USA > New York > Chemung County > Chemung County, its history > Part 8
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The powerless glider has been a familiar sight in Big Flats since 1930, when the first National Soaring Contest was held at what is now "Harris Hill." The hill has become a tourist mecca.
Located approximately half way between Elmira and Corning, Big Flats has seen the construction of many new homes, some in developments, such as Golden Glow and Green Acres.
Many residents work in Corning or Elmira. The Corning Glass Works during the late 1950's opened a plant just east of the village on old Route 17. Near the airport is the Schweizer Aircraft Corporation, which fittingly, manufactures gliders and aircraft parts. The Latta Brook Corporation in the village pro- duces building blocks and ready mortar mix. Despite changes, the town grows on in 1961, and will continue to do so, becoming the home of new residents who will work in the local and nearby industrial plants.
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VILLAGE OF BREESPORT
There were settlers on the site of Breesport before 1808; even three or four log homes by 1818, one of which belonged to James Hartgroose, a British soldier, who refused to be exchanged after he was captured by the Colonial Army at Saratoga.
Breesport was named for the Brees brothers, Ulysses and William, who owned the land on which they laid out the village in 1854. Within a year they built a tavern and a store.
The village grew rapidly after Joseph Rodbourn arrived in 1855. He erected the first steam saw mill (1857) and steam grist mill (1860) within the village although the Heller brothers had built a saw mill near by in 1830. Mr. Rodbourn and his brother James (of Erin), the lumber barons of this area, helped bring the railroad to these parts in 1874. The car shops were located at Breesport until they burned in 1883.
Breesport was a booming town from 1874 until the 1890's when many of the early business men died and their enterprises faded. Some of the products made here were: carriages, harnesses, oat meal, boots and shoes, toys, tin and leather goods. There were two creameries, two blacksmith shops and two doctors, a law- yer, a drug store and four churches. The Adam Kinley family operated one of the three brick yards and the tannery which often had mile-long strings of vehicles waiting to unload their tanbark (bark peeled from hemlock logs, and used in making leather from cattle and horse hides.)
The county poor house was located here in 1836 when Chemung County was formed. An old log house, patched up and en- larged, was used until 1862, when, with Mr. Rodbourn as super- intendant, a frame structure was built. A brick building was added in 1888. A hundred years ago the county house sheltered destitute adults, homeless children and the violently insane, all under one roof, with inadequate facilities and under unsanitary conditions-a far cry from the modern, efficient County Home we have today.
Breesport has been plagued with disastrous fires. The tannery burned twice. Harding Brothers' store burned; also the Meth- odist church, Grady's store and the Rodbourn House, a hotel famous for its ballroom with the floor built on springs, that "swayed with the dancers".
Today Breesport is a pleasant little town in which to live. Its last bit of industrial glory vanished in 1938 along with the railroad.
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In 1815 Basil Sperry came from Newfield, Tompkins County, and settled in the northwestern section of what, a few years later, was to become the town of Erin. This was the first settlement in the town.
About 1818 Michael Robinson, an Irishman, settled nearby and at once took a leading part in all the activities of the community. In return for his interest and enthusiasm, he was accorded the honor of naming the new community and gave it the name "Erin Go Bragh" (meaning Erin Forever), in honor of the land of his forefathers. Only the Erin part survived, and when, by an act of the Legislature of the State of New York, March 29, 1822, the north part of the town of Chemung was erected as a new town. Erin became its official name, and has since been known by that name.
Not unlike the other towns of Chemung County, the hills and valleys of the town of Erin were covered with a dense forest of pine, hemlock and hardwood timber. Thus the clearing of the land became the first concern of the settler and, for several years, the felling of the giant trees and burning them, to pre- pare land for growing crops, was his principal occupation.
In 1824 the first sawmill in the town was built on Newtown Creek by two MacMillan brothers, and lumbering soon became of commercial importance. Other sawmills were rapidly estab- lished until, around Civil War days, there were a dozen or more large ones in operation, also many smaller ones.
In 1868 J. H. Rodbourn & Co. built a huge sawmill in the center of what is now the hamlet of Erin, furnishing employment for thirty men and as many more in the extensive woodlands they either owned or controlled.
