger generations gone in search of work elsewhere.
As more and more summer visitors purchased land and homes on North Haven, the economy of the island shifted. Islanders gained jobs as caretakers, cooks, maids, boatmen, and carpenters. Simultaneously, they strove to hold onto livelihoods in farming, fishing, and boatbuilding as they had for decades previously. Islanders walked a fine line between relying on summer residents for income, while holding fast to the strong, independent traditions of their ancestors.
For some farmers on North Haven, the influx of wealthy summer residents also offered a new market for their products as demand increased for fresh milk, produce, and meats. However, for those farmers who had grown too old to manage on their own, were without family to inherit the farm, or could no longer afford to pay the taxes on their land, selling their farm seemed the only option. Often, an agreement called “life tenancy” was made so that an elderly farmer could remain in residence at the farm for the rest of his or her life. One such agreement occurred in the purchase of the Oren Waterman farm and a 1916 letter outlined the deal:
Some people interested in North Haven have joined together and purchased the Waterman farm for Golf Links [with] Waterman reserving the right to use his house and barn and two acres of land, for life. Work will be begun on the course in a few days so that it will be possible to play golf on the farm next summer….There are about 140 acres in the farm. The price paid was $15,000.
While land ownership on the island was beginning to change, for the most part farming continued to thrive through the early 1900s. Shipping ties to Boston markets remained secure and sales during the summer to the stores, the inn, and summer families strengthened many farms. But when the Great Depression swept the nation in the 1930s, even relatively remote and self-sufficient places like North Haven felt the effects.
One of the most detrimental blows to the island came in 1935 when the Eastern Steamship Line suspended service to the Maine coast. Like many other companies, the Eastern Steamship Line suffered the economic hardships of the Depression but it also faced rising competition from the development of truck and plane transportation. When steamship travel originally arrived to the Maine coast, it played an integral role in transforming farming on North Haven from a subsistence lifestyle to a busy export trade. When the Eastern Steamship Line came to a halt, efficient overnight access to urban markets ended.
For North Haven farmers, the loss of the steamship was devastating. Increasingly, more people left the island in search of employment elsewhere, while some sold their farms and moved into the village, and others tried to hold on as best they could. Lewis Haskell remembered:
When the Eastern Steamship Line stopped, it was the same effect of cutting the throat of the farmers here. They lost their market, their ready market. They tried to cut back, but when they cut back they couldn’t make it. They didn’t have enough income. Up until then they had been so competitive. When you saw ‘em they was always braggin’ to each other about how big their pigs were, or how many calves their cows had had, or how many eggs their hens were laying, how many strawberries they got. It was very competitive. But after the steamship line closed, it just took the life out of them. Milk business kept a few of them going but the egg business went, the sheep went -- it just did, farm after farm.
Several other steamship lines continued to service North Haven but none provided the same efficiency as the Eastern Line in shipping goods to market.
Those farmers who managed to hold on after the loss of steamship service faced yet another blow to their livelihoods after World War II when the government enacted strict regulations for butchering. The new laws required farmers to have special facilities for slaughtering livestock that was headed to market. While perhaps well intended and meant to establish safer food standards, the new laws forced many farmers on North Haven out of business. Prior to the new regulations, farmers were simply required to pass a physical exam and be certified not to have tuberculosis. After passing the exam, farmers received a government issued inspection stamp, which they applied to the meat they butchered and sold. If farmers were unable or unwilling to comply with new laws, the government ordered them to return the previously issued inspection stamps. Frustrated that they could not keep on as they had for generations, most farmers gave up and sold their livestock. In an interview with Eliot Beveridge, Leah Young Beverage recalled how her husband, Ray, left farming as a result of the government’s butchering regulations:
They began to tighten up on the meat inspection...we saw the writing on the wall and got out of it....you were not supposed to butcher unless you had running water, concrete floor, and so forth….if you had an animal to kill you had to send it to the mainland. That was up in the 1950s; this all came in after the war...why if you even wanted to put off our roosters you had to have them killed at a certified butcher place; and that is why so many sheep disappeared off the island.
