USA > New York > Allegany County > Gazetteer and business directory of Allegany County, N. Y. for 1875 > Part 10
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The Second Baptist Church of Cuba, was organized with twenty-two mem- bers in 1835, by Rev. Mr Tuttle, the first pastor. The first church edifice was erected in 1838, and the present one, which will seat 350 persons, in 1571, at a cost of $11,000. The Society numbers 180. The pastor is Rev. 1 C Seeley. The Church property is valued at $15,000.
The First M. E Church, nt Cuba, was organized with twelve members, in 1814, by S. Y. Hammond, the first pastor, and the church edifice, which will seat 200 persons, was erected in 1850, nt a cost of $2,000, one-half the present value of Church property. The Society numbers fifty and is under the pastoral care of Rev. E. B. Williams, our informant.
The First Universalist Church, at Cuba, was organized with thirty-one members, in 1869, by Rev. E. W. Fuller, and their house of worship. which will seut 300 persons, was erected the same year, at a cost of $5,000. The present number of members is forty-five. The pastor is Res I. P. Blackford, our informant. The Church property is valued at
Christ Church of Cuba. N. Y., (Protestant Episcopal,) was organized with three or four communicants and fifteen or twenty worshipers, Nov. 1, 1852, at a meeting called for the purpose by Rev. Moses E. Wilson, who was the first pastor. From those who attended the meeting Gen. C. T. Chamberlain and Anson Stewart were elected wardens, and R L. Colwell, W A Kirkpatrick, Dr S Maxon, N. P. Loveridge, S. M Russell, Hon. Marshal B. Champhn and Stephen L. Davidson, vestrymen. The first church edifice was erected in the fall of 1857; and the present one, which sill sent 300 persons, and is pronounced one of the most complete and beautiful in this part of the State, in 1-71 and '72, at a cost of $12,000. there are forty-nine communicants, six male and forty-three female. The pastor is Rev. Eleutherus Jay Cooke, our informant. The Church property is valued at $15,000.
The First Presbyterian Church of Cuba, was organized with ten mem- bers, July 19, 1827, by Rev. Reuben Hurd and James Davidson Esq. Their first house of worship was erected in 1838; the present one, which will seat 400 members in 1871-2, at a cost of $21,500. The first pastor was Rev. Samuel W. May; the present one is Rev. C. B. Gardner, our inform- ant The Society numbers 167, one of the members being Abner Huntley, previously mentioned, who joined the Church after he was eighty years old. The Church property is valued at about $23,000.
FRIENDSHIP was formed from Capeadea, March 24, 1815. Cuba was taken off Feb. 4, 1822; Bolivar, Feb. 15, 1825 ;
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and Wirt, April 12, 1838. The first town officers were : John Figgins, Supervisor ; T. Gold, Town Clerk ; Samuel Derby, Sylvanus Merriam and Win. Hungerford. Assessors ; Ira Hickox. Collector ; Ira Hickox and Timothy Hyde, Constables ; Bethuel Clark, Elijah Strong and Ebenezer Steenrod, Commissioners of Highways.
It is an interior town, lying a little south-west of the center of the county, and contains 22,760 acres. The surface is broken by high, mountainons ridges, the summits of which are 600 to 800 feet above the valleys. It is drained by Van Campeus Creek and its branches. The soil is a clay and gravelly loam.
The Erie R. R. extends diagonally through the central part of the town, in the valley of Van Campens Creek.
The population of the town in 1870 was 1528 ; of whom 1460 were native, 68, foreign and all, except one, white.
FRIENDSHIP, (p. v.) situated a little sonth of the center of the town, on Van Campens Creek and the Erie R. R., contains four churches, the Friendship Academy, the Baxter University of Music, a newspaper office, (the Friendship Register, published weekly by R. R. Helme,) one bank, two flouring mulls, a shingle mill. employing three men and making 7,000 shingles per day, several saw mills, and had, in 1870, a population of 474.
