Beech Ridge School Update (Sept 2021)

Posted on September 1, 2021 by Karlene Osborne

By Karlene Osborne

Beech Ridge Schoolhouse
August 2021.

Restoration of the 1800s schoolhouse at 184 Holmes Road continues. Since the donation of the building to Scarborough Historical Society in the fall of 2018, the Society has been busy stabilizing the structure. Of an estimated budget of $250,000 for the restoration, $95,000 has been raised to date. These funds enabled us to put in a new foundation, restore rotted sills, enclose the exposed backside of the building, install temporary electrical service, etc. To secure the building for the coming winter, plastic sheets have been placed over the broken windows. Ten replacement windows have been purchased and delivered and three were installed in the back walls this past spring. We hope volunteers will help with the staining and painting.

The next phase, estimated to cost $25,600, will begin when additional funds are received. This phase will include reframing and repair of interior walls, installation of windows and doors, demolition of exterior siding, and installation of a weather-resistant barrier and exterior clapboards.

Interior – Beech Ridge School
August 2021

Please consider a donation by sending a check to Scarborough Historical Society, PO Box156, Scarborough, ME, 04070-0156. The Society’s Beech Ridge Schoolhouse Project GoFundMe page is https://www.gofundme.com/f/SHS-Restore-Beech-Ridge-School. Your gift is tax-deductible, as we are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. Thank you for helping to save a part of Scarborough history.

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The Villages of Scarborough

Posted on September 1, 2021 by Becky Delaware

By Becky Delaware

North Scarborough

Continuing our series about the villages of Scarborough. . .

O. E. Sherman & Son
Photo: SHS Archives

The Village of North Scarborough is often more closely associated with Gorham or Westbrook. For a long time, residents in this area had a Gorham telephone prefix and a Westbrook mailing address. It’s been noted that many residents of this area have felt alienated from Scarborough, as they usually were the last to get any public services and even had to argue intensely to receive them. As true of most villages, North Scarborough had a church, a store (Sherman’s), a school (District #13), a fire station, and a post office (located in Sherman’s store), as well as the Grange. The closest banks were in Gorham and Westbrook!

Coal Kiln School – SHS Archives

I am told the stagecoach ran through this village and there was at least one stagecoach stopover. There’s a cemetery, now in South Gorham but originally in North Scarborough, in which many Scarborough people are interred. It’s rumored there might also be an unmarked African American burial ground. Other businesses included a blacksmith, first Charles McLellan, then Bert Libby and finally Arthur Roberts; gas station, the first run by a McKenny (Herb?) on Route 114 and later Leon Vaill on Route 22; The Pines, known for its oyster dinners and dancing afterward, run by the Libby/ Larrabee women; a lumber mill, Herb McKenney; a shingle mill, Carl Temm; and a building-mover, Merry & Sons. Very early there was a soap manufacturer. A “World’s Fair” was held until the late 1940s (as far as I can find). Schools were closed so all could attend the fair. The fair had activities typical of today’s fairs: horse-pulling, livestock competitions, etc.

From the 1871
Atlas of Cumberland County, Maine

North Scarborough also was commonly called “Kokill,” Maine-speak for Coal Kiln Corners. There were at least three coal kilns located here. The kilns looked like overgrown beaver houses and were eight- to twelve feet high. The kilns were used to burn alders into pea coal that could be burned in residence stoves. I have read that most of this coal was shipped to Portland for use in apartments.

The boundaries are vague. Roughly, the North Scarborough boundary ran to the Westbrook lines on both Saco Street and Route 22. How far up Route 22 is open to discussion, but probably as far as Crystal Springs Trailer Park. Again, it could be further up or nearer to the corner? The boundary extended down Beech Ridge Road until the border of the Beech Ridge area, again at least to the foot of the steep hill, Lord’s Hill, but maybe a bit further? If you lived there, you knew the boundaries!

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From the Ephemera

Posted on September 1, 2021 by Linda Snow-McLoon

By Linda Snow McLoon

Pine Point School District #8

Last Pine Point district school, built in 1940
Rodney Laughton Collection

When the Boston & Maine Railroad added its new route from North Berwick to Portland in 1872, its plan was for the tracks to cross the Pine Point marshes and the Scarborough River en route. But before the project could go forward, a deal had to be struck with the town. In consideration for allowing the railroad to build a long bridge across the mouth of the Scarborough River without a draw- bridge, the B&M Railroad paid the town a portion of the cost to construct a roadway from Blue Point to Pine Point and one to connect Dunstan Landing to the depot at Blue Point. For the first time, there would be a roadway from Dun- stan directly to Pine Point.

