Odds and Ends From The MUSEUM!
By Trudy Wyman, Curator, Millinocket Society Museum
Company coming for the holidays or shopping needs to be done? In 1908 in Millinocket getting around town was mostly by foot or by four-legged transport. Joseph McEwen owned a livery and stable. His ad said, “look for the big steel gray team at the depot.” He also rented hacks for weddings and funerals. Powers Livery Stable on Central Street advertised “all kinds of livery work promptly attended to.” Signs on his carriages at the railroad station advertised Great Northern Hotel.
If you had your own horse and wagon to get around town, A. Davis was a blacksmith and also built wagons to order. A. H. Russell’s ad proclaimed, “prompt passenger service to and from all trains.” H. W. Howard did horse shoeing and general jobbing as well as carriage repair.
When the weather got colder, in 1908, Millinocketites could get their wood supply and also ice from McCaffrey Brothers on Penobscot Avenue. Both products could also be purchased from Millinocket Fuel & Supply Co. (coal too). Their office was in the Doctor’s Block and their yard was at the B & A Station. Fred Clifford sold cordwood to heat the homes in addition to being a local milkman. He “can deliver every morning and night, fresh milk direct from his farm.”
Needed groceries could be obtained at several stores. On Cottage Hill (early name for Medway Rd.?) was E. Barbien Groceries with “all kinds of family supplies.”
McAvey & Smart were “dealers in choice family groceries, meats, fish, fruits and first- class bakery and confectionery.” And they had a “telephone connection” for easy ordering! On Penobscot Avenue, A. C. Smart’s grocery advertised “the best line of groceries at the right prices.” In Little Italy, Fred Peluso was an “importer of foreign groceries.”
If you had guests needing accommodation, there was the Mountain View Hotel located on the “eastern side of Penobscot Avenue” about where the current telephone company building is located. It offered reasonable rates by day or week. C.J.M. Merrifield was proprietor. Many out-of-town guests stayed at the “Little Palace in the Woods,” otherwise known as the Great Northern Hotel. In 1908 E.E. Young was the manager.
Everything residents needed could be found in the town of Millinocket in 1908!
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