Islesford Historical Society 2008

Purpose
Membership Application
Publication List and Order Form
Trustees and Officers

PRESIDENT'S LETTER

July 1, 2008

Dear Members and Friends,

Your Historical Society has spent another year growing its collections, distributing its publications, assisting researchers and otherwise carrying out its purposes.  Now it is time for our Annual Meeting which will be held at the Islesford Neighborhood House at 7:30pm on Wednesday, July 16th.  We hope to see all of you there and please bring your ideas for new projects, publications or activities for us to undertake.

Many of you know that I proposed and, at Town Meeting, the town approved a contribution of up to $2000 to clean up and restore the small cemetery on Baker Island.  The town contribution is with an understanding that I will propose that the Historical Society undertake the project and appropriate a like sum to carry it out.  Most of the Gilleys and Stanleys buried in that little cemetery came across the Bar from Islesford.  (I wonder if the Bar might have been easier to cross in those days as they seemed to do so quite regularly?)  I hope that you will support our society undertaking the project.  There may also be need for some volunteers.

At our last two meetings, our trustee, Ralph Stanley, told us of some of his research into the local schooner business and into the genealogy of some of our early settler families.  Sheldon Goldthwait, in Bar Harbor, has also been doing a great deal of research on the families of Mount Desert and the Cranberry Isles.  Sheldon has accepted an invitation to attend our meeting and tell us about the work that he has been doing.

We congratulate the GCI Historical Society on the grand opening of The Cranberry House!  A copy of the front page of their Museum Memo is enclosed.  We hope that you will want to pay a visit this summer.  I'm looking forward to tea at Hitty's Café!  Competition for The Jordan Pond House?

Please mark your calendar to join us at the Neighborhood House at 7:30pm On Wednesday, July 16th!

Sincerely,
Hugh L. Dwelley
President

The following is an excerpt from the book Cemeteries of Cranberry Isles and the Towns of Mount Desert Island, by Thomas F. Vining.

Baker Island Cemetery

(Cranberry Isles - 1)

Location/directions. In a field, near the northwest shore of Baker Island.  From the cobble beach on the north shore of the island, follow the trail leading toward the interior of the island.  At a concrete post turn right and follow this trail to the cemetery.

History. All persons whose graves are marked by stones are descendants of William GILLEY and Hannah (LURVEY), who moved to the island in the early 1800s from what is now Southwest Harbor.

Notes. No fence encloses this cemetery, and the grass is rarely mowed.  Some stones are leaning or laying on the ground.  The stone of Elisha B. Gilley is broken into several pieces and lays on the middle of another grave.

Names and dates on gravestones and other markers.

DOLLIVER

• [Adeline - see GILLEY]

GILLEY

• Adeline (DOLLIVER; wife of Joseph) - d. 27 March 1876 AE 54 y., 8 m.
• Charles A. - b. 27 November 1847; d. 24 November 1914
• Elisha B. (husb. of Hannah M.) - d. [...]1 AE 93 y., 10 m., 1[6?]1 d.
• Hannah M. (wife of Elisha B.) - d. 11 May 1880 AE 69 y., 4 m., 15 d.
• Harriet E. "Hattie" (wife of Samuel B.) - d. 11 February 1908 AE 51 y., 3 m., 17 d.
• Joseph (husb. of Adeline (DOLLIVER)) - d. 10 July 1894 f 81 y., 1 m., 21 d.
• Joseph W. - b. 13 October 1859; d. 5 May 1918
• Samuel B. (husb. of Harriet E. "Hattie") - d. [8?]2 January 1927 AE 70 y., 25 d.
• Victor (son of Samuel B. and Harriet E. "Hattie") - b. [and d.?] 25 October 1884

STANLEY

• Phebe J. (wife of Robert S.) - d. 24 April 1929 AE 87 y., 3 m.
• Robert S. (husb. of Phebe J.) - d. 29 November 1890 AE [...]3
• Albert (son)4 b. 1871 - d. 10 Dec. 1949

Notes.

1. Stone broken.
2. Difficult to read.
3. Remainder of stone below ground.
4. Albert Stanley entry added by Hugh Dwelley; it is not in Vining's book.

DALE HADLOCK & RALPH STANLEY
at the Baker Island Cemetery 2007

membership application
Islesford Hist. Soc. Publication List and Order Form

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