USA > New York > Chautauqua County > Gazetteer and business directory of Chautauqua County, N.Y., for 1873-4 > Part 9
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E
D
1874
1875
1876
1877
1878
1879 |1880
1881
1882
1883
1 8 15 22 29
Sun.
Sat.
Frid'y.
Thurs.
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Tues.
Mon.
2 9 16 23 30
Mon.
Sun.
Sat.
Frid'y.
Thurs.
Wed.
Tues.
3 10 17 2131
Tues.
Mon.
Sun.
Sat.
Frid'y.
Thurs.
Wed.
4 11 18 25
Wed.
Tues.
Mon.
Sun.
Sat.
Frid'y.
Thurs.
5 12 19 26
Thurs,
Wed.
Tues.
Mon.
Sun.
Sat.
Frid'y.
6 13 20 27
Frid'y.
Thurs.
Wed.
Tues.
Mon.
Sun.
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7 14 2128 .
Sat.
Frid'v.
Thurs.
Wed.
Tues.
Mon.
Sun.
Jan. and Oct.
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
May.
B
0
. D
E
F
G
A
August.
C
D
E
F
G
A
B
Feb., Mar., Nov.
D
E
F
G
A
B
C
June.
E
F
G
A
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C
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Sept. & Dec.
F
G
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April & July.
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EXPLANATION .- Find the Year and observe the Letter above it ; they look for the Month, and in a line with it find the Letter of the Year; above the Letter find the Dur; and the figures on the left, in the same line, are the days of the same name in the mouth
Leap Years have two letters ; the first is used till the end of February, the second during the remainder of the year.
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CHAUTAUQUA COUNTY.
CHAUTAUQUA COUNTY
CHAUTAUQUA COUNTY was formed from Gene- see, March 11, 1808, with its present limits, and was provision- ally annexed to Niagara county until a population of 500 persons qualified to vote for members of the assembly was attained. Prior to that time, with the exception of the tenth range of townships, it formed the town of Chautauqua in Genesee county, receiving its name from the beautiful lake within its borders. In 1811 the organization of the county was completed, officers* were appointed, and a commissiont designated to select a site for the county seat and superin- tend the erection of a court house and jail .;
The county lies upon the south shore of Lake Erie, in the southwest corner of the State. It is centrally distant from Albany 288 miles, and contains 1,099 square miles.§ Its physical features are marked by rolling and hilly uplands,
* The first county officers were : First Judge. Zattu Cushing, who represented the county the three preceding years in the judiciary of Niagara county : Asociate !! 'gex. Matthew Prendergast. Philo Orton, Jonathan Thompson and Win. Alexander ; Sherif, David Eason ; and County Clerk, John E. Marshall.
! This commission consisted of Jonas Williams, Isaac Sutherland and Asa Ransom. The county seat was established at Mayville, and the first court was held there June 25th of that year. At that time the county contained only two towns-Chau- tanqua and Pomfret. the latter having been erected at the erection of the county in IN. The location of the county seat at Mayville excited the jealousy of the resi- dents of Pomfret, who desired to have the county buildings located at Fredonia, thea known as Canadaway ; and in 1812, an appropriation of $1500 for the construc- ton of county buildings, authorized at the erection of the county. and proposed by the Supervisor of Chautauqua, was opposed by the Pomfret Supervisor. As the lat- ter manifested no disposition to yield the point the subject was temporarily laid all" for the transaction of other business. When the business of auditing town Beennuts was reached the Chautauqua Supervisor retaliated by refusing an appro- priation for the accounts presented by his opponent, and as the board consisted of ulily two members, a majority could not be obtained upon either question. A dead Ing str. and the matter was can promised by allowing the appropriation art : - French's Guanteer of New York and Warren's Sketches of the History je tounty.
French's Gazetteer of New York. In Benton's Dictionary of Geography the area of this county is said to be 1020 square miles ; and Spaford, in his Gazetteer of New York, says " its land area is 856 square miles."