Friendship Academy was established in 1849 and opened the same year. The faculty numbers tive. It has been under the care of Prof. Prosper Miller since 1854, with the exception of four years. The building contains tive recitation rooms. a room for the library and apparatus, and a large hall in the third story. The value of the building and grounds is $5,000; of apparatus, $560; and of the library, $250.
Baxter University of Music .- We copy from the Catalogue of this Institution the following description of it :-
"[It] was first opened for the reception of students, March 15, 1853, under the name of Baxter's Music Rooms.' In 1853 it was enlarged, and the name changed to 'Baxter's Musical Institute.' In 1861 it was ag. in en- larged, the named being changed to 'Baxter's Institute of Music' In 1866 more building, were added, and the name 'Allegany Academy of Music' wasgiven it. March 17, 1870, the present name was adopted; the processes of the institution having been developed from its inception to its present magnitude, by and under the exclusive guidance and control of the individual whose name it bears.
"At first the entire stock of operative material consisted in two rented rooms, one Piano, one Violin, a Flute and a Bugle. It now-1874-con- sists of an entire set of buildings constructed expressly for it, containing a large hall, a reception room, reading room, class rooms, practice rooms, office, store and publishing room, and is amply provided with instruments of all kinds, for Church, Parlor, Brass Band and Orchestra.
"The processes of the Institution are comprised in four general Depart- ments-SACRED, SECULAR, ORCHESTRA and BRASS BAND MUSIC.
FRIENDSHIP.
"Each Department includes two courses - PREPARATORY and ACADEMIC. Each of these being a concrete course of Theory, Voice and Instrument, combining the exercise of the mental, aesthetical and executive faculties, and blending them in a perfectly symmetrical educa. tion, -enabling the student to read, write and speak, in an elegant manner, the language of Music.
"The College course comprises a study of the means, methods and forms employed in the classical compositions of the best masters.
The buildings and equipments cost $16,000. Sixty students can he accommodated. The average number of students in attendance is fifty. One hundred and twenty students have been graduated. The instructors are laboring sedulously to advance musical art and develope the true theory of musical culture.
The First National Bank of Friendship was organized Feb. 1, 1864. with a capital of $75,000. The original organization consisted of George W. Robinson, President ; Asher W. Miner, Vice-President ; Abijah J. Wellman, Cashier ; George W. Robin- son, Asher W. Miner, Abijah J. Wellman, Hugh J. Wellman, Win. Colwell, Wm. H. King, Ira D. Hartshorn, Morris C. Mul- kim, Stephen W. Cole, Directors : the present organization, Asher W. Miner, President; Win. H. King, Vice-President; Alujah J. Wellman, Cashier ; Asher W. Miner, Wm. H. King, Abijah J. Wellman, Wm. Colwell, Jacob O. Price, Stephen W. Cule, Albert F. Wells, John B. Cole and Hugh J. Higgins, Directors.
Allegany Lodge No. 225 F. & A. M. was organized as Allegany Lodge No. 273, and re-organized June 18, 1851. It consists of ninety-nine members, and meets the first and third Saturdays of each month.
NILE, (p. o.) situated on the south-branch of Van Campens Creek, in the south part of the town, contains a church, two stores, a harness shop, shoe shop, blacksmith shop, carriage shop, cheese factory and fifty dwellings. H. G. Higgins' steam mill, located in the east part of the town, contains four cirenlar saws, gives employment to five to seven persons, and is capable of sawing 10,000 feet of lumber, 10,000 to 15,000 shingles and 7,000 luth per day.
