In 1922, Otis A. Bean, a 37-year-old guide and letter carrier, was murdered near his garage in Oquossoc. Authorities arrested two itinerant lumberjacks, Norman Mawson and Jeremiah Wheaton, whom neighbors found on the road outside the garage at the time of the murder. Several months later, authorities released the men from a Farmington jail without charges.

The Bean murder case drew intense public and media attention, with Evening Express journalists documenting the suspects and crime scene in articles such as “Persons and Scenes That Figure in the Otis Bean Death Case” where this photograph was published. The image shows the rear of the jail in Farmington, where Mawson and Wheaton were held. The caption reads, "Rear of jail in Farmington, showing wood pile which keeps prisoners busy."