After the Utica, Ithaca and Elmira Railroad, that later became the Elmira, Cortland and Northern and, later still, the Elmira and Cortland Branch of the Lehigh Valley was built, the hamlet grew as if by magic, and the Rodbourn sawmill became a flour- ishing enterprise.
As the supply of virgin timber became exhausted, in 1912, the sawmill was dismantled and the town became primarily a dairy- ing and farming region, known for many years as the leading potato and buckwheat growing section of the county, and the Erin railroad station became an important shipping station.
In 1882 the Rodbourn Company established a creamery and be- gan the manufacture of butter on a large scale. In 1908 the Lehigh Valley Railroad Company built a milk shipping station. Soon after World War I, both those enterprises were discon- tinued.
TOWN OF ERIN
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In 1938, the railroad from Horseheads to Van Etten was aban- doned and since then there has been no industry of any sort in the town. With the exception of a few dairymen and poultry- men, farming is now of secondary importance, a large majority of the inhabitants are employed in the industries at Horseheads, Elmira and elsewhere.
The first post office was established Jan. 2, 1833 as Erin Centre and in 1872 the name was changed to Erin.
The first schoolhouse, a log structure, was built in 1818. The first church, The Associate Reformed Church of Erin, later Presbyterian, was erected in 1836; the Austin Hill Church, at first Methodist Episcopal, later Methodist Protestant, was built in 1858; the Erin Baptist Church was built in 1871 and, in 1874 the Erin Methodist Church was erected. Thus there have been four churches, at different times, in the town. Today only the Methodist Church remains-the Presbyterian and Methodist Protestant Churches long since dismantled, while the Baptist Church building is now the post office, town hall and museum of the Erin Historical Society.
During the early years practically every settlement of any size and importance had a post office and, during those years the town of Erin, at different times had five, with at least three of them-Erin or Erin Centre, South Erin and Park-in operation at the same time; the other two were Herrington's Corners and State Road.
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TOWN OF CATLIN
The Town of Catlin, situated in the northwestern section of Chemung County, has shown an exceptional population increase since 1950. When a special census was taken in 1957 Catlin showed the greatest population increase, percentagewise, of any town in the state-50.1 per cent.
Catlin had a 1950 population of 690; by 1957 it was 1,725 and in 1960 it was 1,826. This growth was a result of the postwar phenomenon of "suburbia." A housing development called Beaver Valley was erected at Chambers in the early 1950s. Beaver Valley has some 300 homes, 80 of them in Schuyler County.
The Town of Catlin is hilly, with deep valleys and two creeks, Post Creek and Sing Sing Creek, running through it. It has an elevation at one point of 1,902 feet above sea level.
The town of Catlin was taken from the town of Catharine and organized April 16, 1823. In 1835 it was divided again and the northern part of it became the town of Dix.
The town was named after Judge Phineas Catlin, who was com- missioned to lay the road from Catskill Landing, on the Hudson River, to Catharine Town on Lake Seneca. Judge Catlin was named the first supervisor of the town of Catharine from which Catlin was formed and later he served as highway commissioner in the town of Catlin. This latter office was the most important job in the township because the roads were and still are a con- stant worry. The terrain is such that winter thaws consistently cause damage.
The early settlers came one by one. Some were English, some were Holland Dutch and others came from Canada. Its first resident was John Martin who built a log cabin there in 1816. All houses and cabins were made of logs in these early days; the leading industry was lumbering because the land had to be cleared for farming. There were several saw mills to cut the pine, hemlock, maple and birch. An ashery was built by Dewitt Talmadge in 1826 and remained in operation for many years. The ashes of logs burned for charcoal were put into barrels and covered with water to make lye. Lye was used with animal fats to make soap.
In 1827 John Ostrander built the first grist mill.
The government in the town of Catlin was carried on by super- visors, town clerks, and a justice of the peace. Early records show that it was a wild and sparsely settled area. In 1836 the town voted to pay twenty dollars for each wolf killed and fifty cents for each fox killed.
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In 1849, the Chemung Railroad went through the eastern line of the town. In 1877 the Syracuse, Geneva and Corning Rail- road was built through the western part of town.