After the loss of the steamship and the introduction of butchering regulations, the island farmers that managed to persist mostly kept dairy cows and often sold eggs or produce on the side. Several farmers had their own milk routes and regularly delivered milk around the island. One North Haven farmer, Lloyd Crockett, began pasteurizing milk in the 1930s and his family’s farm held a claim as the first milk pasteurizing plant in Knox County. Many islanders were wary of this new advancement in the industry and most preferred to keep drinking raw milk. Summer residents were accustomed to having pasteurized milk and were Crockett’s primary customers. Dick Bloom remembered:
There was the typical island attitude of “What’s that guy thinking! Trying to go into the business of pasteurizing milk!” Of course, for him I suppose it was being progressive in the milk business, but I think local people took a sneering attitude about it. But I remember going up and seeing it when it was first opened and it was very impressive with stainless steel tanks and everybody got the idea how clean, how neat everything was. For a lot of the local farmers, everything was done in the back room of the kitchen. Most people individually chose the family from whom they’re going to buy their milk from depending on what their attitude was regarding the sanitary conditions of the farmhouse.
Alton “Tonny” Calderwood is remembered by older islanders as the last farmer to deliver milk on North Haven. Tonny grew up at his family’s place on Indian Point and began farming there in the 1930s. Throughout the 1940s, 50s, and into the early 60s, Tonny and his wife, Anne, maintained a busy dairy farm and regularly delivered milk to customers around the island. He kept a daily diary for most of his life and occasionally made note of the changes in farming on North Haven. As more and more farmers sold off their livestock, the fields long grazed by animals or cut for hay soon grew up in trees. Tonny made note in his diary of these changes in the island’s landscape, writing on August 26, 1945, "Enough to make one cry the way the island is growing up."
By 1963, when Tonny was 55 and weary of farming, he remarked upon the dramatic decline in cattle kept on North Haven. In this diary entry Tonny referred to himself as ‘Calderwood’ and wrote:
May 14, 1963. Uptown to meet the boat and state veterinary coming to test cattle...three cows on North Haven besides the herd at Indian Point. What a change from when Calderwood was a boy with upwards of 200 on the island.
In 1965, Tonny and Ann sold their herd and retired from dairy farming. Heartbroken at seeing it come to an end, Tonny wrote:
February 19, 1965. I expect that over the past few days we’ve made the greatest decision of our lives -- we’ve decided to give up our milk route March 1st and sell our animals. It’s all become too much of a strain for us...The decision may be for the best but at present I haven’t the least idea how we’ll make a living.
February 20, 1965. Telephoned a sale ad to the Swap Sheet editor tonight advertising our herd for sale. Twenty-seven years of work all canceled by a few strokes of a pen. How can I face it.
As farm after farm folded, the island’s younger generations were left with little hope for the future of farming on North Haven. Once again, as in earlier decades, many young people moved away in search of work elsewhere. Older islanders were left with little help in caring for their farms and the buildings fell into disrepair. Many of the family farms that had been handed down for generations were sold. Lewis Haskell remembered:
It was sad. Somebody’d say “Did you hear so and so’s farm is gonna close down?” On the telephone you know, they had those old party lines where you could have as many as five people talkin’ at the same time -- so and so’s farm is gonna close, they got to leave, they got to close down or Mr. So and So died, that’s the end of that farm. Or they were in debt so much money they’re gonna have to sell it. It was very sad.
Farmer Hiram Beverage continued to grow and sell produce at his farm on the Middle Road into the early 1970s. At nearly ninety years old, he was known by many at that time as the last remaining active farmer on North Haven.
Over a span of about four decades, North Haven lost nearly all its recognizable features of farming. Livestock disappeared, barns tumbled, pastures grew up in spruce trees, and equipment and tools rusted away. North Haven went from a thriving farming community to one where residents held little hope for an agricultural future on the island.
The arrival of summer visitors to North Haven occurred just as the island’s economy was hit hard by the devastating crash of the mackerel fishing industry. Many islanders who gained at least part of their living from the sea were devastated by the financial loss. Consequently, many left land and homes on North Haven in search of income elsewhere. By 1890 the island’s population had declined to 552 residents (down from the all-time high of 951 in 1860). When the wave of wealthy visitors came to the island in search of summer homes, they found plenty of available land, either abandoned or with only the elderly owners in residence and much of the younger generations gone in search of work elsewhere.
