The Republican journal., 1909-03-11
Nearly Three Centuries
OF Temperance Agitation and Legislation
in Maine I636-l9Oe.
BY FRANK w. GOWEN.
NyN

NO 4.
The Grand Lodge of Maine Good Tenn
plars was organized in 1860. and clever
years later, in 1871, the order was incor
porated by the legislature. The petition
for this act of incorporation was signed
by Hon. Joshua Nye, Rev. Smith Baker
Jr., Major H. A. shorey, B. F. Hamilton
Sumner Bashford, w. L. Hathorn. anc
their associates, and the act was approv.
ed by Hon. Sidney Perham, who was ther
Governor of Maine, on the 9th of Fehr,,.
airy OF the same year, and in the following
spring, April 18th, the act was accented
at the annual session of the Grand Lodpe
of the order. The first Grand Lodge SEES
sion of the order in Maine was held in
Portland, August %, 1860. Eight lodges
We're represented and Nicolas Berry of
Camden was the first Grand Chief Tenn
plar in Maine, and Mr.. E. C. Lowe of
Waterville the first Grand Secretary.
| The growth of the order in Maine was
very slow during the Civil War and it
then numbered but few thousand in the
State. In April, 1866 one year after the
close OF the war, the membership was
reported at the annual session of the
Grand Lodge as 6,682; but at the annual
session in Bangor, April 8, 1867, the men,
bership was reported as q, 919. 1t was
at this session that Ex-Governor Nelson
Dingley was elected Grand Chief Tenn
plar. Nothing can say in these papers
will add any glory to the memory of Mel
son Dingley. He was grand man and
deeply interested in the Good Templar
order, as we'll as in the cause OF prohi-
bition.
At the semi-annual session held in
/ Rockland in October, 1868, Major H. A.
Shorey of Bridgton, who was then Grand
Secretary, reported the membership as
e, 500, representing 258 subordinate
lodges. 1t will be seen by these Stats
ties that in only three years after the
close of the Civil War the Good Templar
order in Maine had made rapid gains and
occupied a very high position. 1t was
then regarded, over 40 years ago, as in
more recent years, as the largest and
most powerful temperance organization
in Maine. Five years later, in October,
1878, another semi annual session of the
order was held in Rockland and w. F.
Morrill, of Portland, then the Grand Sec
rotary, reported the membership as a,
206 Here was loss of over half this
membership since the last Grand Lodge
session five years before in the city by
the sea. Various reasons were given at
this session for this decrease in member
ship, which it is unnecessary to state
here. | will only add that the Reform
Club movement, which originated with
Mr.. J. X. Osgood of Gardiner in 1872,
was then sweeping over the State and
retaining hundreds of inebriate men to
total abstinence, and no doubt at that
time, and for few years after, it retarded
the growth of the Good Templar order
The best of feeling, however, existed
between these two organizations, and
when the Reform Club movement ceased
to exist the Good Templars found that
the movement had been a most fruitful
field from which to gather bountiful
and glorious harvest of reclaimed men,
rejoicing in the sunlight of temperance,
who united themselves with the different
lodges throughout the State and We're
thus absorbed by more perfect and
better organized institution to carry on
the work of the great reform.
This Reform Club movement produced
many eloquent temperance orators, such
as DR.. Henry A. Reynolds of Bangor,
who labored so earnestly and eloquently
in the glorious cause; the unhappy Dan
Clary of DiXnont whose eloquent story
of the sad, dark days of intemperance
touched the hearts of many Maine au-
dience with pity and sorrow; and the
famous Francis Murphy, whose name as
temperance orator became household
word far and wide. This great temper
ance orator delivered his first temper
ance lecture under the auspices of the
Reform Club movement in the old city
hall in Portland in 1873. When the ex-
element and enthusiasm of this move
ment were sweeping over Maine and our
nation | was but a little boy, but can
remember the stirring meetings that
were held in the famous old town house
at Center Montville, where l was reared,
and where these reformed men or orators
used to speak of the misery, sorrow and
shame involved in the love of strong
drink
The stirring public temperance meet
ings which had been held throughout the
State by the Reform Clubs were followed
up by the Good Templars, and at the
Grand Lodge session in Rockland in 1873,
to which have referred, it was voted to
hold public meetings in every city and
town in the State, the same as the Re-
form Clubs We're doing. Over 80 years
have passed since that Grand Lodge ses-
sion was held and many Of the members
who were in attendance have left US and
,,F,I h. IL