LISBON
A great place to live and do business.
Lisbon, as it is known today, was settled
in 1628. Some of our early records indicate
Lisbon started manufacturing right away.
On March 4, the year unknown, Oliver Moses,
John Tebbets, Edward Plummer and Galen Moses,
organized a stock company with a capital
of twenty-four thousand dollars divided into
240 one hundred dollar shares each for manufacturing
purposes at Little River Village. They purchased
from the present proprietors mill privileges
at the Upper Falls, and such other real estate
they currently had an interest in for the
sum of seven-thousand dollars. Then they
agreed to buy the Thompson property. They
built a dam and mill and began manufacturing
cloth.
On June 29, 1798, the two branches of the
Massachusetts Legislature approved a document
appointing three commissioners to oversee
the sale of undivided land to settlers. This
sum of money had to be paid by the end of
1805. These settlers were given for the most
part, 100-acre parcels.
Bowdoin's Town Clerk Samuel Smith recorded
in April of 1798 a vote to divide Bowdoin
into two equal parts and two distinct towns.
Samuel Tebbets, Thomas Ham, and Joseph Killgore
submitted the application for Incorporation
in June of 1798. The reason being the center
of said town was broken and wasteland so
the inhabitants were obligated to meet on
the north side or south side of the town.
The document pleaded the inhabitants had
to travel near ten miles to get to town meeting
for which reason, many did not attend. They
petitioned to incorporate the western part
of Bowdoin by itself beginning at the north
west corner of Topsham. On June 22, 1799
Lisbon became incorporated under the name
of Thompsonborough in the County of Lincoln
under the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
On March 17, 1800 the first town meeting
was called to order in the house of Samuel
Tebbets to elect officers. In April of 1800
Lisbon voted to have the assessors go through
the town to take the valuation, to collect
twenty cents on a pound, and to have the
Selectmen be the committee to settle accounts
between Lisbon and Bowdoin. At the adjournment
of the annual town meeting in May of 1800
the first eight member school committee was
chosen.
On December 21, 1801 Thompsonborough voters
agreed to alter the name of the town, and
voted to petition the General Court to change
its name to Lisbon. Noah Jordan submitted
the petition to the General Court and cited
"the inconveniency in the length of
the name" as the reason for changing
it, and on February 20, 1802 the Town of
Thompsonborough was officially changed to
the Town of Lisbon.
Today, Lisbon is the third largest of fourteen
communities in Androscoggin County, and is
centrally located within a 20-mile radius
of more than 100,000 people. According to
the 1990 census records, Lisbon's population
is 9,457. State Route 196 passes through
the entire length of Lisbon connecting to
the Lewiston/Auburn area and Interstate 495
and to the Topsham/Brunswick area and Interstate
95.
Twila Lycette, Lisbon Town Clerk
Historical Events:
On December 21, 1801 Thompsonborough voted
to send a remonstrance to petition the General
Court that Wales not be given three miles
of its north end of town.
In 1803 Lisbon voted to build the Sabattus
River Bridge, and in 1806 they voted to raise
money to build a bridge over the Sabattus
stream.
On December 18, 1805 Lisbon voted to send
a remonstrance to the General Court against
the petition of the Inhabitants of the Plantation
of Little River to annex.
In 1806 our records show that Lisbon voted
25 for and 56 against the separation of the
District of Maine from the Commonwealth of
Massachusetts. Maine was admitted to the
Union as a State in 1820.
On July 27, 1811 Lisbon gave Bowdoin seventy-nine
dollars in consideration whereof Solomon
Eaton for Bowdoin quitclaimed to Lisbon all
suites or causes of suites that Bowdoin have
or could have against Lisbon and all demands
of every kind from the beginning of the world
to that date.