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CHAUTAUQUA COUNTY.
similar to those of the southern tier of counties. The hills, though of the same nature, are less elevated than those of Cat- taraugus and Allegany counties by two hundred feet ; and as we proceed further west we find their altitude constantly diminishing until in Ohio, the highest rocks in this county, where an altitude of about 2,000 feet above tide is attained, are only a few hundred feet above Lake Erie. The highest point in the county is in the town of Charlotte. The north and south parts are less elevated than the central. A ridge ex- tending through the county from four to six miles from Lake Erie, and converging toward that lake in the west, forms the water shed between the streams flowing north and those flow- ing south .* The hills forming this ridge are from 1000 to 1200 feet above Lake Erie, to which they descend by a pic- turesque slope-nearly the whole descent being made in the first three or four miles. The uplands are broken by several deep valleys. Chautauqua Lake, near the center, lies more than 500 feet below the highest summits; Conewango Creek, in the southeast, forms a depression of 500 to 800 feet; while the deep gorge of the Cattaraugus, in the northeast, is even lower than the Conewango. In many places these declivities are too steep to admit of profitable cultivation.
The county is well watered by numerous streams and lakes. The principal streams are Cattarangus, (which forms a small portion of the north boundary,) Silver, Walnut,t Canadaway, Chautauqua and Twenty Mile creeks, flowing north into Lake Erie, and Conewango,f Cassadaga and French creeks, flowing
* It is a remarkable fact that the waters of Chautauqua Lake, which is distant only eight miles from Lake Erie, and a small stream flowing into the former, and distant less than five miles, are discharged by the Conewango, Allegheny, Ohio and Mis- sissippi into the Gulf of Mexico.
t This creek received its name from a large black-walnut tree which stood near its bank, within the limits of the village of Silver Creek, and on the line of the old stage road from Buffalo to Cleveland. This tree measured nine feet in diameter three and one-half feet from the ground and ran up sixty feet to the first limbs. It was blown down April 22, 1522. and about 1829 a section fourteen feet in length was cut from the bntt by Luther Heaton and Calvin Wood, who hollowed it out, leaving the shell about three inches thick, cut openings for a door and window, furnished it with & circular table, shelves, &c., and kept a grocery, with "Cake and Beer for Sale." "Twelve men could be comfortably seated within it. On the opening of the Erie Canal in 1-25 it was taken to Buffalo, put on board the first canal boat that ran the whole length of the canal, and conveyed to New York, where it was set up on the Bowery as a grocery. After a few years it was sent to London, where it was sold for $1700, and honored with a place in the British Museum, being regarded as the "great American curiosity." Titus Roberts, of Gowanda, Cattaraugus county, then a resident of Forestville and proprietor of the principal hotel there, was en- gaged in its removal eastward. and, as was currently reported. lost money in the en- terprise .- [From statements of Mr. H. H. Hawkins, of Silver Creek, March 13. 1573 ; and! Hon. Geo. W. Patterson at the semi-centennial celebration of the Fredonia timmar, in the issue of that paper of Fub. 8, 18Tl.
+ This name is variously spelled by different anthors. On Guy Johnson's map of the frontiers of the northern colonies, &c. published in Doc. Hist. Vol. I. pag. Es. it is spelled cameragan ; on " A Map of the Genesee Country, " accompanying a descrip- tion of that country by Robert Munro, published in Doc. Mist. Vol. If. page 1170. Cznotcongo River ; in French's Gazetteer of New York and Warren's Historical Sketched .
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south, the first and last into Allegheny River, and Cassadaga, into the Conewango. The principal lakes are Chautauqua* and Cassadaga in the central, and Findleys in the west part.