The census of 1845 listed 142 farmers growing wheat, oats, flax, corn, potatoes, buckwheat, beans and turnips. Hogs and cattle were raised and butter and cheese sold. There was a total of 3,295 sheep on the farms. The census listed 2449 yards of flan- nel and other woolen cloth manufactured by the families; 1896 yards of linen or cotton and 1439 yards of fulled cloth. One family of eleven made 80 yards of woolen cloth and 56 yards of linen. The total cost of 11 school houses then was $1200. There were 368 children of school age. One clergyman had a salary of $100 a year. Six saw mills, two grist mills and one ashery were listed in 1845.
Most of the residents down through the years were farmers primarily, but they carried on another occupation, too, such as wagon maker, blacksmith, etc. In the beginning there were only trails that led from one spring or creek to another spring or creek. Later when wagons were in use these trails became wagon trails and now are finally roads. Another result of lum- bering was the tan bark from hemlock trees. It was hauled to Watkins to be taken by boat to the tannery to be used in the process of tanning hides for leather.
A map of 1869 shows Catlin's principal communities were Post Creek in the west, Tompkins Corners, near the south line, and Catlin Center. In 1879 Post Creek was the largest settlement. It had two small hotels, a post office, school house, grist mill, blacksmith shop, grocery, and railroad depot. Tompkins Corners was listed as a small hamlet with a post office, school house, grocery, blacksmith shop and a grain cradle factory. Catlin Center boasted a steam saw mill. The township had 10 frame school houses and, with the land, was valued at only $4,265. There were twenty teachers and 488 students. There was also a steam shingle manufacturer.
Since the 1880's there was little change in the town of Catlin until the Beaver Valley subdivision was built. Its population is spread out on farms on which grain and cattle are raised. Potatoes are a main crop because of the stony soil. There is still a saw mill in operation and a feed mill that is mobile to furnish its customers. Since school districts are not divided by towns, many students go to Corning or Horseheads. There is one new elementary school at Beaver Valley in the community of Cham- bers. There are three small churches, The Wesleyan Methodist Church, The Assembly of God Church and the Catlin Methodist Church.
The town is divided in name by areas for there are no sizeable communities. The area of Catlin Center is entirely farms. The
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settlements of Catlin Center and Post Creek have disappeared. At Tompkins Corners there are a few houses, a store and a church. Chambers is a hamlet of a few houses and the elemen- tary school. A new development, Beaver Valley, is made up of about 300 new houses. The people in the town of Catlin rely on surrounding communities, for the most part, for their trade, schools and churches.
When you visit Catlin and visit with its senior citizens, you get the feeling that you are in touch with the past. Early days are recalled and handed down memories of past generations bring close at hand the manner in which people used to live. Before matches were invented, wood coals had to be kept overnight to start the fires the next morning. If the fire went out then one had to walk miles to a-neighbor and get some coals. Mrs. Orin Backer recalls that families, like her ancesters, the Smith fam- ily, had large outdoor fireplaces and baked pies on the hot stones, storing them in a cool place until used. Picnics and flag raisings, grange meetings and church affairs were their entertainment. Almost everything was hand made by the residents themselves. Each person if he was lucky had one pair of shoes a year. He was very careful with them and often carried them on his way to church and put them on only to enter. Flax and wool were grown, spun and woven into cloth and sewn into clothes. Very few things were bought.
Today life in Catlin is easier, but the people are the same hard working farmers. The roads bear the name of the people who live on them and the localities indicate who live there, such as Johnson Hollow, Smith Corners, DeMunn Road, Halm Road, Backer Road, Scudder Road, Saudy Road.
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TOWN OF HORSEHEADS
The village was incorporated as Fairport in 1837. The original name of Horse Heads was restored in 1845. For one year (1885- 86) it was North Elmira. The village was in the town of Elmira until the town of Horseheads was formed in 1854.
Horseheads was "born" Sept. 24, 1779, when Gen. Sullivan, on his return from the Genesee, disposed of his worn-out horses (estimated from 30 to 300) on this site. (The army had camped here the night of Aug. 31, on their way up the valley.) Later the Indians arranged the heads in rows along the trail near the present Hanover Square, and called this "the Valley of the Horse Heads". Pioneer children played here, stepping from one horse head to another. All early writers use the term "at the Horse Heads" instead of "at Horseheads." These famous relics were still plainly visible in 1830.
John Brees (Breese), the first settler, built (1789) his log home on the spot where he had camped with the army ten years before. The Brees marker on South Main St. indicates the location.
This first home also became the first school house in 1793 with Amelia Parkhurst as teacher.
