vices, the parish embracing some of the oldest and most respectable families in town.
The Roman Catholic church has a very large attendance and membership, their house of worship, built in 1877, being one of the best structures in town, and the work of the church tending much to good order and morality in the large number brought within its influence.
Thus it may be seen that the religious element of our natures can have its preferences gratified by the different shades of belief and faith here represented.
Lancaster academy was incorporated in 1827, and has been the educational centre for a large region, and many who here received the finishing touches of their scholastic education have been and are men of mark and influence in all the walks of life in our widely extended country.
Before speaking of the Lancaster that now is, I wish to mention more particularly some of the men who have contributed largely to the prosperity and growth of the town in education, morals, and wealth, who have passed away, and now sleep in "God's acre," but whose memories are dear to all who reverence sterling worth and heroic devotion to duty. Among the men whose lives were not very much disturbed by the ambitions and turmoils of political life, but who kept on the "even tenor of their way," were Major Jonas Wilder, Edwards Bucknam, Ephraim Stockwell, William Lovejoy, Andrew Adams, Phineas Hodgdon, Bryant Stephenson, Benjamin Adams, James B. Weeks, and John Mclntire. Edward Spaulding was a descendant of the famous Hannah Duston. His father, Daniel Spaulding, was one of the first settlers of Northumberland. Edward married the eldest daughter of Capt. John Weeks, and cleared the farm on the slope of Mt. Pleasant in this town, where he lived until his death, which occurred in 1845. He was a famous hunter, his last exploit being the killing of a wolf, which he had caught in a trap, with a small club, and this when in his seventy-sixth year. His wife lived to be nearly 100 years old, and was a woman of great energy and worth.
Among those whose lives were spent almost entirely in town, having come with fathers, the earlier settlers, and who attained prominence in political and social life, were,—Maj. John W. Weeks, whose fame as a soldier was won on the bloody battlefields of Lundy's Lane and Chippewa, and who, after the war of 1812, returned to his farm, and was successively elected county treasurer, sheriff, senator from Dist. No. 12, and member of congress in 1828, serving two terms;—Adino N. Brackett, who filled all the town offices, and represented the town in the legislature a greater number of terms than any other man in the town, who was clerk of the courts for a long time, a man of good judgment, of a decidedly literary and philosophic cast of mind, and a good man;—Richard Eastman, one of the solid men, upon whose good sense and judgment his fellow-citizens could rely with perfect confidence, and who lived a spotless life, enjoying all the honors his town or county could confer.
Among others in their several pursuits and professions who gained
