McEachern trucks, Atlas Plywood tractor moved Coburn Steamboat building to make American Legion’s permanent home

Jun5

The Cecil R. Cole Post #94 American Legion on Pritham Avenue is the very same building that used to be the offices of the Coburn Steamboat Company in Greenville Junction. During the early boom years before roads were built, the Coburn offices at the Junction were used to conduct the business of transporting freight and passengers north from Greenville to Rockwood and Mt. Kineo. When the road between Greenville and Rockwood was completed in the mid-1930s, business subsided on the wharf. By 1944, the Coburn building was closed.

2010_34_0004 Am.Legion building being moved

The Coburn Steam Co. office was moved across the ice on Moosehead Lake from Greenville Jct. Wharf to Pritnam Ave.                             2010.34.0004                                    

For the sum of one dollar, historical records indicate that in 1947 the Coburn building was given to the American Legion by Louis Oakes, who rose to become a great benefactor of the Town of Greenville from his early days as a surveyor with the Hollingsworth & Whitney Company. Mr. Oakes had the brick school built and gave it to the Town of Greenville; it opened in 1935 and remains in operation today.

In the winter of 1947, Dominic Murray and Gerald Peachey supervised a crew of six men to maneuver the Coburn building from the Junction onto its lot on West Street, now known as Pritham Ave.

Four trucks owned by C.W. McEachern and a tractor owned by Atlas Plywood were used to move the building across the ice on Moosehead Lake to its permanent home.
2010_34_0006 Am. Legion building on ice

A bulldozer pushes while trucks pull the Coburn building across Moosehead Lake          2010.34.0006

The building, constructed of concrete, measuring 22 feet by 67 feet and weighing 70 tons, was hauled 900 feet up a 30-foot grade by three tractors. The land on West Street was offered by the Rev. Robert Mayhew, long-time pastor of the Union Evangelical Church in Greenville and founder of the Log Chapel in Rockwood. It wasn’t until the mid-1950s that the American Legion building was set on a cellar foundation. Over the years, many renovations to the building were made from the financial contributions of the Legion Auxiliary. The final payment on a mortgage was made August 2, 1960. Today, the Cecil R. Cole Post #94 continues to be an active part of the area’s communities.