The Conkling, Sayre and Carpenter families were among the pioneers. The Carpenters built the first hotel, the Half-Way House (half way between Horseheads and Elmira) on Lake St. a few rods above 14th St. There was a race track back of it.
The vicinity of Hanover Square had been an important Indian cross-roads (trails) for centuries, and continued to be long after most of the local Indians died of smallpox in 1802-03. (James Sayre and his son, James, buried a large number of them.)
The Indians entered the pioneer cabins any time of day or night, often sleeping on the floor with their head to the fireplace, and "stinking to high heaven". They never knocked and never failed to return with a silent "thank you" gift of fish or venison.
Wild animals abounded in this "great western wilderness". As late as 1823, the State paid residents "forty shilling ($5.00) for each full-grown wolf, wolf whelp or panther ("painter") killed and 16 shillings ($2.00) for each wildcat.
Many Revolutionary soldiers were paid in land instead of money. Ezra L'Hommedieu thus acquired 1440 acres in the north-west section of the town, from which tract many early farms were taken.
John Rickey also got his farm through the Soldier's Claim Act. His first wife was killed in the Wyoming Massacre while he was
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fighting the Indians. At this same time a Mr. Lowe was killed. His wife and five children fled to the forest where they lived for seven days as best they could. Later Mr. Rickey married Mrs. Lowe and settled at Horseheads. Howard Rickey of the fifth generation lives on the original farm.
The Chemung Canal brought Horseheads its first big boom. During the three years (1830-33) of its construction the village nearly doubled in population.
The office of Toll Collector on the Canal was located in Horse- heads at the junction of the Feeder Canal from Corning with the Chemung Canal. Until the canal closed in 1877, watching the boats go through the locks was a favorite pastime of the school children. One lock was on west Franklin St. near the railroad tracks.
Under the old militia system, the annual "General Training" or "Muster" days were held at Horseheads-on the north side of Bowman Hill Rd., on the flat just across the bridge.
Some 500 militia and rifle corps assembled from all corners of the county to parade, drill and practice military evolutions. The cavalry wheeled and maneuvered; the infantry charged with fixed bayonets, while old-time fife, bugle, snare and bass drums filled the air with martial music familiar to the scores of Revolutionary and War of 1812 veterans sure to be present. The "enemy" was always the British Red Coats. This gala event attracted the entire population and all the counterfeiters as well.
When Chemung County was formed in 1836, Elmira won the battle for county seat but Horseheads remained the social and political center. In historic Pritchard Hall politicians were made and unmade at party conventions that often ended in near riot.
Horseheads fairs, social hops, oyster suppers, cotillions, military balls and Fourth of July celebrations drew crowds for better than 50 miles around. As many as 400 couples were dancing at once-not all in the same ballroom.
In 1862 the citizens of the village erected a shaft, in Maple Grove Cemetery, to the memory of George L. Van Dusen who "gave his life for his country". During the Civil War he was a drummer in Co. I, 38th Regt., N. Y. Vol. This company was composed entirely of Horseheads boys.
For many years Horseheads had more taverns than grocery stores. (Also one squeaky town pump). In 1828 Colwell built a hotel where the bank now stands. This burned in the great fire of August 1862 when all the wooden buildings around Han-
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over Square, including N. Van Dusen's Hotel, between Ithaca and E. Franklin Sts., burned. Colwell's rebuilt hotel became the Trembly House and later the Platt House, the last and most famous of all. The last great ball held here was to celebrate (1904) the installation of water and electric service in the village.
"Uncle Dick" and "Aunt Sally" Hatfield ran the Elderberry House on the east side of Lake St. just south of the Latta Brook Road. He made his famous elderberry wine from bushes he cultivated himself.
Vincent Conkling operated the first hotel in the village, where the Hoffman House (Brown's Drug Store) was built later.
About one hundred years ago there were still more oxen than horses in every town in the county. Horseheads had some 600 horses and twice as many oxen. The population of Horseheads town was 2,650. There were just over a thousand children taught in nine district schools, one of which was the beloved old 4-room "Teal school house" (1850-1892) on the "meeting house lot", now Teal Park.
The first school house (log) was erected about 1800 near the site of the Ryant Block. In 1815 a two-room school was built on "the Meeting House" lot. The brick school, on Grand Central, was opened in 1892.
