The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1898-11-26
A QUEER COMMUNITY.
Strange Lot Of People in a Small
Maine Town.
They Are Happy and Prosperous With
out Schools, Law, Theology, Medicine
or Taxes-The Only Place Of Its
Kind on Earth.

New York and Boston papers for ac-
counts of queer people and strange
forms of government in different parts
of the world could learn facts worth
studying by going to Norcross. The
settlements of Eskimos on the coast
of Greenland have their old men, the
tribes of Africa have their chiefs, and
even penal colonies recognize the au-
thority of firearms and the lash. Here
the law-abiding people feel but one
power-the hurrying, unsympathetic
cars, which bring everything that
comes to their homes and take away
everything that goes out.
The distance from Milnocket bridge,
which crosses the West branch east
of there, to Perkins Siding, which is
three miles west, is five miles as the
railroad runs or the crow flies. AT
and between these two points are five
settlements of new log and board
structures, comprising about 40 build
ings in all. Of these one is "a railroad
station, one is small store, two are
small hotels, one is a sawmill, six are
good-sized sporting camps, eight are
frame houses with shingles and clap
boards on them, and the rest are prim-
itive log cabins with splits for roofing,
spotted poles for floors and boughs for
bedding. One-half of the male inhab-
itants are either guides or lumbermen,
partly both, one-quarter are mill hands
who saw spool bars and bowels at Per-
kin's Siding, and the remainder are Sec
ton hands and other employees who
| work for the Bangor & Aroostook rail-
| road. Though no census was ever
| taken of the place there are about
| 200 people who live there the year
round. Among them are some rs wom-
en- and nearly 40 children. This is
| when the population is at low ebb. In
July when the West Branch drive
comes down the population swells to
400 or 500, and after open season for
big game begins it often reaches 1000
souls, besides Indians.
Having grown without governmental
restraint from one log camp to its
present proportions inside Of three
years, Norcross has made itself the
most anomalous community on earth.
1t is not town. It is not even a planta-
ton. On the old survey maps it is
named Indian township, No. B, so
called by the surveyors to distinguish
it from Indian townships Nos. 1 and
2. The name of Norcross signifies moth
ing. It was so called in order to locate
a station for railroad and post Office
for the hunters.
Though property that cost $5OO,000 is
here and visible, the assessor and tax
collector never visit the place. The
children are born and grow up without
seeing the inside or the outside of a
schoolhouse. There are not two rods
of bicycle and not 20 rods of cart roads
in the whole township. AS the nearest
clergyman, lawyer and doctor are from
SO to SO miles away the people get talong
very well without them. When
couple want to get married they take
their bridal tour in hunting up min
lister and coming home again. IT a
person is sick he is sent out to doc
tor, because no physician can be coaxed
to come and see him; and, in case he
= dies, the body must be transported
more than 30 miles before it can rest
in a Christian burying ground. There
is no drug store, no dance hall, and no
barroom or other place where liquor
is sold in the township. If two or more
men have a dispute which leads to
free fight, the non-combatants stand
hy to see fair play, without attempting
to interfere. In case the defeated par
ty feels himself wronged and wants to
take the matter into court, he cannot
afford TO do 50, besause he would have
to travel nearly all day by rail before
he could find magistrate. Even the
game wardcns who arrest men for kill
ing deer spend more money in taking
their prisoners to court than the fines
amount to when a conviction is Sc
cured. Once in it's history, when
murder was committed near here, a
sheriff from Dover spent week reach
J ing here and getting back home. The
chances are it would take something
bigger than murder to take him there
again.
The person who reads this descrip'
tion of Norcross and thinks the inhab.
itants are degraded or immoral will
make great mistake. A mail four
. times day brings letters and papers
, from everywhere. An enterprising ano
considerate railroad carries away aA
the people have to sell, and brings II
all they buy. Divine Providence does
: the rest. The men are industrious anc
moral. The women are model wives
and excellent cooks. The children are
bright and we'll dressed. If Norcross
were formed into plantation or in
, corporated as a town, the residents
: would have to pay municipal, county
and state taxes. Now they pay nc
taxes, they do not vote, and every mar
is as good as his neighbor. The place
is fairer than Utopia, and sweeter thar
| the dream of nihilist- 1t has no coun
terpart on earth.-N. Y. Sun.