Little is known about the personal life of Francis Hector Clergue. It is known that he was born on August 28, 1856 in Brewer, Maine, a small town across the Penobscot River from Bangor. After completing his high school education, he taught school for a year before entering the office of Fred M. Laughton of Bangor as a law clerk. Clergue later studied law at the University of Maine. He was called to the Bar in Maine in 1878. Even as a young law student, Clergue had the foresight to recognize what he wanted and to go after it with single-minded determination. When he failed to get the job he most wanted a position in the office of Senator Hamlin in Washington, he moved on to plan "B" a job with Laughton's law firm and a second job with the Town of Bangor. Although it was not his original intention to enter into private practice, he soon found himself both a partner in the law firm of Laughton and Clergue and Town Counsel for the Town of Bangor. It was only a matter of time, however, before the lure of promotion and entrepreneurship enticed him first from the practice of law then from Bangor and finally from the United States. Prior to coming to Sault Ste. Marie in 1894, Clergue had been involved in some fourteen entrepreneurial ventures, most of which were spectacular if only for their lack of financial success. Clergue was a man of thought and vision; for him, to think was to act. The financial implications of his actions were of only fleeting interest to him. His first and only early success was the construction in 1880 of an electric street railway in Bangor while Clergue was the Town Counsel. Prior to embarking upon the construction of the electric street railway, Clergue consulted with Thomas Edison. Edison advised Clergue that an electric railway had been attempted only once before in the United States, at Richmond, Virginia and that the experiment had been unsuccessful. Clergue visited the site at Edison's urging and spoke with the man responsible for the transformation of the street railway from one that was steam driven to one that was electrically powered. He found that the topography of Richmond was significantly different from that of Bangor and that it was the steep hills in Richmond that caused the electric engines to burn out with such frequency rendering the system both unreliable and expensive. Clergue described Bangor as being as flat as a tabletop and therefore able to sustain a street railway. He took the additional precaution of travelling to England to meet with the British and Swedish engineers who were constructing the electric cars to ensure they met the necessary specifications. This doesn't mean that Clergue's undertaking proceeded smoothly: some residents of Bangor opposed the project. They feared that a street railway would disturb the peace and quietude of the community. Technological advancement prevailed, however, and Bangor was serviced by an electrical streetcar system despite the objections of the few. Using his widely touted powers of persuasion and the success of the street railway, Clergue convinced local industrialists who had invested in the street railway to similarly invest in an electrical power station on the Penobscot River just north of Bangor. Not only was the undertaking extremely expensive (said to be in the vicinity of more than half a million dollars with annual debt servicing of approximately $33,000) but its scale and proposed output far exceeded the needs of Bangor at the time. The debt repayment and debt servicing became so burdensome that within a very short period of time the original backers lost all of the money that they had invested. Despite the investment losses, the power plant continued to operate under the auspices of the Town of Bangor. The investors may have ended up with nothing in their pockets but Bangor acquired capital equipment, albeit in excess of their needs. Undaunted by this set back, Clergue began investigating other potential investment opportunities. He settled on the development of a tourist destination consisting of cog railway /luxury resort complex on Mount Desert Island. Clergue knew that tourists from Bar Harbor, Maine hired buckboards to drive up Green Mountain on Desert Island. Tourists paid tolls to the owners of the carriage road and for the privilege of traveling to the top of the Mountain. Most stayed the night in the hotel at the summit or, at least, enjoyed a meal there before making the trip down to the base of the Mountain. Clergue's intention was to expand upon this foundation. He raised $100,000 from backers that he used to purchase both the existing hotel and two hundred acres along the side of the Mountain. He proposed to transport tourists to Mount Desert Island from Bar Harbor by way of a ferry and from Annapolis, Nova Scotia by way of steamship. In order to accommodate the tourists who made the trip, Clergue and his backers constructed the Bluffs Hotel at the shipping terminus. They began construction of a cog railway up the side of Green Mountain (now known as Cadillac Mountain) in February, 1883 after sliding a railway charter through the state legislature. It was substantially complete by April of that year enabling photographers to take the first publicity and advertising shots. They modernized the existing hotel thereby completing the first stage in the proposed development of Mount Desert Island. Clergue celebrated the formal opening of the resort on 23 June 1883 with a two day gala party. During its first year of operation tourists poured in spending money on everything from tickets to meals to lodgings. Revenues were sufficient for the company to pay a six per cent dividend in its first year. Fuelled by this success, Clergue attempted to eliminate the competition created by the carriage road by dynamiting it. He then announced plans to construct an electric railroad in Bar Harbor. Summer residents were furious with his actions and cavalier attitude. They held a public hearing and subsequently hired former Vice President Hannibal Hamlin (the same man Clergue had applied to for employment several years before) to represent them legally. Clergue met his match in Hamlin and the railway was not constructed. As Bar Harbor became a year round community rather than merely a summer settlement, the tourist industry declined. The resort limped along for nine years after its first season. Finally, on 16 January 1893 the resort and all of its assets were sold at a sheriff's sale. The tracks were removed and sold for scrap and the engine ended up in New Hampshire. Mount Desert Island represented Clergue's one and only foray into the field of resort promotion. Rather than let yet another failure deter him, though, he sought investment opportunities in still different directions. He built a pulp mill near Bangor, a project that was saved only by the actions of the investors: they proactively prevented him from having anything to do with the financial operation of the mill. His ability to charm money from New England investors appeared to have run its course after he failed to make a promised fortune for his backers by cutting ice on the Penobscot River during the winter months and then retailing it in New York and Philadelphia. Clergue had to look further afield for his financing. He traveled to London, England where he secured British backing for the construction of shipyards, a dry-dock and a bank at Mobile, Alabama. Again, his actions were plagued by a lack of success. His most dramatic failure, however, came in 1888 when he announced that he had been granted permission to build a railway across Persia. He secured financing, again in England, this time in the amount of $25,000. He traveled to Persia where he proceeded to form three separate companies: the Persian Railway and Construction Company, the Persian Electric Light Company and the City of Tehran Water Works. Each of these companies had a capitalization of $1,000,000. Unfortunately for Clergue, he had not familiarized himself with the international relations between Persia and Russia before entering into negotiations with the Shah of Persia. Soon after he began the survey work associated with each of these three companies, the Russian government intervened and secured for itself the first right of refusal with respect to the construction of all railroads in Persia for a period of forty years. Clergue was frozen out of the construction project, losing the monies provided by his backers in the process. His plans completely shattered, Clergue returned to Bangor where he tried his hand at mining speculation when western mining fever hit. Each of his ventures in this field failed but again Clergue was unfazed. He immediately went looking for money in his native Maine to divert the waters of the Penobscot River for the construction of a series of dams and power plants. His powers of persuasion failed to sway Maine investors and no amount of eloquent rhetoric could induce them to put money into yet another of his schemes. In order to maintain his position in the field of promotion, Clergue went to work for a group of Philadelphia financiers and investors, employment that brought him to Sault Ste. Marie in 1894.