Chautauqua Lake is a beautiful sheet of water, eighteen miles long, and from one to three miles wide. It extends diagonally nearly half across the country, and is navigable its entire length for steamboats. It is 726 feet above Lake Erie, and 1,291 feet above tide; and in 1846 it was pronounced by Emory F. Warren, " the highest body of water upon the globe navigated by steam." Upon the east it is bounded by fine sloping gravel- ly banks of exceeding richness and fertility, and on the west by level and in some places marshy shores. Its waters are sup- plied principally from springs, and their purity is attested by the depth to which objects within them are discernible, and the choice fish with which they abound. Its outlet forms a branch of the Conewango, and is navigable for steamers as far as James- town.
The rocks of this county belong to the Chemung and Port- age groups. To superficial observation there are few rocks to be seen in the county, but examinations made along the deep ravines prove the existence of all the great masses further east. All the northern part of the county below the elevation of 1.400 feet above tide, or about 840 feet above Lake Erie, is un- derlaid by the shale and thin sandstone of the Portage group, which are distinguished from those above by the almost entire absence of all fossils except fucoids, as well as the greater pre- dominance of shale. All the southern part as well as the high- est portions of the northern part, are occupied by the Chemung group, readily known by the great number of shells of the gen- vra strophomena, orthis, delthyris, avicula, &c., which characterize it everywhere. In this group the proportion of sand increases over that below, and in its upper part the larger proportion is sandstone. The strata composing the Portage group may be
Chautauque County. Connercango; and in Spafford's Gazetteer of New York, Con- warongo. We have adopted the form of the word officially applied to the post office of the same name in Cattaraugus county. a course in which Hough, in his Gazetteer " Sar York, has preceded us. A similar remark is applicable to the word Cassadaga, the most noticeable deviation we have observed being sanctioned by Spafford, who writes it Comdauga.
* The French named this lake Chadakoin, (Colonial History of the State of New York, Vi. VI page 835 :) in Benton's Dictionary of Geography, where a final e is substituted for the final a now in common use, it is pronounced Chiar-the-ke-(r); and Warren, in Historical Sketches of Chautauque County, (where it will be observed the final e is to draugs of the origin of the name. "one authority derives it from a corruption of the Indian word (tx-ha-to-ku, which signifies ' foggy place,' and was applied to the country around the head of Chautauqua Lake, which was said to be noted for the prevalence of its fors. Another derives it from the words. CZonkanegra, in the det. which signify . a pack tid in the rullar from the resemblance which 1. : brats to that object." Barber's Historien foi actions of Noe York assigns rixin of the name to the same Indian word. On the map accompanying Munro's scription of the Genesee country, before alluded to, the word is spelled thatunghiud.
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CHAUTAUQUA COUNTY.
seen to advantage on the shore of Lake Erie, which consists of perpendicular bluffs from ten to one hundred feet in height; and those in the Chemung group, in the banks of Chautauqua Creek, six miles above Westfield, and in the outlet of Chautauqua Lake, below Jamestown. The latter may also be seen to some extent on Twenty Mile Creek, and in many of the ravines along the Conewango and Cassadaga valleys. They are nowhere seen, except in ravines on the banks of the streams. Many of the hills are capped with conglomerate, which is the highest rock in the county. It varies in thickness from five to six feet, and, when free from pebbles, forms a good building stone, being easily dressed and readily obtained in blocks of large dimensions. It is, in fact, almost the only building stone, exceeding a few inches in thickness, which can be ob- tained in the southern part of the county. At Panama it oc- curs on both sides of the stream, and follows the eastern slope of a hill for more than half a mile. Upon the stream it mea- sured sixty feet thick, and lay in huge masses' 60 or 70 feet long, and 20 or 40 feet wide and thick. These masses diminish in size and frequency toward the south, and soon disappear. They are separated by deep fissures, and are sometimes so ar- ranged as to form caverns, which are so excluded from sunlight that snow and ice remain during the summer. Four miles north-west of Panama the conglomerate and sandstone cover the ground to a considerable depth. The whole is composed of fragments, most of them small, which are piled irregularly one above the other, as