Peter Clark, Jr. House, Gows Lane, Hallowell, 1968
Hubbard Free Library
In Liberty Men and Great Proprietors, Alan Taylor observed that in the years following the Revolutionary War, "population growth and careless exploitation had wrought worsening scarcities of land, hay, fish, lumber, timber and firewood in Southern New England’s old towns."
A better life beckoned in the District of Maine, and a three dollar fare on a boat could get a man from Massachusetts to the Kennebec valley. Each decade after the Revolution saw the population of the area increase by 10,000 or more.
Two of the early arrivals were Ephraim and Martha Ballard, who came from Oxford, Massachusetts. Ephraim brought the skills of a surveyor which were much in demand, and Martha brought the skills of a midwife and caregiver that often meant the difference between life and death for her neighbors.