Settlement was commenced in Nov. 1806, by Richard Friar, from Kingston, Ulster Co. John Harrison and Simeon and Zebulon Gates settled in the town in June, 1807. Peter Frier und Henry Utter, the latter from Delaware Co., came in 1808; und Aaron Axtell, and John and Josiah Utter, from Otsego Co., in 1809. Josiah Utter was father of Judge Josiah Utter, and he and Axwell were the first settlers on the south branch of Van Campens Creek. At this time, in addition to those
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named, settlements had been made by Elisha Strong, John Higgins, Edward Brines, Lemuel Haskins, Samuel Wardell and Wm. Burnett. The nearest postoffice and mill were at Angelica. a distance of twelve miles, and the nearest neighbor south, says Mr. J. J. Stebbins, was John King, a mile and a half beyond Ceres, and no road between them. A few years later a road was cut by Mr. King as far as Nile. In August, 1809, a freshet flooded the flats and destroyed the crops, so that there was no breadstuff raised. The settlers were obliged to go to Dansville to procure flour for their subsistence. Josiah Utter says he has been to the town of Leicester, Livingston Co., a distance of forty miles, on horse-baek, for corn. Adam Renwick came in from Geneva, Ontario Co., in 1810. Ambrose Willard came from Massachusetts in 1812. Daniel Crabtree, from Amsterdam, Montgomery Co., came in about 1812 and resided here twenty-four years, when he removed to the town of Amity, where he still lives. Chester Scott, from New Hampshire, and Samnel Thomas, from Delaware Co., came in 1814. Ebenzer Steenrod, from Delaware Co., came in 1815, and Win. Niver, from the same county, in 1816. Casper Niver was also an early settler. Hugh J. Higgins settled in Angelica in 1806, and in 1818 he removed to this town, to the farm on which he now resides. Waitsell und Job Scott, from New Hampshire, and J. J. Stebbins, from Columbia Co., came in 1821. Justns Scott, also from New Hampshire, settled in 1822, and Rufus Scott, probably the same year. Martin Butts, from Vermont, also settled here this latter year. He remained two years and then removed to the town of Belfast, where he remained six years, when he again removed to Friendship, remaining six years, after which he removed to Bolivar, and in January, 1843, to Clarksville, where he has been supervisor-the present making the sixth term. Levi W. Pearse and Rev. Chester Coburn were settlers of an early day. Pearse moved in from Almond, where he had lived four or tive years, and still lives on the farm settled by his father. Mr. Coburn was the first to preach in the Baptist Church. Wm. Colwell, from Dansville, Livingston Co., was also an early settler. D. F. Carnahan, from Chenango Co., came in 1827. The first birth in town was that of Sherman Haskins, in a sugar camp, in March, 1808; the first marriage, that of James Sanford and Sally Harrison, in December, 1809; and the first death, that of Hattie Friar, in December, 1806. The first school was taught by Pelatiah Morgan, in the winter of 1810-11. The first school house, a log structure, was built a little pre- vious to 1816, and stood where George Skiff's house now is. The second school house was built where Wm. Townsend's barn stands. The first inn was opened in Mav, 1808, by Simon
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Ciates, and the first store, in the spring of 1818, by Stephen South. The first grist mill was built in 1810, by Aaron Axtell and his son-in-law, Sylvanus Merriam, who was for many years county judge in this county. It stood on the old Merriam place, on the south branch creek, about half-way between the villages of Friendship and Nile. Col. King, agent of the Holland Land Co., built what is now the Baxter grist mill. Othello Church, who was murdered by David D. Howe, of Angelica, in December, 1823, built one where the "old factory" now is. The first saw mill was built in 1815, by Ebenezer Steenrod, who also built the first mill for wool carding and cloth dressing the following year. The first distillery was built by Squire Wardell, on the site of Cosane Thurston's house. The first framed building was a barn, erected by Squire Wardell.
The first religious services were held by Samuel Vary, in July, 1810, in a barn which stood on the lot now owned by John Van Horn. Occasion- nl public worship was held at an enrly day by Rev. Robert Hubbard, a Presbyterian, and Rev. Mr. Braman a Baptist; the former of whom formed the first Church (Presbyterian) in the spring of 1813.