The railroads ended the usefulness of the Chemung Canal; buses replaced the street cars (1871-1939). The log schools be- came first the little red and later little white school houses, until they in turn became part of the Horseheads Central School Dis- trict (1951). In 1961 seven modern schools serve 5,100 children of the community. The population of Horseheads Village (1960) is 7,209. The Town of Horseheads population (1960) is 17,900.
Horseheads had stood still for 30 years when World War II brought the village its second big boom, and soon made it the fastest growing community in the state.
Before the First World War H. C. "Celery" Smith made Horse- heads celery famous from Maine to Florida, now Horseheads products flow to national, even world markets. They go by plane, train, or truck over the multimillion dollar highways. Anything from a tiny radio part to a TV picture tube; a prefabricated house to cow feed or a few thousand brick. The Horseheads Consolidated Brick Co. is one of the oldest industries, dating from 1840.
Westinghouse, the Horseheads Industrial Center (Holding Point) and the many housing developments are the three big industries of this town.
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The police and fire departments (organized 1873) and the churches have kept pace with the fast-expanding Horseheads. The first church building was the "Marsh Church" (1827) be- side the old cemetery at the north end of the Holding Point. The Rev. Roswell Goff ministered to the spiritual needs of both Indian and white settler before 1805.
Our most famous citizen was the cartoonist, Eugene Zimmer- man (1862-1935), better known as "Zim". He wrote (1911) a Foolish History of Horseheads. He mentions the finding of the horse heads by the pioneers and observes: "Don't know what'd become of us if they'd found a pile of horse tails instead."
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TOWN OF VETERAN
The name of the town of Veteran might have been "Bently" because it was named for Green Bently, the first settler. How- ever, as he was a veteran of the Revolutionary War, the final selection honored his war record rather than his family name.
Green Bently left his home in Wyoming, Pa., and poled his family and his possessions up the Susquehanna in a flat boat to the present site of Wellsburg. Here, he acquired a tract of 300 acres and lived for some years. He then sold this land and bought another tract of the same size in the Catharine Creek valley. The village of Millport now stands on a part of his farm and he is buried farther north along the old Indian route to the Chemung, now the road from Elmira to Watkins Glen. The town was formally organized by the State Legislature in 1823 when it was formed from a part of the town of Catharine in Schuyler County.
Indian stories connected with this locality are rather rare. The last red man seen may have existed in the imagination of a little boy. George Parsons, who was the son of the man who built the first frame house in the town, walked to school along a wood path. On his way home one afternoon, he was accosted by an Indian who slipped from the dark woods. The little boy ran screaming to his mother. As a man, he often told his daughters of his frightening sight of the "last of the red men".
Another of these first inhabitants remained near the homes of his ancestors for his grave was found while excavating for a cellar in Millport. He had been buried with his dearest posses- sion, an iron kettle.
The village of Millport, once called Millvale, was a thriving town in the days of the old Chemung Canal. There was a factory that made bridges and one was used over a stream on a country road as late as 1959. Other small shops utilized the plentiful lumber from the White Pines that covered the hills. This was sawed by mills along Catharine Creek and sold in Havana, now Montour Falls, for $4 a thousand feet. Other products of the shops included blinds, chairs and other products of a cabinet shop as well as wagons and barrels.
Catharine Creek is now known as a trout stream but in the old days, the waters ran many saw mills and a flour mill or two.
Another town south of Millport was a busy and growing village in the time of the canal. Pine Valley and Millport were rivals in business and in the social life of the time. Both boasted of their growth and of the excellence of the singing societies, and the vigor of the Temperance societies which flourished at this time. There was a Post of the GAR in Millport after the Civil War and the Masonic Lodge built its hall there.
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The only other town is a small settlement now called Sullivan- ville on the road to Ithaca. It used to be known as Dean's Corners and there was a doctor of that name and the storekeeper was also a Dean. This town had two of the inevitable black- smith shops.
Today's few saddle horses are shod by a modern smith who takes his equipment with him in a small truck but in horse and buggy days, the blacksmith was a very necessary part of every community. Most farm families made a rare trip to Elmira for shopping or to take in the potatoes raised on the farm. They often drove the team on a heavy wagon or on a light carriage. Sometimes, the women of the family could drive the horse to Millport and then take the trolley into town, leaving the horse tied in the Masonic shed all day.
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