High school students encouraged to apply for Elks scholarship

DEAR SUN SPOTS: Any high school senior who is a U.S. citizen and a resident of Androscoggin County is encouraged to apply for a Most Valuable Student Scholarship. Applications will be judged on scholarship, leadership, and financial need. The deadline is Friday, Dec. 4. For details and to download an application, visit www.elks.org/enf/scholars. Also visit www.elks.org/lodges for location information. -- Nancy Mahar, Lewiston Elks Lodge #371.

DEAR SUN SPOTS: In the column published on Saturday, Nov. 7, it is stated that as of 2004 there was no photo available of the first Lewiston High School building. However, when conducting research for my most recent book, "Lewiston Politics in the Gilded Age," I came across a photo that appears to be a likely possibility.

It is known that the first high school was at 268 Main Street, where Sam's Italian Foods is now. This would place it next to what was then the First Free Will Baptist Church on the corner of Main and Bates Streets. In the photo of the church, at the right is a building with broad steps. We cannot be sure that this is the first high school building, but the address and the broad steps make this a likely candidate. -- Doug Hodgkin, Lewiston, ME.

RESPONSE: Thank you Doug. Information like this is great to share as for whatever reasons it was not available to the people who were researching this back in 2004. The researchers used the photos available at that time to create paintings of the schools as seen in the photos. These paintings were then displayed in the Lewiston High School cafetaria. For those interested, if you visit Sun Spots online at www.sunjournal.com/sunspots, you can see the photo that Doug shared which is possibly of the first Lewiston High School from the mid 1800s.

DEAR SUN SPOTS: I remember that, when I was a small child, there was a series of arson house fires on Broad Street in Auburn that seemed to stop without being solved. I cannot even find a mention about it despite Internet searches, which now makes me ask, "Did I just imagine it all?" With sympathies to the victims for bringing up perhaps an uncomfortable history for them, I would like to know the number and extent of area of the crimes. And was anyone brought to justice in this case?

ANSWER: No, you didn't imagine it all. In May 2013, Sun Journal reporter Scott Taylor wrote an article about the great New Auburn fire of 1933 to mark its 80th anniversary. He wrote:

"According to accounts at the time, the fire was started by an 11-year-old boy in a car repair shop behind a Mill Street gasoline station just after lunchtime on May 15, 1933. The exact spot currently is in a back room of a pawnshop in the Pontbriand Building.

"After the fire leveled the Mill Street buildings, it spread quickly to the rest of the city. By the time it was under control six hours later, 249 buildings were destroyed along a 600-foot tract from Pulsifer Street half a mile southeast, almost to Loring Street. It destroyed 125 tenements, leaving 422 families and 2,167 individuals homeless."

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