Lenville Hawkes
Posted on: August 5, 2021 - 11:57am
(Photo Courtesy of Prince Memorial Library)
In 1931 Lenville Hawkes of West Cumberland delivered 40 bushels of Maine potatoes to President Herbert Hoover using a two-wheeled cart pulled by a pair of Hereford-Durham oxen.
The gift was a joint effort by Maine governor William Tudor Gardiner, the Potato Committee of new England Shippers' Advisory Board, the Maine State Agricultural Department, and the Maine Development commission, and was designed to bring the Maine potato crop to the attention of the American public.
This photo was taken on November 23, 1931, as Hawkes passed the U.S. Capitol on the way to the White House.