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

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RUMFORD.

scent of greater magnitude; for large holes peculiar to falls are found
high in the rocky hanks, far above where the waters have run within
the knowledge of man. The whole pitch is from 160 to 170 feet. The
principal one has a perpendicular descent of 84 feet, somewhat broken
hy rocks near the middle of the stream. In 1833, a stone flume v as
built at the head of this fall to divert a portion of the water to mills.
After its completion, Mr. Nathan Knapp, one of the proprietors, stepped
upon the wall to see if it was tight,—when 30 feet of it were forced
over by the water, and he was precipitated to the base of the fall, and
drowned. A few years since a steamboat was placed in this river, to
run between the falls and Canton, where it connected with the Buck-
field and Rumford railroad.

This township was granted by Massachusetts in 1779 to Timothy
Walker, jr., and his associates, of Concord, N. H., to make up losses
which they and their ancestors sustained in controversy with the town

of Bow, growing out of the purchase of Concord. The township was
at first named New Pennacook. The pioneers were Jonathan Keyes
and his son Francis, who arrived from Massachusetts in June, 1782.
A few years later came Philip and David Abbott, Jacob, Benjamin and
David Farnuin, Benjamin Lufkin and wife, Stephen Putnam and wife,
and John, Daniel and Kimball Martin,—these coming principally from
Concord, N. H. The settlement was incorporated as Rumford in
February, 1800 There are in the town Methodist, Congregationalist,
Umversalist and two Union church edifices Rumford has a good high-