Title	Mr.
Last Name	Flanders
First Name	Reuben
Middle Name
Maiden Name
Nick Name
Place of Birth	Cornville, ME
Date of Birth	1811-07-11
Place of Death	Dexter, ME
Date of Death	1883-03-22
Publication	The Eastern Gazette 6-1-1944, p.3 (LHC)
Obituary	REUBEN FLANDERS 1811 - 1883 Reuben Flanders was born in the town of Cornville in Somerset County, Maine, July 11, 1811, where he received a common school education. He came to Dexter when he was nineteen years of age and settled in the village where he engaged in the business of cabinet making, and was the pioneer in that branch of business in Dexter. He made furniture, coffins and caskets. He was a Universalist and in 1829, when that society erected the first church in town, Mr. Flanders made the pulpit. He built the house on Zion's Hill long known as the Bassett house, and still owned by the Bassett heirs. In 1836 he invented a machine for the manufacture of orange and lemon boxes but never got it patented. He was long in possession of the machine that cut the first box of that kind ever manufactured in the world. Not being patented any one who wished could make the machines. He followed his trade in Dexter village for about thirty years and then sold out. In 1867 he purchased the mill property of Charles Jumper, about four miles north of the village of Dexter, and engaged extensively in the manufacture of long and short lumber. He never sought or allowed himself to run for office of any kind whatever, but attended strictly to business. He was a thorough-going business man, having been thrown on his own at the age of nineteen years,, with hardly a dollar, but by industry and economy he accumulated a comfortable fortune. In 1840 he married Abigail B. Allen born Nov. 17, 1812, a native of Cambridge, Maine, and died in Dexter, March 26, 1854. Reuben Flanders died in Dexter March 22, 1883.