The Baptist Church in Friendship was organized July 10, 1822. Elder Braman and wife, James Reed, Deacon Sherwin, Jonathan Savage and Harry Ileyden were the first six members. Mrs. Baxter and Nancy MeQueen were the first two baptized, by Elder Knapp. Samuel King joined by letter May 10, 1823; Dencon A. Everets, August 9th, and Deacon S. Carter, August 30th of the same year. The present church edifice was built in 1821, and was aided by a donation of 100 acres of land from the Holland Land Co. John Carter had a license from this Church to preach und was well known in the capacity of an exhorter twenty-five years ago. lle now lives nt Smith's Mills, in Chautauqua Co.
The M. E. Church, at Friendship, was organized with about twelve members, about 1825 or '26, by John Wiley and Ira Brownson. The first church editice was erected in 1829; the present one, which will seat 250 persons, in 1853, at a cost of $3,000. The first pastor, after the house was built, was Rev. Samuel Woster; the present one is Rev. Enos Smith. The Society numbers 150. Their property is valued at $7,000. They have a parsonage valued at $2,000. [ Information furnished by Mr. J. J. Stebbins.
The First Uwrersalist Church of Friendship, was organized with thirty members in 1854, aby Rev. F. M. Alvord, the first pastor, and the church editice, which will seat 800 persons, was crected in 1855, at a cost of #2,000, one-halt the present value of Church property. The present num- ber of members is sixty, and the pastor, Rev. S. T. Aldrich.
GENESEE was formed from Cuba, April 16, 1830. The first town officers were : Benj. Maxson, Supervisor ; David Maxson, Town Clerk ; John Bell Jr., Geo. W. Kenyon and Wm. Hooker, Assessors ; Jabez Burdick, Collector ; Horace H. Wil- son and Riverions Hooker, Commissioners of Highways ; Joseph Maxson and Joseph Wells, Overseers of the Poor ; Joel Crandall, Rowland Coon and Edwin Stillman, Commissioners of Common Schools; Henry P. Green, Joel Maxson and George W. Kenyon,
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Inspectors of Common Schools ; Jabez Burdick, Norry Hooker and Daniel Carr, Constables ; James Waterbury, Ethan Kenyon, Joel Maxson and John L. Slayton, Justices.
The town lies in the south-west corner of the county and contains 22,905 acres. The surface is very broken and moun- tainous, the highest summits being 1,000 to 1.400 feet above the valleys. Upon a rounded eminence a little north-east of the center of the town is a locality known as Rock City. It consists of a belt of huge masses of conglomerate, covering an area of forty acres, which extends from north to south, across the sumunit and down the declivities of the hill. The blocks are composed of milk-white pebbles, broken into regular layers, and so arranged as to form alleys and streets. The streams are Little Genesee, Dodges. Deer, Windfall and Oswayo creeks, all of which flow through narrow, mountainous ravines. The soil is a sandy and clayey loam. Agriculture is the chief pursuit of the inhabitants-dairying being the leading branch of agri- culture. Lumbering, thongh on the wane, is still carried ou to a considerable extent. We are credibly informed that no license has ever been granted in the town of Genesee and that none of its inhabitants have been sent to state prison. It is also asserted that none have been sent to the poor house.
The population in 1870 was 888; of whom all, except seven, were native, and all, except two, white.
LITTLE GENESEE, (p. o.) situated in the south-east part of the town, on the creek of the same name, contains one church, (Seventh Day Baptist,) one school, a general store, tavern, blacksmith shop, two saw mills, a cider mill, a millinery shop, tailor shop, twenty-five dwellings and 80 to 100 inhabitants.
CERES. (p. o.) situated on Oswayo Creek, and lying partly in this State and partly in Pennsylvania, contains a church, (M. E.) hotel, three general stores, one hardware store, a printing office, (the Ceres News,) one harness shop, two shoe shops, a carriage shop, blacksmith shop, grist mill, two saw mills. a milliner shop, thirty-eight dwellings and about 150 inhabitants. The Genesee portion of the village contains the post-office, a general store, grist mill, saw mill, hardware store, harness and shoe shops, milliner shop, twenty dwellings and about eighty inhabitants.
