our restoration

the history

In 1763, a fur trader, Captain John Frost with his schooner and desire to be near his native partners, became the first permanent white settler of the future town of Perry, Maine. In 1781, Jacob Boyden, of Foxboro, Massachusetts, decided to leave his home and friends and stake his claim for good in the woods. He built his log cabin between two streams, on a ridge, overlooking the north side of a medium-sized body of fresh water; the indigenous Passamaquoddy named the mythical, Nesseyik - where water is muddy - in oral tradition the result of a battle between two chiefs, one in the form of a serpent, the other as a giant slug.

To exploit large quantities of rejected timber (left as they fell) from pre-settlement lumbering of primordial, great white pine, Jacob's son, Delpha, would build a sturdy sawmill on a stream near the lake. It came to be known as Boyden's Lake.

In 1784, Revolutionary War hero, General Benjamin Lincoln, of Hingham, Massachusetts and two associates, impressed with the natural beauty and plentitude of the area, purchased from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (as a speculative venture and for the purposes of settlement) a slice of eastern wilderness on the Passamaquoddy Bay. It included these pioneers, a native population and a large portion of that lake.

He spawned the arrival of a band of hearty neighbors, the Hingham Migration, led by his son, Theodore.

Six years later, William Bugbee (directly descended from Edward Bugby, of solid Puritan stock, who in 1634, voyaged from the port of Ipswich, England on the good ship Francis to Roxbury, Mass.), traveled from Dorchester, Mass. and settled on the bay. Twenty-eight years later, even as the British held the disputed Eastport - six miles away - he helped found a new town - in Washington County, on the Little River.

Perry (formerly designated Plantation #1) was named for Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, whose great fame came in 1813, from the Battle of Lake Erie, where U.S. ships under his command defeated British forces - a turning point in the War of 1812. His message to President William Henry Harrison, "We have met the enemy and they are ours." The Commodore passed away in 1819, the year after the town's incorporation.

In 1820, separating from Massachusetts, Maine became a state. Four years later, one of William's sons, Edward, purchased from Theodore Lincoln, a parcel of land (lot # 5 in the third range) on the east side of Boyden's. He cleared land, built a traditional New England style cape, established a farm, and courted his bride. In 1838, he married Ann - she bore five children, Amariah, John Gilman, Stephen Nash, Henrietta Brewer and Loarn Patten. Two of his siblings, William and John Brewer, built to his north and south - three brothers in a row. William and John built their capes facing the lake, their brother, facing a brook. For many years known as the Edward Bugbee farm - one day, it would be our farm.

In the cold, mid-winter of 1853, Edward passed away, followed by Ann, fourteen months later, in the cool Maine spring, leaving their children orphaned. Two weeks after Edward's death, his brother, William, succumbed as well. Also victims of this apparent epidemic were the wife and son of John Brewer. William's young children found a home with family in Roxbury, while Edward's eventually dispersed, to Eastport and the new state of Minnesota. One of John Brewer's boys, Thomas Sherman Bugbee, established the second cattle ranch (the Quarter Circle T) in the Panhandle of an emerging Texas. John Brewer passed away in 1899.

Within seven months of William Bugbee's passing, Robert and Martha Ann Golding (recently of nearby Robbinston, formerly from "over home," Saint John, Canada), searching for new quarters, purchased from William's estate, the property to Edward's north. Robert Golding was a grandchild of Loyalists from Long Island, New York, who as part of a larger movement, migrated to Canada after the Revolutionary War. Robert's father, Long Island native, Daniel "Trapper" Goulding (a tough and crusty, mythical fellow with piercing and twinkling black eyes), relocated his family to Robbinston from Canada in 1827. A legend to his descendents (lore has it married a Micmac princess), he built a log cabin on the edge of a small lake that today bears his name. Maintaining connections with Canada, Robert wed Martha Ann Smith, on a warm summer Tuesday in 1840. A lumberman and surveyor by trade, he would lay out the Golding Road.

Edward's estate, 32 acres and a house traversed by the bubbling Bugbee Brook, fell into arrears and changed hands several times - owned briefly by Civil War veteran, Salathiel D. Seeley (the town butcher), who with his wife, Margaret, laid an infant to rest in the north field. Falling on hard times (the state was heavily affected by a postwar recession); he could not pay the taxes. Robert and Martha Ann Golding purchased this adjacent farm in 1870. Within two years, one of their ten children, Nathaniel, with his new bride, Mary Frye, moved into the aging home. In 1876, he paid his parents, a sum of 200 dollars, for his rural, fertile estate. All nine of the exceptional Golding children - Mame, Rob, Francis, Daisy, Vi, Will, Amy, Kate and Jim - were born in the tired cape. Further down, Nathaniel's two brothers, Samuel and William, would put down roots as well - three brothers on the Golding Road.

About 1893, Nathaniel and Mary built anew (on a granite foundation) - a simple, hipped roof, Georgian style, two-story farmhouse (fronted by an expertly laid, fieldstone wall) - solid and austere, it would someday be our home. They moved the Bugbee cape down to the lake and turned it into a camp - renting at the turn of the century, to J.W. Raye, who had enlisted with their son (his best friend, Rob - Robert Nathaniel Golding), in the Spanish American War. Raye's, stone ground mustard mill (still operated in Eastport by his descendents) supplied Maine's burgeoning, sardine industry.

Edward's home stands today, as do the dwellings of his two brothers. Robert and Martha Ann's great-great granddaughter, Georgiana Kendall, now lives in William Bugbee's old cape. Formerly the home of her grandparents, Leona and Everett Kendall - who received it from Everett's parents, Georgiana (Golding) and Samuel Kendall. "Georgie's" dad, "Bill," still faithfully tends to the buildings and land.

