WHO WAS BILL MORGAN, FOUNDER OF MARANACOOK BOYS’ CAMP? by Dale Potter-Clark

Thomas College in Waterville calls business students in their accelerated degree program the “Keist-Morgan Scholars”.  The title honors Harry Keist and William “Bill” Morgan – two men who owned and managed Thomas College during its fledgling era.

 

When Keist and Morgan owned the business school they were in their twenties. Both men were sons of farmers and each married children of professional men – Keist to the daughter of a Maine Methodist minister, and Morgan to a daughter of Dr. Eli S. Hannaford, a well known Readfield physician. In 1905, after Keist’s untimely death, his wife sold the school to Bill Morgan, and he changed its name to “Morgan’s Business College”.

Bill Morgan was a 10^th generation New Englander, born 1879 in Weld, Maine, and the elder of two brothers. His parents moved to Readfield in 1882 where they bought a 245 acre farm – east of and adjacent to the present day Maranacook Community School. Bill was a go-getter from the start. He attended Kents Hill School and afterwards, according to the 1911 Maine Chamber Catalogue, he went to New York where he served as “head of a business college turning out 1,500 students a year”.  In 1905 he returned to Readfield and married Pearl Hannaford, who was also a Kents Hill School alumnus. By age 27 Bill Morgan owned Morgan’s Business College where he and Pearl taught and Bill served as the principal. A few years later he entered into a second successful enterprise, in Readfield.

A 1908 advertisement proclaimed Morgan’s Business College as a “…high grade commercial school which secures employment for its graduates… and special rooms for every department.” Even in Morgan’s time students were assisted in “securing desirable employment.” Thomas College provides that feature to this day with their “Guaranteed Job Program”. The 1911 Chamber catalogue related that Morgan’s Business College was “on the highest standard of efficiency with all modern office devices, including billing machines, mimeographs, letter presses and other pieces of labor saving machines, which are kept in actual daily use.” This promotion went on to say that “Under Mr. Morgan’s management the college has been phenomenally successful from the first.” The entry boasted that Morgan enlisted only the most competent commercial teachers and graduated hundreds of students who readily found business positions throughout the state. 

Back in Readfield, Bill’s parents sold their Readfield farm in 1906 and bought another house nearby - also on Main Street but with frontage on Lake Maranacook. In researching various census records, directories and Kennebec County property deeds one can see Morgan’s life story unfolding. The elder couple shared the lakefront home part-time with Bill and Pearl, who were living in Waterville by that time. Morgan bought Birch Island on Lake Maranacook in 1907 where he built a cottage that same summer. From there he began to develop Camp Maranacook, an eight-week summer adventure camp for young men ages six to sixteen. More than likely Morgan was inspired by John Chase - another Readfield native and educator - who had established Chase’s Boys Camp on Torsey Pond ten years earlier, reputed to be the first summer boys camp in Maine.

 In 1911 Bill ran an advertisement in the Chamber Catalogue that included a picture showing large canvas tents set-up in a woodsy setting. The caption read “Real tent life at Camp Maranacook for boys, Readfield, Maine under the personal direction of W.H. Morgan of Waterville, Maine.”  Morgan, who was known as a suave and likeable people-person with drive, had simultaneously developed a second venture - this one to satisfy his ambition during the summer months. That same year Bill sold his school in Waterville to John L. Thomas, Sr., who renamed it, Morgan-Thomas Business College. In 1962 it was finally named Thomas College.

 After that Morgan was devoted fulltime to building Maranacook Boys’ Camp into a successful business that served hundreds of boys from all over the country. He and Pearl continued to live in Readfield during the warmer months, and in the winter they kept an apartment on Boylston St. in Boston where they could more easily meet and recruit campers.

 As the camp evolved Bill managed to accumulate two islands and one-hundred-eight acres with over a mile of wooded lakeshore. Fifty buildings for every need were built on the property, as well as athletic fields and a horse riding facility. He also owned a forty-three acre outpost on Tumbledown Mountain in Weld. Campers were exposed to every kind of outdoor sport and athletic activity imaginable as well as photography, music, theater, woodworking and boat building.

Bill Morgan ran Maranacook Boys’ Camp for thirty-eight consecutive years until he was stricken with heart disease and forced to sell out. In 1965 Camp Maranacook’s subsequent owners sold the camp to a Massachusetts developer, who subdivided all the land into cottage and year-round house lots. A few of the original buildings remain as the only reminders of what once was.

 Bill Morgan died suddenly in 1947 at age sixty-seven. His home passed to his niece, Joanne Hunt, who owned it until 1974. In the meantime she subdivided part of Morgan’s land into Hunt’s Lane. Morgan is buried at Readfield Corner Cemetery with his wife, infant daughter, parents and brother along with Joanne and her husband Donald Hunt.

 

This article was written by Dale Potter-Clark who is a founding member and consultant for Readfield Historical Society and co-leader of Readfield History Walks. She is currently in the process of co-researching and writing two books. One with Charlie Day regarding the evolution of summer resorts and kids camps in Readfield; and another with Bill Adams about old houses in Readfield and the people who lived in them. FMI about her works visit www.readfieldmaine.blogspot.com

(C) 2015 All Rights Reserved by Dale Potter-Clark

This article appeared in Community Advertiser Nov. 21, 2015