His people came from Freeman via Kingfield, Leeds and Falmouth, Me. They arrived in Kingfield in 1831 and family has owned land in Freeman ever since. I grew up in the Manchester - West Gardiner area and attended High School in Hallowell. (the "Old HHS") Enlisted in the Navy during Korea and spent all my time in the "MED" serving aboard the USS Des Moines CA-134, USS New Jersey BB-62, MCB-4 and MCB-7 Returned to Maine with my wife Jan and the children and bought land and buildings in Freeman from Allie Richards of Strong. We tore the house down as it was about to fall in. After building another from the remains we lived there for five years. I worked at Forster Mfg., in Wilton, Kingfield Wood Products in Kingfield and Starbird Lumber Co. in Strong and also in the woods clearing property lines for Starbird. Later was a saw filer and worked in and operated the boiler that provided the heat for the Mill.
It wasn't long before I took ill from pneumonia three times in quick secession. Trying to recover I had to have something to do keep me out of mischief so we began to trace my family. After a short while it became evident that in one way or another I was related to nearly everyone who had ever lived in the town of Freeman, Me. So we uttered those famous last words, "Freeman was only a town for 138 years; let's write a genealogical history of the town and then we will know how we are connected. While the children were at home we were involved in many things; Photo-journalism, and published a series of articles on Rock and Mineral Hunting in Maine which appeared in the monthly News Magazine "Maine Life". Jan and I also had several pieces of Poetry published there.
Jan published a children's story and in the Bethel paper a column titled "Did You Know" that highlighted little known facts each week. She received many letters as a result of her work. While living in Freeman I became interested in the History of the area and we joined the Strong Historical Society. I was later elected President and Jan the Secretary.
Then I learned that I had emphysema, so we moved to West Gardiner and made our home there.
Received a phone call one evening from a friend, Roswell Dyar, and he wanted to know if we would be interested in helping form a Maine Genealogical Society. We told him we would be there and when the time came I became the by-laws committee and later served on the board of directors. Jan & I hold MGS founding membership #9.
In March of 1996 after nearly 26 years in research and writing our book was published. As they say the rest is History..........
Your Friends In Genealogy,