Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1895-05-15
A FOUL ISLANDER
Against the Fair Name of the
Good State of Maine.
Religious Cranks Seek Notoriety by
OBTAINING Pine Tree State.
The Seat Of Satan" and ''Sodom Of Maine"
Two Pet Expressions.

Boston. May Ii AT the forenoon Sos
sion of the eighth annual meeting and
conference of pastors, evangolists and
business men of tho Evangolistic Associa-
ton of New England, at the Park Street
church, this morning, the evangelists
spoke in strong language of things In
Maine. These young speakers, for they
are nearly all young. have many Of them
been working In the pine Tree State,
recently, and they pictured in vivid colo,s
the wickedness OF tho Prohibition State
where rum seems to them to be king and
where they say tho churches are filed
with 'backsliders.
THE seat Of Satan" and "the Sodom of
Maine were two Of the expressions used
by the speakers. Serious charges are
made against citizens of the little town Of
Brookton, 90 miles from Calais
Miss +. X. Edwards was the first
speaker. During the past year she has
been laboring in a little village in Maine.
where she encountered great difficulties In
her work. There was no pastor there,
and the man who claimed to be deacon
had never been ordained but held his post
ton on his own responsibility. Later
she went to another hamlet near her birth
n
full, notwithstanding the statements that
she could not do well where she was SO
we'll known
+. T. Greenwood said that he felt call
to go to Maine, and went there and found
it the coolest place he was ever in. His
work there was wonderfully successful.
Il never got quite so well acquainted with
'backslidors' as did down In Maine"
is n In a.
there" He told of another Maine town,
"Thc deadest place ever saw
There had not been a service In the
church for Is years with the exception of
two years. There are miles and miles Of
territory in Maine where there is no
minister and no service Many times
ministers have to be sent after for miles
and miles to preach funeral services.
Often there are burials without the prayer
of officiating clergymen -
John S. Blair devoted his entire re-
marks to the alleged terrible state Of desti-
tuition of religion in Maine why do we
talk about Asia and Africa and send our
missionaries there and neglect entirely
this wicked and destitute State OF MaineY'
Brother Folger said he was once in the
Seat of Satan
l never saw so much liquor drinking In
the prohibition State as there was In the
town of Brookton. There seemed moth
ing but rum in Brookton, nothing hut
drinking dancing and gambling. Tho
liquor dealer and the hotel man offered us
any amount of money IL we wouldn't
preach against rum. They offered to keep
us all winter II we wanted to stay, but
n h.. hi
gospel. Then they threatened and planned
to run us out of town
There was little girl sick in house
where we were staying, and the liquor
men went to the doctor and tried to force
him to say it was scarlet fever, so that he
could quarantine the house and imprison
us there, so we could not hold any more
public meetings, but the doctor wouldn't
do this until he was certain it was scarlet
fever.
"When he did so decide the chairman
of the board of selectmen came up and
nailed the quarantine notice on the house,
thinking we were imprisoned there But
we had left the house the night before
and their plans were frustrated. This Is
only one of the sodoms of Maine"
George G. Sutherland told how he went
up in Aroostook county. "we stayed
there two nights and they told us that
they did not went any moro. They
stopped us and told us to get
out. We rode to the next town, but they
would not let us stay there even one
night. We went over this same ground
afterwards and stayed there I've months,
and they wanted me back there now. It's
just like Boston. Sinners in Maine are
just like sinners in Boston"