Religion and Schools

The First Baptist Church was gathered in 1784 and organized in 1789, making it the oldest surviving religious group in the county. From it sprang the Ridge Church (1817), the Tenants Harbor Church (1842) and a Baptist Church at Clark's Island, now extinct. The Port Clyde Baptist Church separated officially from the Ridge Church in the 1940's, although the church building dates from 1897. The Port Clyde Advent Church was gathered prior to 1900 and organized early in that century. The Community Church at Spruce Head dates from the last decades of the 1800's, and St. George's Episcopal Chapel, built in 1901 at Long Cove, is a reminder of the English granite workers who lived at "Englishtown," as that locality was called. It is now only open in summer.

According to tradition related by the late Roy Meservey, the first school in town was kept for the children of Samuel Watts. That must have been in the 1780's. In 1792, four school districts were laid out. The number of districts increased as the town's population grew, so that by the late 1800's, there were eighteen or twenty schools in town. Gradually, the districts were consolidated, and in 1957, albeit with much opposition, the remaining district schools at St. George, Clark's Island, and Port Clyde were closed. Since then, all elementary students have attended school at Tenants Harbor.

A high school was begun in 1894 in the sail loft over Long's store. The High School building was erected in 1900. The first class graduated in 1901, the last in 1962. In 1963, high school students began attending Georges Valley High School in Thomaston, and St. George grammar school students replaced them in the old high school building. A few years later the building was torn down and replaced by the current town office and fire station.

For more information on town history, see Albert Smalley's entertaining book "St George, Maine"; a copy of which is in the Jackson Memorial Library.