Throwback Thursday

The Wards are one of those Kennebunkport families that keep popping up in my local history research. Nathaniel Ward moved here from Salem, Massachusetts in 1789. He married ferryman Shephen Harding’s daughter. When Lydia Harding Ward died, part of her father’s property near the mouth of the Kennebunk River was sold by the Ward Family to the United States Government. We all know that property today as Government Wharf. Nathaniel Ward’s eldest son, Nathaniel, Jr., a boatbuilder, built a house at the corner of Maine and School Streets in 1812. His son Charles, whom I have featured in several articles,...

A yellow stagecoach on sleigh runners turned up in Barnstead, NH recently after having been stored away in a trailer there for decades. The gentleman upon whose property it had been abandoned contacted me at the Kennebunkport Historical Society to inquire about it since Kennebunkport was lettered above the doors on both sides of the coach. I recognized something in his photographs of the 10x4x6 foot vehicle. The shape of the coach reminded me of old photos I have seen of Ham Littlefield’s stagecoaches. He had a stable on Ocean Ave at the foot of Wharf Lane until it burned...

There is a monument at the Cape Porpoise Pier honoring soldiers and sailors who served in the American Revolution and a plaque in Cape Porpoise Square honoring veterans of WWII, Korean, and Vietnam conflicts. WWI Veterans were honored upon their return to Kennebunkport in 1919. An all-encompassing Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Eagle perches proud in the center of Dock Square. I’ve always wondered why Kennebunkport does not have a monument specifically honoring veterans of the Civil War. Imagine my surprise to learn that there once was a bronze tablet honoring Civil War Veterans on Stone Haven Hill that has since...

Kudos to L. Blake Baldwin of Video Creations in Kennebunk for converting this 16mm film from our collection. It was produced by the U.S. Department of Agriculture after the Maine Fire of October 1947 to warn folks to prevent forest fires, “It happened in Maine so don’t let it happen to you.” Keep an eye out for shots in the Kennebunks in 1947. This is the clearest copy of this footage I have ever seen. Thanks, Blake!

“I was awakened from a sound sleep and saw this figure of a Quaker lady surrounded by a gray haze. She glided by the foot of the bed and went out the door,” recalled musical star Jane Morgan’s good friend Muriel Pierce to a reporter in the mid-1960s. The newspaper man and his photographer had agreed to spend a misty moonless night in the farmhouse next to the foundering Kennebunkport Playhouse. Photogenic believer Jane Morgan conducted a guided tour of the most haunted corners of the old house, stopping briefly to let the photographer capture her stunning silhouette in a...

Did you ever wonder why Spring Street in Kennebunkport is so named? It was the way to the freshwater spring that stood along Mast Cove between The Village Baptist Church and the White Columned Nott House. Its location is clearly indicated on both the 1856 map and the 1872 map of Kennebunkport. That spring was in use long before the town of Kennebunkport fashioned a town water system. In fact, residents of Kennebunkport were already relying on the spring for drinking water before the Village Baptist Church was built in 1838. When Captain Eliphalet Perkins conveyed the lot to the...

World War II veterans Wesley Boynton and Morse Haithwaite performed in the Kennebunks for the first time in 1946 when their friend Robert Currier invited them to appear at his Kennebunkport Playhouse. Their performance was so well received that they returned several times that season to perform at the Olympian Club on Temple St. Starting in 1947, Boynton and Haithwaite’s New Bostonians Light Opera company performed regularly at Kennebunk Town Hall, but it was becoming clear that they needed a theatre of their own in the Kennebunks. Contractor Arthur Hendrick encouraged Boynton and Haithwaite to bid on the old Town...

The Municipal Building on Elm St is cramped and outdated. The town employees are giving tours of the building this week to show taxpayers the condition of our 1960 Town Offices. I thought this might be a good time to talk about the various Town Halls in Kennebunkport’s history. Cape Porpoise was originally the center of town. Town Government was conducted in the Meetinghouse there along with religious services. By 1763, the town had spread out. The meetinghouse at Cape Porpoise was considered inconveniently remote for much of Arundel’s population. The Cape Porpoise Meetinghouse was deliberately burned to end the...

I love this view of Dock Square shared with us by Cecil Benson, Jr. It must have been taken between 1933 and 1942. Benson’s can be seen here at the far right where Alisson’s stands now. Cecil wrote, “This is the restaurant that Dad [Cecil Benson, Sr.] and the family ran during the summer from 6 AM till 1-2 the following morning. We ate all our meals here and spent a lot of time walking back and forth from our home on North Street. Dad served full meals, had a soda fountain, potato chips fried by hand in the back...

The first picture I’m sharing today shows The Kennebunk Green as it was in 1927. Henry Parsons donated the land at the corner of Main and Fletcher Streets to Kennebunk for a Civil War Memorial. The Civil War Memorial Statue was unveiled there on October 24, 1908. The small Revolutionary War era ships cannon on the little wooden cart was once owned by Captain Wm Lord, Jr. It was half-buried on Main St for many years and used as a hitching post. It was occasionally pulled out and fired for public occasions with disastrous results. Lord’s descendant, William Barry built...

We have probably all heard the warnings about the hurricane that may threaten our coast this weekend. I worry about potential flooding and beach erosion. I can’t help but think about the hundreds of shipwrecks at rest under our beaches and along our rocky shores that might make an appearance in the wake of a destructive storm. In October 1891, the builders of St Ann’s-by-the-Sea had finally raised enough funds to finish the tower on their beautiful Cape Arundel Episcopal Church. The workmen had gone home on the night of October 29, 1891, when the four-year-old, 121-ton schooner Empress of...

When someone calls to ask me to help them learn more about their old Kennebunkport house, the first thing I do is to look at the 1856 York County Atlas Wall Map, Sanford Everts & Co 1872 York County Atlas Map, and our handmade WWII Kennebunkport Warden’s Map of their neighborhood to learn who lived in their house during those time periods. The various years of Sanborn Insurance maps provide information about the structure itself, including the number of stories, materials, orientation, etc. during that particular year. If it is a Cape Arundel or Kennebunk Beach property, I might consult...