Text Box: The Bethel Journals The Bethel Journals’ goal is to put as much Bethel, Maine history as possible online.  If you know the details of what happened in years past plus the people involved and how they made it happen, then maybe you will understand today’s Bethel plus its social, economic and civic activity. I have never found anyone who came up with a “Grand Plan” for Bethel’s future. What you see today is the handiwork of many people over 200 years. What started as a wilderness settlement dependent on self-sufficiency, changed to a more interdependent community exporting wood products and agricultural produce and importing items such as clothing, food, and “fancy goods”. Employment relied on mills, farms, store keepers, school teachers and professional people. We were very, very lucky to have a railroad connection to the outside world, such as the Grand Trunk’s shipping docks in Portland. Our second stroke of luck was the generosity and interest of William Bingham 2nd of Cleveland, Ohio. His support of Gould Academy has made a big difference in Bethel’s future. Well the mills have pretty much gone, school employment opportunities have increased and a handful of farms raise more crops and milk than all the small farmers ever could. Bethel has an abundance of part time population and the recreation, tourist, retirement population has grown. So in many ways Bethel is lucky to survive and relatively speaking, prosper. Today we here owe a lot the arrival of Bingham, Booze and Skiing. Getting back to the BethelJournals—I have tried to give priority to some of the “benchmark” events in the period from 1886 to today. These are arranged in chronological order as each article and biographic profile is finished.

About the Bethel Journals

The Bethel Journals

PO Box 763

Bethel, Maine 04217

Donald G. Bennett, Editor

Contact me

Skip to Journals