As more and more summer visitors purchased land and homes on North Haven, the economy of the island shifted. Islanders gained jobs as caretakers, cooks, maids, boatmen, and carpenters. Simultaneously, they strove to hold onto livelihoods in farming, fishing, and boatbuilding as they had for decades previously. Islanders walked a fine line between relying on summer residents for income, while holding fast to the strong, independent traditions of their ancestors.
For some farmers on North Haven, the influx of wealthy summer residents also offered a new market for their products as demand increased for fresh milk, produce, and meats. However, for those farmers who had grown too old to manage on their own, were without family to inherit the farm, or could no longer afford to pay the taxes on their land, selling their farm seemed the only option. Often, an agreement called “life tenancy” was made so that an elderly farmer could remain in residence at the farm for the rest of his or her life. One such agreement occurred in the purchase of the Oren Waterman farm and a 1916 letter outlined the deal:
Some people interested in North Haven have joined together and purchased the Waterman farm for Golf Links [with] Waterman reserving the right to use his house and barn and two acres of land, for life. Work will be begun on the course in a few days so that it will be possible to play golf on the farm next summer….There are about 140 acres in the farm. The price paid was $15,000.
While land ownership on the island was beginning to change, for the most part farming continued to thrive through the early 1900s. Shipping ties to Boston markets remained secure and sales during the summer to the stores, the inn, and summer families strengthened many farms. But when the Great Depression swept the nation in the 1930s, even relatively remote and self-sufficient places like North Haven felt the effects.
One of the most detrimental blows to the island came in 1935 when the Eastern Steamship Line suspended service to the Maine coast. Like many other companies, the Eastern Steamship Line suffered the economic hardships of the Depression but it also faced rising competition from the development of truck and plane transportation. When steamship travel originally arrived to the Maine coast, it played an integral role in transforming farming on North Haven from a subsistence lifestyle to a busy export trade. When the Eastern Steamship Line came to a halt, efficient overnight access to urban markets ended.
For North Haven farmers, the loss of the steamship was devastating. Increasingly, more people left the island in search of employment elsewhere, while some sold their farms and moved into the village, and others tried to hold on as best they could. Lewis Haskell remembered:
When the Eastern Steamship Line stopped, it was the same effect of cutting the throat of the farmers here. They lost their market, their ready market. They tried to cut back, but when they cut back they couldn’t make it. They didn’t have enough income. Up until then they had been so competitive. When you saw ‘em they was always braggin’ to each other about how big their pigs were, or how many calves their cows had had, or how many eggs their hens were laying, how many strawberries they got. It was very competitive. But after the steamship line closed, it just took the life out of them. Milk business kept a few of them going but the egg business went, the sheep went -- it just did, farm after farm.
Several other steamship lines continued to service North Haven but none provided the same efficiency as the Eastern Line in shipping goods to market.
Those farmers who managed to hold on after the loss of steamship service faced yet another blow to their livelihoods after World War II when the government enacted strict regulations for butchering. The new laws required farmers to have special facilities for slaughtering livestock that was headed to market. While perhaps well intended and meant to establish safer food standards, the new laws forced many farmers on North Haven out of business. Prior to the new regulations, farmers were simply required to pass a physical exam and be certified not to have tuberculosis. After passing the exam, farmers received a government issued inspection stamp, which they applied to the meat they butchered and sold. If farmers were unable or unwilling to comply with new laws, the government ordered them to return the previously issued inspection stamps. Frustrated that they could not keep on as they had for generations, most farmers gave up and sold their livestock. In an interview with Eliot Beveridge, Leah Young Beverage recalled how her husband, Ray, left farming as a result of the government’s butchering regulations:
They began to tighten up on the meat inspection...we saw the writing on the wall and got out of it....you were not supposed to butcher unless you had running water, concrete floor, and so forth….if you had an animal to kill you had to send it to the mainland. That was up in the 1950s; this all came in after the war...why if you even wanted to put off our roosters you had to have them killed at a certified butcher place; and that is why so many sheep disappeared off the island.