The Ceres News was started Sept. 24, 1873, by J. J. Barker, a resident of Ceres township, Potter Co., Pa. At present it is published in this State, where it was begun, but is soon to be removed across the line. It has always been considered a Penn- sylvania newspaper. It is published weekly by Mr. Barker still.
The settlement of this town is of comparatively recent date,
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though settlement was commenced at Ceres, just south of the hne, in Pennsylvania, as early as 1799, by Francis King and his son John, who were joined in 1802, by Thomas Bec, Thomas Smith and John Bell, all from England. The first settler in in Genesee was John Bell Jr., who was born in England, May 5, 1992, and emigrated thence with his father, John Bell, in 1801. He landed at Philadelphia and was apprenticed at Ger- mantown Pa., to learn the trade of a saddletree maker by his father, who removed in the autumn of 1802 to Ceres town- ship, Potter Co., Pa., as above stated. In the spring of 1817 John Bell Jr., removed to Ceres township and lived with John King, one of the first settlers there. In the fall of the same year he located land in the south-east corner of lot 49 in this town and commenced a clearing. and the following summer he built a log house upon it. The house stood upon the east bank and near the month of the brook which bears his name. The cellar may yet be seen. On the 28th of December, 1818, he married Miss Jane King of Ceres and soon after moved into his house. Hle persned the occupation of a farmer and lumber- man as did most of the early settlers in this locality. He lived on the old homestead till his death, May 3, 1874. The next settler of whom we have information was Newman Crabtree, an early settler in Wirt, who came to this town and commenced the erection of a saw mill on Little Genesee Creek. on lot 18, in 1819. The mill was not got ready for use till a year or two after, not, according to one authority, till the summer of 1822. This was the first mill of the kind built in the town. He put up a shanty to live in while building the mill, and on the com- pletion of the latter he sawed some plank and built a house. He also ent some 15,000 or 20.000 feet of boards. In the sum- mer of 1822 he started for Wirt with an ox sled to bring his family to stay with him a short time as they had done on previous occasione, alternating their residence with him here and at his place in Wirt. On arriving at lot 3 he stopped at an old hut used by the Indians as a half-way house between the tribes on the Allegany and Genesee rivers to let his oxen bait upon the rank herbage which grew around it, and while waiting he conceived the idea of setting fire to the shanty. lle took out his flint and punk and soon had the building in a blaze. Hle resumed his journey to Wirt and after a stay of a day or two there he started back for his home at the mill. When he arrived within sight of his house he was horrified to ser it in flames; and doubtless recognizing in this a punitive act for his wanton destruction of the Indian hut, he retraced his journey to the house of Timothy Cowles in Bolivar, where he remained over night, and the next day he returned
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to Wirt. He never returned to run the mill. That same fall a large pine tree fell across the mill dam and carried it away. The mill stood idle about four years, when it was purchased of Mr. Crabtree by Horace Wilson, who repaired and operated it for a number of years. A few days after the burning of Mr. Crabtree's house Mr. Timothy Cowles while on his way to Ceres, met an Indian a mile or two below the mill. He accosted the Indian and inquired why he burned the house, to which the latter ingenuously replied, " he burn me house, me burn his " ; and when asked why he did not burn the mill too, he answered, "Ugh ! he no burn me mill, me no burn his." Jabez Burdick, a native of Berlin, Rensselaer Co., started for this county in the winter of 1821-2, and in the latter part of February of the latter year he arrived at Friendship, where he remained during the summer and worked a farm on shares. In the fall of the same year he came to Genesee, locating on Little Genesee Creek, in the north part of lot 3, and made a chopping and built a log house on the same. In January, 1823, he brought in his family, consisting of his wife a son and two daughters. That spring he was appointed path-master, his beat extending from the Friendship