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-=-=-= THE FIRST SETTLERS =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= -=-=-= After 150 years, British troops triumphed at Quebec and ended French dominion in Acadia. With Native Americans scattered and the fleur-de-lis banished, lands along the Maine coast opened for English settlement. Governor Francis Bernard of Massachusetts obtained a royal land grant on Mt. Desert Island, and in 1760, attempted to secure his claim by offering free land to settlers. Abraham Somes and James Richardson accepted the offer and settled their families at what is now Somesville. The onset of the American Revolution ended Bernard's plans for Mt. Desert. In its aftermath, Bernard lost his claim, and the newly created United States of America granted the western half of Mt. Desert Island to John Bernard, son of the governor (a supporter of the new Republic), and the eastern half to Marie Therese de Gregoire, granddaughter of Cadillac. Bernard and de Gregoire soon sold their land holdings to non-resident landlords. Their real estate transactions probably made very little difference to the increasing number of settlers homesteading on Mt. Desert Island. By 1820, farming and lumbering vied with fishing and ship building as major occupations. Settlers converted hundreds of forest acreage into wood products ranging from schooners and barns to baby cribs and hand tools. Farmers harvested wheat, rye, corn and potatoes. By 1850, the familiar sights of fishermen and sailors, fish racks and shipyards, revealed a way of life linked to the sea. Many towns on present-day Mt. Desert Island bear the names of those first settlers, including Abraham Somes, a Massachusetts sailor who, with his wife and four daughters, settled on the island in 1762. Because of its proximity to sailing routes, the western side of the island was settled first. Later arrivals gravitated to the island's eastern half, where the soil proved more suitable for farming. Then known as Eden, Bar Harbor was incorporated as a town in 1796. By 1820, the year Maine was admitted to the Union, most island inhabitants had en-gaged in fishing, shipbuilding, lumbering or farming. This period of island life is well documented at the Islesford Historical Museum, located on Little Cranberry Island and accessible by cruise boat. Continued in news History4 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= |