SHAPLEIGH

A short history of Shapleigh

In 1668, Chief Captain Sunday (or Wesumbe) of the Newichawannock Abenaki tribe deeded Francis Small the Ossipee Tract, which included Cornish, Parsonsfield, Newfield, Limerick, Limington and Shapleigh. Small, a trader from Kittery, then sold a half interest to Major Nicholas Shapleigh of Eliot. In 1770, heirs discovered the unrecorded deed and made claim. Shapleigh's heirs took Parsonsfield, Shapleigh and one half of Limerick.

First called Hubbardstown, it was settled in 1772 when Simeon Emery erected a sawmill at the foot of Mousam Pond. On March 5, 1785, the town was incorporated as Shapleigh, named for its early proprietor. In 1830, Shapleigh's west half was set off and incorporated as Acton. In 1846, a portion of Shapleigh was annexed by Newfield. Shapleigh annexed an eastern portion of land from Waterboro in 1854.

There were sawmills in Emery Mills, Shapleigh Corner and North Shapleigh, which also had a woolen textile factory (known as Hargraves Woolen Mill) and leather board factory. For a few years beginning in 1837, iron was produced at a blast furnace in North Shapleigh from bog iron retrieved from Little Ossipee Pond. Foundations, walls, and slag remained at the site at the time of a 2003 Maine Geological Survey publication on the site. Shapleigh was one of the Maine towns devastated by the Great Fires of 1947.

In 2009, Shapleigh residents (along with those of Newfield) successfully opposed the industrial-scale drawing of water from its aquifer by Nestlé, operating under the Poland Spring brand.

Adapted (trimmed) from the Wikipedia article Shapleigh, Maine, revision 1377918042 by its contributors, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.