WILLOW CREEK — Judge Silas P. Merrill of the Aroostook County Superior Court has ruled in favour of Elias Homan and the Willow Creek Hardwood Flooring Company, declaring that the Thorne family no longer holds exclusive water rights to the Willow River below the old shipyard.
The ruling clears the way for construction of a dam at Homan’s Hole and the mill race that will power the proposed flooring mill. The court found that the Thorne family’s water rights, dating to an 1825 grant, had been abandoned through non-use following the closure of Thorne & Sons Shipworks in 1891.
“Eight years of inactivity on the part of the Thorne yard constitutes abandonment as a matter of law,” Judge Merrill wrote. “The river’s water belongs to the town.”
Ezra Thorne II was visibly shaken. “My father built this town,” he said on the courthouse steps, “and the court has given it to the men with the money.”
The railroad was the unspoken presence throughout the proceedings. The Bangor & Aroostook line, which will carry the mill’s flooring to market, was cited repeatedly as the reason Willow Creek needed a new industry. Asa Pendleton had made clear the mill would not be built without the railroad connection.
“Mr. Pendleton’s mill cannot exist without the railroad,” Thorne said bitterly, “and the railroad cannot exist without the towns it serves. So the town chooses the railroad over the family that founded it. That is the logic of the iron horse.”
Construction of the dam is expected to begin in the spring.
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