Gazetteer of the State of Maine With Numerous Illustrations, by Geo. J. Varney

BOSTON: PUBLISHED BY B. B. RUSSELL, 57 CORNHILL. 1882. Public domain image from

PISCATAQUIS COUNTY.

split and quartered from end to end. The whole of this county is on
the north side of the 45th parallel of north latitude. Frosts come early,
the winters are long and snows deep; yet even in the northern part
wheat and the other farm products, excepting corn, ripen abundant
crops. When first entered by settlers, this territory was included in
Hancock and Kennebec counties, but when (in 1809) Somerset County
was incorporated, the western portion, amounting to three tiers of
townships, was embraced m this new county. In 1816, Penobscot
County was incorporated, and all but the three western tiers of town-
ships above mentioned were included m that county. In 1838, Pis-
cataquis County was incorporated, taking four tiers of townships from
Penobscot, and three from Somerset county,—the most western tier
being included in the Bingham purchase. It then extended in full
width to Canada, but m 1844 its northern portion, embracing ahout 60
townships, was annexed to Aroostook County. In its present extent it
contains more than 100 full townships, with an area of 3,780 square
miles. The townships are generally 6 miles square, lying in regular
ranges; the latter was numbered from the north line of the Waldo
patent (now constituting a part of the north line of Waldo County) the
southern tier m Piscataquis County being the sixth range in this enu-
meration. In its length north and south, it includes 16 townships,
and m its width, 7. Nearly tw^ro-thirds of these townships are now
covered with forests, and wholly unoccupied, except by the lumber-
men in their annual pursuit of logs.

The county abounds m water-power, slate, granite, limestone;
while there are some valuable mineral deposits,—the ehiefest yet known
being the Katahdin iron mine.

The most important river is the Piscataquis, which gives its name
to the county, and upon which the first settlements were made. The
pioneer settler of Piscataquis County was Eli Towne, who moved his
family from Temple, N. H., into Dover m 1803. Sebec was the first
town incorporated in the county, the act having been passed February
28, 1812. The next was Foxcroft, which was incorporated on Feb-
ruary 29, 1812. Dover, though the first settled, was not incorporated
until 1822.

The principal occurrences of wide-spread effect in the county were
the cold seasons of 1815 and the following year, when the crops suffered
to such an extent as to produce great hardship,—and the great fires of
1825, which began in August and continued until the middle of
October, in which much timber land and quite a number of dwellings
were destroyed. '

The only railroad in the county is the Bangor and Piscataquis
railway, chartered from Oldtown to Moosehead Lake. The Piscataquis
Observer, is the only paper m the county. It was started in 1838 by
George V. Edes as the Piscataquis Herald, but this was changed to
the Piscataquis Farmer, from this in 1848 to its present name. The
present proprietor is Mr. S. D. Edes, who still maintains its character
as an excellent county paper. In the war of the Rebellion, Piscataquis
County furnished its full proportion of gallant soldiers who did battle
for the Union. Colonel C. S. Douty and Major C. P. Chandler, of oui
fallen heroes, were natives of Piscataquis County.

The public schoolhouses of the county number 140,—valued at $44,-
200. The valuation in 1870 was 4,845,880 ; in 1880, $3,342,236. The