In Episode 358 Jeff Belanger and Ray Auger visit Fairfield, Vermont, searching for the controversial birthplace of 21st U.S. President Chester A. Arthur. Today there are multiple historic markers and even an historic site, but the place and year of his birth is in debate. How did it happen?
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Produced and hosted by: Jeff Belanger and Ray Auger
Edited by: Ray Auger
Theme Music by: John Judd
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21st President Chester A. Arthur.
The historic site in Fairfield, Vermont, where President Chester Arthur was NOT born.
The Vermont historic marker outside of the birth house site in Fairfield, Vermont.
The Vermont historic marker in downtown Fairfield, Vermont.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:
*A note on the text: Please forgive punctuation, spelling, and grammar mistakes. Like us, the transcripts ain’t perfect.
[DRIVING IN CAR]
RAY: We’re pretty far up here in northern Vermont.
JEFF: That we are. We’re east of St. Albans, Vermont, and about 12 miles south of the Canadian border.
RAY: Vermont’s northeast kingdom is a mysterious place. And remote too!
JEFF: That it is. It would be easy to hide up here.
RAY: Hmmm… the way you said that makes me think we’re looking for something hidden.
JEFF: We are. Something hidden AND mysterious.
RAY: Oooooh got it. I can see up ahead that this paved road turns into a dirt road in a minute. What are we looking for? Are we going to be off-roading here soon?
JEFF: No, we’re not off-roading, but our first stop is right up here on the right. We’ve come to East Fairfield, Vermont… to look for a president of the United States.
[INTRO]
JEFF: I’m Jeff Belanger.
RAY: And I’m Ray Auger. Welcome to Episode 358 of the New England Legends podcast. Thank you for joining us on our mission to chronicle every legend in New England one story at a time. We’re always on the hunt for historical oddities and curiosities, ghosts, monsters, UFOs, and anything else weird. Most of our story leads come from you, so please reach out to us anytime through our web site.
JEFF: We’ll go searching for this president of the United States right after this word from our sponsor.
SPONSOR
[DRIVING]
RAY: So we’re up here in East Fairfield, Vermont, looking for a president?
JEFF: We are! It’s an election year, and I know there’s few things as triggering in this country as talking about presidential politics. We have good news for everyone. We don’t talk about living presidents. We don’t tell you who to vote for. But we do love history. The weirder the better. We should pull over here by that little yellow house.
RAY: Okay.
[CAR STOPS / DOORS CLOSE]
JEFF: Ray, we’re looking for the birthplace of President Chester A. Arthur.
RAY: Okay, I admit it. The name is familiar, but I don’t know a lot about him.
JEFF: That’s totally fair. He’s not one of those stand-out names in presidential history. But he WAS president. Go ahead and start looking him up on your phone.
RAY: Already on it. Okay… Chester A. Arthur was the 21st president of the United States. Oh… check this out… he was the Vice President to James Garfield. Garfield took office March 4th, 1881, and was assassinated six months later on September 19th. So Chester Arthur became president after the assassination.
JEFF: Right.
RAY: This is interesting, Arthur was a vain guy. He dressed well, and preferred to be known as General Arthur, referring to his title during the Civil War. He never saw combat, but liked the title. He tried to lower taxes. He felt it was an embarrassment when the government had a surplus. He also only served one term. He was not nominated to run again.
JEFF: So his own political party didn’t like him.
RAY: Right?! Chester Arthur died in 1886, and look at that, it says he was born October 5, 1829 in Fairfield, Vermont.
JEFF: Right… there’s some question there on the year, and the location. It’s a mystery that brings us here to this yellow house.
RAY: So the yellow house in front of us is really small. It looks almost like a really large backyard shed. It’s got white shutters, and looks new or at least well-maintained.
JEFF: Right, the house is not original. It’s a reproduction. Check out the stone sign next to the house.
RAY: Okay, it’s a square monument to the right of the house. The front reads: On this spot stood the cottage where was born Chester A. Arthur. The twenty-first president of the United States. Erected by the State of Vermont.
JEFF: Grammatically a little awkward, but that’s how they wrote it. This stone was placed here in 1903. That yellow cottage was built in 1953 and was supposed to be a replica of the small home where the Arthur Family once lived when the president was born.
RAY: Well there you go. Mystery solved. Doesn’t seem like there was much of a mystery at all. I guess he was born right here.
JEFF: That’s the thing. Chester Arthur wasn’t born here. And that’s not what his first house looked like.
RAY: Really?! How did the state of Vermont get it wrong?
JEFF: In Vermont’s defense, they weren’t far off, and there’s been some controversy about Chester Arthur’s date and place of birth since 1880.
RAY: 1880 was the year before he became president. What was in debate back then?
JEFF: One part of the problem is Chester Arthur himself. He was known to tell people he was born in 1830 to make himself a year younger than he actually was.
RAY: So lying about his age.
JEFF: Right. By one year. And by the way, Arthur was committed to this lie about his age. Today he’s buried in Albany Rural Cemetery in New York State. He’s got a fancy grave and monument with a plaque that says his date of birth was October 5th, 1830.
RAY: Even his grave says 1830?!
JEFF: It does. It seems silly to me to lie about your age by only one year. It doesn’t get you much. But that’s how he was. We won’t split hairs over the year of birth thing. But the place of birth… that one has caused more of a dust-up.
RAY: How so?
JEFF: First, back in 1880 when it was announced that Chester Arthur was going to be on the James Garfield presidential ticket as the V.P., their political rivals tried to dig up all the dirt they could. One conspiracy theory that was floated was that Chester Arthur was actually born about 20 miles north from this spot.
RAY: Okay… I think I see where this is going.
JEFF: Do you?
RAY: 20 miles north of here would put us in Canada, wouldn’t it?
