Daily Kennebec journal., 1903-01-24

all over New England as a man who
can engineer the building of an cleo
trio road almost anywhere there is q
strip of dirt four feet wide on which
to lay the rails, but in Fairfield in ad-
dition to this he is also known as Il
man who can make almost anything
out of wood or iron if he takes a no.
| ton. If he hadn't turned his attention
| to electric roads he would doubtless
have made an equal success as an in
ventor as he has realized some re-
spectacle profits from inventions, the
cabinet sewing machine being one of
these. He is certainly what is known
| in New England as handy" man.
| A good example of this happened
once when he had some speedy horses
| in his barn. He was very particular
about their shoes. having ideas of his
own regarding the manner in which
they should be put on. His black
smith was bit mettled one day at the
minuteness of the directions given him
and exclaimed that he might shoe the
horse himself and see if he could get
| them on to suit him.
| "All right all right, just give me ell
| bow room," said Mr.. Gerald cheerfuliy
and pulling off his coat to set to work
| When the job was finished the black
smith commended it in great shape
and thereafter he took directions from
Mr. Gerald as from man who knew
what he was talking about.
In his younger days Mr.. Gerald ''fol-
llowed the river according to the Gus
tom of the young men of his day and
lswung an axe and cant dog with the
best of them in the woods and on the
ldrives. One year he joined a crew OF
linen from this vicinity that had beer
Iengaged to build 9 big dam on tho
IMerrimac river, and having mastered
La certain part of dam building he com
lmanded very good pay. The work or
the dam progressed well for II time anC
then the supply of cant dogs gave out
land the boss was hard put to ge
enough to keep the men going.
There were blacksmiths in the crew
but somehow they could not make {
. cant Dog that would do the business
The boss was a grouty old man and HI
lfussed and fumed and 'cussed'' hi
blacksmiths up hill and down becaus,
they could not do their work Mr
Gerald had spent some of his tim
WneD Dpy DI1ckSultlHlllS W1tn one q
his mothers fiatirons for, an anvil ant
the kitchen stove fqq "a forge and hat
picked UP. a fittle Khbwle4sa of iron s.
he set to work during his Eisure tim
to see what he could do atS making
cant dog II took him sbnk Nme but h
Ifnallyszeompleted something that Ii
called can't dog. <eHe had 11tiAt. stuc
lit into the floor of the shop when tn
boss walked in and noticed it. He too
it out and gave it a pretty thoroug
trial on log, grunting his approval.
'Humph. lnlmph. That's pretty gooe
Give s. to know who made that" II
was told who it was and finding NJ
Gerald gruffiy told him to leave tn
dam and 60 into the shop and sta
there until they had cant dog
enough. So he became a full fedge
blacksmith as the trade goes in tn
woods.
The job moved along smoothly fo
some time after that then another sna
was struck. 1t was necessary to dri
and blast some ledge and in doing thi
an extremely hard stratum of rock wa
struck. None of the drills could stan
up against it, no matter how they wer
tempered and sharpened. The old bos