The Golding clan was an honest, industrious family, respected by their neighbors. Pa was a farmer, stone mason, woodsman, hunter, trapper, fisherman and guide, as well as, a talented broom-maker - a skill acquired from the Boydens, who learned it from the "Indians." He also played the fiddle. Ma (a former schoolteacher) was a diligent weaver, quilter and rug-maker. She sang to her family as she spun yarn - wove warm blankets and rough cloth (she made into clothes). She worked hard around the house and barn - even bucksawing wood for their diminutive, cast-iron kitchen stove.

They had their share of tragedy. They lost a baby, Francis Edward, just shy of 2 months old. Their beautiful Kate passed away at a tender age, sweet 16, of "aortie insufficiency." She lay down on the couch in the kitchen for a nap and never opened her eyes. Her Excelsior Report Card revealed a straight -A- student with consistently excellent deportment. Their fifth child, Will (a member of the Maine Militia), in his 25th year, succumbed to frigid, springtime, Boyden waters, when his sail-rigged canoe capsized some 60 rods from shore. He was attempting to cross a blustery lake, to see his sweetheart, Flossie. So esteemed was he held by the community, that at his funeral, some 300 people filled the house and yard - his regiment fired a volley.

In 1917 (the year they installed their first telephone, "the farmers line"), Mary passed away, having lost Nat, seven years earlier. A rosebush she once planted at the side of the house still blossoms there today. Their son, Rob, in respect to his father's deathbed wish, took over the family farm. With a new Ford Model T pick-up - he lived off wits, his good nature and the land, weathering the Great Depression.

In 1935, Jane, Rob's new bride (and second wife) spearheaded a cape-style addition. Their next door neighbor, cousin Everett, executed the carpentry. They added a brand-new kitchen and turned the old pantry (with its black iron sink and hand pump) into a modern bathroom - complete with running water (supplied by a gas-powered well pump), porcelain fixtures and a glorious, claw foot bathtub. They could finally retire their dependable outhouse (the two-seater became a hen house) and a well-worn, dutiful, tin step-tub (so ancient, it could well have been inherited from the Bugbee homestead). Keeping kerosene lamps - electricity would not reach their property until 1949.

Virginia, Rob's only child from his first marriage (he sent no sons to war), was described as an intelligent, articulate, original woman. She was a grade school teacher and the first female harness racing driver in the State of Maine. A stalwart of her community, she was proud of her accomplished father. Possessing all of his father's talents (though he didn't play the fiddle), he ran a lath-mill on the Little River, a maple syrup camp on Penknife Lake and was a gifted storyteller.

Dating back to the early 1920's, there exists both silent and sound movie footage of hunting and fishing expeditions, Rob's storytelling and broom-making, plus period shots of the Golding family and farm. These precious, celluloid glimpses, shot by film buff, Thomas Archibald "Archie" Stewart, a businessman from, "away" (Newburgh, New York), are archived at the Northeast Historic Film, in Bucksport, Maine. Rob was his guide, as his father, Nat, had been, for Archie's father, "Stew".

At the University of Maine Folklife Center in Orono, there are hours of illuminating audio reels of Rob reciting his poems and telling his remarkable stories. They contain wisdom, wit and memories of his life in rural Maine. These cherished recordings were made affectionately, by Archie, as well as, folklorist and author, Dr. Edward "Sandy" Ives and Maine humorist, Marshall Dodge. Archie wanted to preserve Rob's much loved stories and was proud to say that he considered "the Colonel," one of the family (click to hear Rob tell Archie a story).

In 1951, Rob deeded his home to Virginia (in consideration of 1 dollar), reserving for him, the right of use and occupancy, of his room over the kitchen. After his passing in 1969, she sold off portions of the property, the encircling woods and lakefront, whittling it down to its present 8.27 heart. Once the location of - Rob's treasured boyhood home, Edward's pioneer farmstead, Salathiel's possible folly and Nathaniel's beloved, fertile estate - where we now live - surrounded by memories of days gone by - on muddy waters - bordered by William's homestead, Robert's Golding Road and the bubbling Bugbee Brook.

Virginia cared for her father, in his declining years, in his home, where she lived for a few years after his passing. She donated to the local Native American-Wabanaki Museum, one of his prized possessions - an elegant, decorated birch-bark canoe (a symbol of a culture), handcrafted and adorned by one of the tribe's most regarded artists, Tomah Joseph (1837-1914). Rob acquired this treasure (in a trade with this friend) a lifetime before. Working as a fishing and canoe guide across the bay on Canada's, Campobello Island (a summer retreat), Tomah, a former chief, became a close friend of the Roosevelt family and the future chief of a larger land, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He would fashion for young Franklin, a similar transcendent skiff.

Joseph's personal symbol was the wise owl (ko-ko-kas), appearing in his art, it was his spirit helper. He would often include this haunting, evocative native phrase - mikwid hamin - recall me in your mind.

In the 1970's, Virginia rented to the Leavitt family.

Robert Leavitt, a linguist, was working with the local Passamaquoddy and Maliseet tribes to represent their words phonetically and produce a definitive dictionary - insuring the preservation of their language. Over thirty years in the making, the dictionary was published in 2008 by the University of Maine Press, with 1,214 pages and over 18,000 Passamaquoddy - Maliseet entries. Leavitt co-authored the tome with respected tribal elder, David Francis (one of Tomah Joseph's heroic birch-bark etchings is reproduced on the dust cover). Culling their words in a unique way, from the conversations and stories of native speaking tribe members, the dictionary's definitions provide an extraordinary glimpse into their culture and traditions - a fitting tribute to a noble people - who were once the sole, proud stewards of - these - their sacred lands.

--- Patrick Mealey & Joyce Jackson, 2009

Read more about our restoration of the Golding House.