line about three-fourths of a mile above his residence, to the Olean line, below Ceres, nearly seven miles in length, and his, says his son, was the only family on it. He worked out his assessment and some $10 of puole money. He was frequently called out to cut out trees that had fallen across the road. He and his son worked nearly sixty days on the road that season. The next season Mr. Streeter had moved in and helped them. He resided in the town till his death, and his son, Jabez Jr., who came in with him, has since lived in the town, with the exception of one year spent in the west. The latter has lived longer in the town than any other person living in it. Joseph Wells, a native of Westerly, R. I., and Ros- well Streeter, a native of Berlin, Rensselaer Co., whence many of the early settlers of this town came, moved in in 1824, the latter in August, and settled on lot 11, where the village of Little Genesee now is. Wells returned and came back early in November, 1825, with his wife and six children. He was a blacksmith and in 1826 he put up the first blacksmith shop in town. He followed that business and farming till his death in 1836. His son Samuel, who came with him, is still living on the old homestead. Streeter built the first framed house in town the same vear. He lived in town five or six years, when he removed to Wirt, and subsequently, after four or five years, to Illinois. Ezekiel Crandall, Riverious Hooker Jr. and John Loop came in December, 1825, Crandall was born at Hopkinton, R. I., Sept. 7, 1784, and removed thence with his family with a
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horse team and wagon, their goods being shipped to Rochester by water. In three weeks they reached Alfred, where Mr. Cran- dall was taken sick with typhoid fever, and where a son, E. R. Crandall, stopped during the winter with an aunt, joining the family in this town the following spring, since which time he has lived here. Another son, Henry C., after staying a few days at Alfred, went to Rochester after the goods, and reached their location on lot 12, with a portion of the goods (the rest being left in Friendship.) after sundown on the 31st of December, 125. He returned to Alfred, where he remained till his father recovered. The latter part of January, 1826. they moved into the town, staying until they could build a honse, at Mr. J. Burdick's, where the few goods that were brought in had been left. They moved into their house the fore part of March. The elder Crandall was called out with the militia during the war of 1812, to defend Stonington, Conn. His services were needed only a few days however. He remained on the place he located till his death in 1855. Henry C. Crandall has lived in the town since he first came. Rivereons Hooker Jr. was a native of Vermont and removed thence to Canada, near King- ston, and thence, in February, 1820, to Ceres township, in Pot- ter Co. l'a., where he lived till his removal to this town. He located on lot 63, in the north-west part of the town. He was a carpenter and millwright and followed that vocation here till his death in 1868. John Loop settled on lot 47, in the north- west part, and cleared a couple of acres. In 1829 he removed to lot 64, and thence, after one year, to Pennsylvania. Joseph Maxson and his son, Joel, moved in from Rhode Island, and settled on lot 4, in 1826, and remained in the town till their death, the former in 1856, and the latter in 1865. Wm. and Norry Hooker came in 1827. Wm. settled on lot 56 and re- mained ten or twelve years ; and Norry, on lot 55, where he re- mained five or six years, then removed to Portville. John Cook settled on lot 55 the same year and remained till about 1850. Settlements were also made by several families from Rhode Island in this year. Among them were Ethan Kenyon, Joel Crandall, Samnel Jaques and Amos and Rev. Henry P. Green, brothers. Kenyon settled on lot 3, in June, and lived there till his death in 1864. He was called to the defence of Stonington during the war of 1812. Two sons and a daughter came with him to this town. One of the former, Ethan Kenyon Jr., still lives on the old homestead. Crandall came in November and settled on lot 10, where he still lives. Jaques was born at Exeter, R. I., July 15, 1786. He removed to this town and settled on lot 2, Nov. 27, 1822. He came by way of Albany on account of the snow and bad roads, in company with Joel Crandall and Benj. Maxson,
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