JEFF: Durham, Quebec, is what was specifically stated back in 1880.
RAY: Which would make Chester Arthur NOT a U.S.-born citizen.
JEFF: Nope. He would have been a British Royal subject if he were born in Canada back then.
RAY: And if Chester Arthur was born in Canada, he wouldn’t be eligible to be President of the United States, and by default, he couldn’t be Vice President either.
JEFF: Correct. That’s article 2, section 1 of the United States Constitution.
RAY: So they had presidential birther conspiracies back in 1880 as well?
JEFF: It looks like they did. Pretty quickly some newspaper reports circulated, shutting down the claims that Arthur was born in Canada, which satisfied some people, but not all. Some folks would rather hold on to the lie. What can you do?
RAY: Got it.
JEFF: As we mentioned back in 1903, this stone was placed here because the historical society said this was the land where Chester Arthur was born. They even had an historic photo of his old house which was long gone buy that point. So the stone was placed. 50 years later, it was decided they should build a replica of the house in the photo. When we dug through the newspaper archives, the plot thickened.
RAY: I’m reading from the June 4, 1953 White River Valley Herald. The headline reads, quote “Fairfield Voted Official President Arthur Birthplace.”
JEFF: That doesn’t seem like something that should be up for a vote, does it?
RAY: No, it doesn’t. I know where I was born. No matter how many people may vote on a different town, it doesn’t change the facts.
JEFF: Right. Read on.
RAY: Further down the article says, quote “The resolution pointed out that $15,000 has been appropriated to develop the Chester A. Arthur birthplace at Fairfield and that there is documentary proof that on October 5th, 1830…
JEFF: There’s that wrong year again… but go on.
RAY: On October 5th, 1830, Arthur was born in Waterville, Lamoille County.
JEFF: Waterville is about six miles southeast of us.
RAY: The article concluded that the matter had been investigated by the historical society and they voted 104 to 71 to go ahead with the Fairfield location.
JEFF: So in 1953 they built this yellow house based on the old photograph, and opened the location to tourists. Years later, after further digging, they learned that this was NOT Chester Arthur’s original home. It was his second home. He moved here when he was very young.
RAY: Wait… I think I’m seeing it now. If people believed Chester Arthur, that he was born in 1830, this is where he was living in 1830.
JEFF: That’s the idea.
RAY: Which means a year earlier, he was somewhere else.
JEFF: Right.
RAY: But not Canada.
JEFF: No. No one but a few of his political opponents ever claimed he was born in Canada.
RAY: Got it. I can see a state of Vermont historical marker over by the road. Let’s check that out.
[WALKING]
RAY: This marker says: Chester A. Arthur, 21st president of the United States. Research indicates Chester Alan Arthur was born in Fairfield, Vermont, on October 5th, 1829. When he was less than a year old his parents moved to a new parsonage built at this site. (BEAT) It then goes on to list his other accomplishments.
JEFF: Right, so the historical marker by the road corrects the history.
RAY: Which begs the question: Where was Chester Arthur born?
JEFF: Let’s head over to Fairfield’s town hall.
[CAR DOORS CLOSE]
[CAR DRIVES OFF]
JEFF: We’re going to head about 5 miles into Fairfield. Heading down Chester A. Arthur Road.
RAY: Good name for the road.
JEFF: I agree. Okay, we can park in the town hall parking lot.
[BLINKAH]
RAY: Got it.
[CAR STOPS / DOORS CLOSE]
RAY: This is a very small town. From this intersection we can see the town hall, the library, a couple of stores, and a farm.
JEFF: We’re going to walk across the street to see another state of Vermont historic sign.
[WALKING]
JEFF: Okay, give this one a read.
RAY: This one looks a lot like the one in front of the Arthur house site. But this one says quote, “Chester A. Arthur – Birthplace of 21st President. Although the exact location is debated, Chester A. Arthur was born on Oct. 5, 1829 in Fairfield. Then it goes on to say how he became a New York lawyer, the V.P. for James Garfield, and that he became president.
JEFF: The Arthurs did live in nearby Waterville, Vermont, for a short time, but moved to Fairfield in May of 1828. Because Chester Arthur’s father was a preacher, they moved around a lot to wherever he could get a job. Which may explain why the exact address of where the family was living on October 5, 1829 is unknown. We suspect the Arthur’s were living in a temporary cabin in Fairfield while their permanent residence was being constructed five miles up the road from here. Where that cabin was located within Fairfield has been lost to time.
RAY: Add in a birther conspiracy theory, and a guy who lied about his age, and I can see how there’s some confusion.
JEFF: Which gets to the point of the matter. Does it matter all that much where we’re born? I get we all start somewhere. That starting place will help shape and define us, there’s no way around that. But in the end, maybe it’s not where you’re from, but where you’re at.
[OUTTRO]
JEFF: It’s always where you’re at! And where we’re at is After the Legend where we take a deeper dive into this week’s story and sometimes veer off course.
RAY: After the Legend is brought to you by our patreon patrons! We thank them every week because we need our patrons. They help us with all of our hosting, production, marketing, travel, and all the others costs it takes to bring you two episodes each week. They get early ad-free access to our entire archive of episodes, they get bonus episodes and content that no one else gets to hear, they get discounts on our events and products, and they get our unending gratitude. It’s just $3 bucks per month. Please join us at patreon.com/newenglandlegends.
To see some pictures of the historic Chester A. Arthur site and signs, click on the link in our episode description, or go to our Web site and click on Episode 358.
We got a lot of information on this week’s story from the Autumn 1970 Vermont History journal from the Vermont Historical Society. The conclusion was that Chester Arthur was born in a log cabin parsonage while the family waited for the new home to be built.
No time travel this week.
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