Before these roadways were built, Pine Point was accessible only by water and was a mostly uninhabited part of town. The new transportation options, along with a roadway to Old Orchard Beach that was subsequently built, provided direct access to Pine Point and a number of families moved there to take advantage of great fishing and clamming opportunities.

A decade later, Pine Point had become an important village in the town, making it necessary to form a new school district. In 1883 Pine Point became School District #8 and building a school there was the next order of business.

Notice of District #8 establishment.

After the proposal to build a school was approved at the September 1883 meeting, an application to borrow the needed funds was made to the Portland Savings Bank. A document spells out the agreement between the bank and “the inhabitants of School District #8” to fund the new schoolhouse for the Pine Point children. A $900 loan plus 5% interest was to be repaid in five annual payments of $185, and as was the custom with the
building of earlier district schools, the debt burden would be carried by the residents of that school district only. Aaron A. Morrill, the chosen agent for the school, signed the loan agreement.

1884 Loan Document

Over 20 years later in1905, at the dedication of the White School, Scarborough’s first high school building, Hon. Augustus Moulton commented on the district school system of Scarborough:

Time brings its changes. School districts have been abolished with general approval and for the most part with good results. Taking all in all, the change is for the best, but the old system also had its advantages. With all its faults, there was much about it that helped to develop independence and strength of character. One of the principal objections to the system was that the appropriations to a school district were based on the number of scholars, so that a district with few pupils had short terms and poorly paid teachers. Petty quarrels and disagreements also often crept in, to the injury of the schools. It was wholly on account of feelings aroused by the location of a schoolhouse that a large tract in one of the best parts of the town seceded and became a part of Gorham.

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Bicentennial Celebration Resumes

Posted on September 1, 2021 by Mary Pickard

In March of 2020 the Scarborough Historical Society, in partnership with the Scarborough Public Library, began to bring a series of programs to the community in observance of Maine’s 200th anniversary of statehood. The series was made possible through the financial partnership of the Society and Library and a grant awarded by the Maine Humanities Council. Dr. Liam Riordan, Professor of History at the University of Maine, delivered the first program, Past and Present Perspectives in Maine Statehood, on March 1, 2020. Not long after this, the COVID pandemic brought a halt to most activities, including our programs. Finally, over a year later, in June 2021 Dr. Matthew Edney of the Osher Map Library delivered via zoom the second program of the bicentennial series, Mapping Maine. Since many people missed the opportunity to view this program, it will be repeated in September.

Bicentennial Quilt
Photo: Joyce Alden

Sunday, August 22nd, the third program in the belated bicentennial series was an in-person reception at the Library featuring an exhibit of the Scarborough Bicentennial quilt on a bed owned by William King, Scarborough native and Maine’s first governor. In the fall of 2019 more than 40 quilters from the Scarborough community created individual squares representing themes related to Scar- borough and its history. The quilt was as- sembled by Joyce Jensen, assisted by Joyce Alden. The quilt is on display at the library until mid-September when it will be returned to the Society.

The fourth program in the series, Dawn- land, presented by Abnaki Reach, is yet to be rescheduled.

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1957, 1965, & 1967 Scarborough High School Yearbooks

Posted on August 14, 2021 by Don Taylor

logo of the Oklahoma Correctional IndustriesOur thanks to the Oklahoma Correctional Insustries for their wonderful job of digitizing several of our yearbook. Newly digitized by DCI are the below Scarborough High School Yearbooks. I’ve uploaded them to our website (Education Page), the Internet Archive (Archive.Org) and to Digital Maine.  

The Four Corners – 1957 – The Scarborough High School Yearbook. Also available at Archive.org and Digital Maine.

The Four Corners – 1965 – The Scarborough High School Yearbook. Also available at Archive.org and Digital Maine.

The Four Corners – 1967 – The Scarborough High School Yearbook. Also available at Archive.org and Digital Maine.

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