St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1895-04-12

pie rarely took more than one pdpT,
and that tried to tell them whit
went on everywhere except at home
As it was not often that any event
not political within so miles o.
Haverhill was noted in its loca,
paper. We should not know from il
that there were schools and churches
with many other interests in the
region. OF the refined and cultured
society for which Haverhil Corner
was famous in that day, we have not
a glimpse. No mention is made OF
the distinguished men who visited
the town unless they were politicians.
The paper did not think the matters
we would like to know most about
were worth mentioning. So it is
that the advertisements are the most
interesting local feature of the paper.
In these things it was like the other
papers gifts time, which were polit-
ical and partisan, and only alluded
to its opponents and their views in
the briefest manner possible, when 1t
alluded to them at all. Toward the
anti-slavery movement, then begin
ming TO arouse questions which would
not down at the bidding Of Isaac
Hill, its hostility was unrelenting.
1t does not conceal its glee in telling
how George Thompson and John 6.
Whittier were mobbed at Plymouth
and echoed the prediction OF Mr.. Hill
that these disturbers OF the peace
would soon be relegated to their
native obscurity. The judgment of
posterity does not agree with Isaac
Hill.
The younger readers of the GALE
DOMAIN Can form no idea OF the bitter
ness of the anti.slavery struggle,
especially in conservative states like
New Hampshire. They will find it
hard to believe that Moves Academy
in Canaan, which had opened its
doors TO a few coored pupils, was
for that cause condemned as NUS
arce in legal town meeting, and that
on the Goth of August, 1885, five
hundred men, embracing some of the
most substantial and respected citi-
zens of Canaan and other towns,
aided by a stringof ninety-hve yoke of
oxen, hauled the offending building
out of town, where it was soon set on
fire and burned. Yet such is history.
Mr.. Reding and his brothers, kind
hearted men, who would on no &C.
count have done a neighbor wrong,
considered slavery an institution as
divine as the gospel itself. But in
some other things the Redings were in
advance of their time. Their paper
began to advocate the building OF
railroad up the Connecticut valley as
early as 1888, in face of much oppo-
sltion and even ridicule. There were
still many who considered a canal
from Lake Winnipesaukee to the river
at Haverhill as the only feasible
thing. But the success of the rail
roads in the southern part of New
England caused a gradual change Of
public opinion. Considerable space
is given to a railroad meeting held at
the hotel Of A. NJ. Rice on St. Johns
bury plain August Goth, 1885, (the
very day that Canaan Academy was
hauled out of town of which Hon.
Erastus Fairbanks was made presi-
dent and Calvin Morrill, secretary,
at which the Passumpsic railroad
had its birth, although actual work
on it was not begun for thirteen
years.
One of these occurrences on that
day foreshadowed the end Of one era,
the other looked forward to a new
one.
This paper records another institu-
ton which has almost passed away,
the country book store. The Red
ings kept one and the titles of the
books advertised indicate commun-
ity possessing a taste for solid read
ing. There were no periodicals then,
and people bought books, of form
and substance, with due elaboration
and comparison, the volume repre-
senting certain dollars and cents
earned by honest toll, and destined
to be thoroughly read by many per-
sons. No country book store now
would venture to keep the standard
classics, the solid biographies, the
reliable works of travel, and the
volumes of theology of our day, such
as the Redings found a steady sale