Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 5.djvu/398

 362 THE GRANITE MONTHLY.

listened wondering upon its b?.nks, where it came sparkling outward again into sunny pastures, we followed in imagination its latest wanderings, through the moist primitive woods, with never an eddying spot or a resting place, shooting unknown rapids, tumbling over hidden rocks, foaming down unseen cascades, and by the law of its birth, up where the mountain rills are, never at rest. But it is no longer a solitary stream, with unexplored, uncultivated borders, for the iron rails are laid, and the locomotive goes screaming along its banks. 'Where it seemed uninterrupted forest to our youthful eyes, away up the silent valley, farmers have come, and the clouds which floated silently over the deep, dark woods, now shed their dews on cultivated fields and sunny pastures. We, how- ever, wish but the old-time picture, whose back-ground is the " forest primeval," where the pine still flourishes and the jay still screams.

"There is something indescribably inspiriting," says Thoreau. "in the aspect of the forest skirtii;ig, and here and there jutting into the midst of new towns, which, like the sand-heaps of fresh fox-burrows, have sprung up in its midst."

Here upon the banks of the John's, about midway between Agiocochook and the Connecticut, is located the village and the lumber industries of White- field.

It was about iSii that Asa King took it into his kingly head to purchase a large tract in and about the present thriving center of the lumber trade of this section. There had been a feeble attempt at developing the splendid water- power at this point, but like the "tallow dip" of our grand-mothers, it only developed a greater want, and a possibility. It located the village of White- field, and created the needs for increased privileges.

While surveying the locality and its advantages, it is supposed, under the pilotage of Major Burns, "Uncle Ase," as he was familiarly known, is said to have originated the "punny " remark, on account of the insignificance of the im- provements already located, " There is a good place for a dam, and an excel- lent mill-site, but there is not much of a mill there by the dam-site."

A lumber and grain mill soon grew out of Mr. King's investments, and on the bank of the stream close by, he built the first frame dwelling in town, and in time also became the landlord of the first hotel, or village inn, also erected by him. This was the nucleus of the present thriving village of Whitefield.

The old mill-house served its purpose and is gone. Its builder and the founder of the village, too, is gone ; and in the little " God's acre " over yonder, " where the rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep," an humble monument of slate tells where and when.

One ancient landmark still remains to remind the gray-haired villagers of time's unceasing changes. The old Dodge house, the second one built upon the village site, still stands upon the river's bank just as finished by Wm. Dodge in 1824. Here he lived when the post-oflice was first established and himself received the appointmentof post-master, which office he retained through suc- cessive administrations until his death, which occurred in 1S37. Here, too, he kept the first store in town ; and the house, just as at present appears, minus the coating of paint which modern days have given it, served as family dwell- ing, post-ofiice, and country store. Small income was derived, indeed, from both these sources, with which to supply the needs of a growing family, even with the simple wants of a new country, for the mail was but a weekly show of a half score of letters and a dozen papers ; and an unpretentious corner store would realize small profit from the demands of a population of two hundred souls ; so another source of revenue was added, and from the country fire-places and the newly cleared lands of the settlers, came the hard-wood ashes to Dodge's potashery, located just east of the house on the banks of the pond ; and there it stood in dilapidation as late as 1845, having outlived its usefulness.

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