In Maine, 183 square miles of new area were topographically surveyed, 179 miles of levels were run, and 15 bench marks were established during the last fiscal year. The only hydro-economic work carried on in Maine during the fiscal year 1904-5 was that of the weekly analysis of composite daily samples of water from Androscoggin River, at Brunswick, by Prof. Franklin B. Robinson of Bowdoin College. Androscoggin River was selected as a typical stream of the north Atlantic drainage area, and the results will be used in connection with similar data now collected upon other rivers in a study of chemical denudation in the United States.

50 Years Ago, 1956

Roger W. Merrill, superintendent of the Auburn highway department, said the crew which began excavation and leveling work at the site for the new National Guard armory in Upper Pettengill Park has struck an area of wet blue clay and that it has been necessary during the day to move the power shovel several times to keep it from sinking into the muck. According to Merrill, crews began work in the area off the actual construction site for the armory and several times had to move the shovel back and put down a gravel apron on which to rest the wide treads of the shovel.

25 Years Ago, 1981

Uncle Sam’s Army want YOU, unless you’re a woman. The Army already has more than 61,000 female soldiers, and it’s “trying to hold the line” because of indications that such numbers, especially if they go much higher, may hamper combat readiness, it told Congress. The Defense Department has set a recruitment target of 87,500 Army women by 1986, but the Army is “reluctant” to pursue that aim, according to testimony by William D. Clark, acting assistant secretary for manpower. Clark told a Senate Armed Services manpower subcommittee that “I don’t think it is a question of whether we should have women in the Army or not. I think it is a question of the degree of reliance that we place upon women.”