Arthur Robinson Gould (March 16, 1857 – July 24, 1946) was an American industrialist involved in lumber, railroads, hydroelectricity, and other large scale industry in Aroostook County, Maine and the neighboring Canadian province of New Brunswick from the 1880s until his death in 1946.

The special election to replace Senator Fernald occurred near the height of the Ku Klux Klan's influence in Maine politics.

Maine Democrats, however, deserted their party in droves to vote for Gould, in order to break the power of the Republican Klan faction.

[3] The Chairman of the Republican State Committee hailed Gould's victory as demonstrating that "the sinister influence of an oath-bound organization no longer threatens the welfare of Maine".

Brewster challenged Sen. Hale for the Republican Senate nomination in 1928, and lost, signaling the eclipse of Grand Dragon DeForest H. Perkins and the Klan as a force in Maine politics.

He created a minor scandal in 1929 when a testimonial he had written in 1927, revealing that he fermented fruit juice for personal consumption, was made public.

[7] Maine's temperance proponents declared they'd work to unseat Gould, but he stated soon after that he wouldn't run for a second term, while denying the prohibitionist threat entered into his decision.

Gould did not deny that a bribe of $100,000 was paid, but he claimed this was done by his associates without his knowledge, and that an additional $50,000 asked for by the Premier was refused, leading to the collapse of the railway.

In a 1929 newspaper interview, he described Sen. George W. Norris of Nebraska as a "bitter, sour old man with not a good word for anybody" and said Sen. Thomas J. Walsh of Montana "hasn't got a kindly thought in his system".