After the loss of the steamship and the introduction of butchering regulations, the island farmers that managed to persist mostly kept dairy cows and often sold eggs or produce on the side. Several farmers had their own milk routes and regularly delivered milk around the island. One North Haven farmer, Lloyd Crockett, began pasteurizing milk in the 1930s and his family’s farm held a claim as the first milk pasteurizing plant in Knox County. Many islanders were wary of this new advancement in the industry and most preferred to keep drinking raw milk. Summer residents were accustomed to having pasteurized milk and were Crockett’s primary customers. Dick Bloom remembered:
There was the typical island attitude of “What’s that guy thinking! Trying to go into the business of pasteurizing milk!” Of course, for him I suppose it was being progressive in the milk business, but I think local people took a sneering attitude about it. But I remember going up and seeing it when it was first opened and it was very impressive with stainless steel tanks and everybody got the idea how clean, how neat everything was. For a lot of the local farmers, everything was done in the back room of the kitchen. Most people individually chose the family from whom they’re going to buy their milk from depending on what their attitude was regarding the sanitary conditions of the farmhouse.
Alton “Tonny” Calderwood is remembered by older islanders as the last farmer to deliver milk on North Haven. Tonny grew up at his family’s place on Indian Point and began farming there in the 1930s. Throughout the 1940s, 50s, and into the early 60s, Tonny and his wife, Anne, maintained a busy dairy farm and regularly delivered milk to customers around the island. He kept a daily diary for most of his life and occasionally made note of the changes in farming on North Haven. As more and more farmers sold off their livestock, the fields long grazed by animals or cut for hay soon grew up in trees. Tonny made note in his diary of these changes in the island’s landscape, writing on August 26, 1945, "Enough to make one cry the way the island is growing up."
By 1963, when Tonny was 55 and weary of farming, he remarked upon the dramatic decline in cattle kept on North Haven. In this diary entry Tonny referred to himself as ‘Calderwood’ and wrote:
May 14, 1963. Uptown to meet the boat and state veterinary coming to test cattle...three cows on North Haven besides the herd at Indian Point. What a change from when Calderwood was a boy with upwards of 200 on the island.
In 1965, Tonny and Ann sold their herd and retired from dairy farming. Heartbroken at seeing it come to an end, Tonny wrote:
February 19, 1965. I expect that over the past few days we’ve made the greatest decision of our lives -- we’ve decided to give up our milk route March 1st and sell our animals. It’s all become too much of a strain for us...The decision may be for the best but at present I haven’t the least idea how we’ll make a living.
February 20, 1965. Telephoned a sale ad to the Swap Sheet editor tonight advertising our herd for sale. Twenty-seven years of work all canceled by a few strokes of a pen. How can I face it.
As farm after farm folded, the island’s younger generations were left with little hope for the future of farming on North Haven. Once again, as in earlier decades, many young people moved away in search of work elsewhere. Older islanders were left with little help in caring for their farms and the buildings fell into disrepair. Many of the family farms that had been handed down for generations were sold. Lewis Haskell remembered:
It was sad. Somebody’d say “Did you hear so and so’s farm is gonna close down?” On the telephone you know, they had those old party lines where you could have as many as five people talkin’ at the same time -- so and so’s farm is gonna close, they got to leave, they got to close down or Mr. So and So died, that’s the end of that farm. Or they were in debt so much money they’re gonna have to sell it. It was very sad.
Farmer Hiram Beverage continued to grow and sell produce at his farm on the Middle Road into the early 1970s. At nearly ninety years old, he was known by many at that time as the last remaining active farmer on North Haven.
Over a span of about four decades, North Haven lost nearly all its recognizable features of farming. Livestock disappeared, barns tumbled, pastures grew up in spruce trees, and equipment and tools rusted away. North Haven went from a thriving farming community to one where residents held little hope for an agricultural future on the island.
Hanson Crockett's barn, collapsed, 1962