w 



Hot space enough have been spared to include ft, if the 

 list of tirst old things was to be a complete one? 



What State pride v^^ould ever be encouraged in the- 

 Maine sehool-boy's mnid, if he had to rely solely on hi& 

 United States history to tell hint what his State had been? 

 celebrated for? Would be ever find it out? Legislators- 

 might do much worse than insist upon a law compelling 

 increased attention to the matters of mir State history. 

 Teachers should be required to secure to their pupils by 

 talks or text-books such information as will fully supply 

 the deficiencies, and awaken a zeal and a love for home- 

 surroundings. 



It is indeed grand to know that Maine men were the 

 first by land to resist British tyrany in the Revolution. 



Says Sparks' American Biography ; "Most readers of 

 American history give Massachusetts the honor of making 

 the fir^t armed resistance to British rule in the Revolu- 

 tion, at the battle of Lexington, fought April 19^th, 1775. 

 But true history gives that credit to Maine. In 1774, 

 John Sullivan, a kiwyer and a native of Berwick, Me., 

 afterwards a distinguished general in the revolutionary war, 

 raised a force and attacked Fort William and Mary in Ports- 

 mouth harbor, which he captured and took possession of 

 one hundred barrels of powder, fifteen cannon, and all the 

 small arms and other stores. The ammunition was carried 

 into the country, and part of it concealed under the pulpit 

 of a church at Durham, N. H. This ammunition was used 

 the next year at the battle of Bunker Hill. This was the 

 first act of armed hostility committed in the colonies." 



It is indeed grand to know, that when the British 

 flag was struck for the first time on the ocean to Ameri- 

 cans, it was to the patriots of Machias, Maine, under the 

 leadership of six brothers, the O'Briens. The ship was 

 the Margaretta. Why not teach it? Will it hurt? How 

 other States would boast of it ! 