if rolled down from an eminence. The situation is at the foot of a hill on the western side. In Cly- mer this sandstone was formerly quarried for grindstones and other purposes. About three miles south-east of Panama, on the east side of the valley of the Little Broken Straw, the con- glomerate is found, and still further east, on lot 13, the sand- stone occupies the surface of two or three acres, outcropping on the northern and eastern sides of the hill. In digging a well near the summit of the hill, the same rock was found, covered with a layer of " fine beach sand." The rock beneath was frac- tured and the surface worn and smooth. Conglomerate has been quarried in considerable quantities upon a hill about two miles from Ashville ; four miles north of Panama ; and again one mile south-west of this. In the north part of Ellery con- glomerate is found in loose blocks scattered thickly over the surface for a small extent, and is evidently the remains of a once continuous stratum ; and again in the south-east corner of the county, upon a ridge extending southward between the Allegheny and Conewango, huge masses, consisting mainly of sandstone, lie scattered over the hill sides and tops, the thickest
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bing about thirty feet. The sandstones of-the Portage group crop out at Laona, Shumla. (where it is the terminating mass of the group,) in several places along the lake shore, and in ex- cavations west of Fredonia. Shales and sandstones, differing in some degree, compose the whole assemblage of this group. In the lower part these are more intermingled, and the sand is tiner ; while in the higher part of this series the sand is often evarser, and generally less intermixed with shale. The Portage group forms the lower member of the division known as the thick bedded sandstones; its constituents are less separated than above ; and the arenaceous strata are finer grained and always more argillaceous than in the Chemung group. The higher mass of sandstone in this group is very persistent, and forms a line of demarkation between the almost non-fossiliferous shales and sandstones below and those above, which are highly fossil- iferous, and are a continuation of the Chemung group. Rip- ple marks are abundant in the shales which are interstratified with sandstone, but it is often difficult or impossible to obtain good specimens. Many of them have the appearance of having been produced by a current opposed to the direction of the wind. These strata give strong indications that at the time of their deposition the sea was alternately deep and shallow. The dark and green argillaceous shales bear no evidence of ripples or diagonal lamination, and their homogeneous nature implies that they were deposited in deep water. This group presents a great variety of concretionary forms, and from their shape and the fancied resemblance of the seams upon their surface to the hues of suture in the shells of the tortoise and turtle they are often mistaken for organic bodies. Hundreds are annually thrown down upon the beach of Lake Erie by the undermining artion of the waves. Between Dunkirk and Portland Harbor they are frequently two or three feet in diameter, and not more than half a foot thick, and great numbers of them have been Inrned in that locality for hydraulic cement, for which they are well adapted. Lime has been manufactured to a limited extent from marl and bowlders of limestone. Large deposits of Well marl (the largest deposit in the county,) are found in Casadaga Lake and the marshes which nearly divide it into two portions. There is also a bed of marl and tufa at the southern extremity of Chautauqua Lake, near Dexterville. The marl is made into the form of bricks and then burned. It has len used many years, and 2,000 bushels of lime have been middle from it per annum. The existence of bowlders and frag- of limestone in various localities induced the belief that sam- rock occurred in situ ; but it is not found, except in detached fragments, south of the limestone terrace in Erie
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CHAUTAUQUA COUNTY.
county. One of these masses, found near Forestville, yielded 150 barrels of lime. A few miles south-east of Fredonia was found a large mass of water lime, which burned into quicklime of a dark color. The county is practically destitute of earthy minerals-the various compounds of silica and alumina -- and metallic minerals. Alum earth is found in the town of Sheridan, from which alum is formed by the action of the atmosphere. It is not, however, thought to be abundant.
This county presents by far the most interesting exhibition of the evolution of carbureted hydrogen which occurs in the State. This gas issues from the shales of the Portage group in various localities, but most profusely from the bed of Canada- way Creek, at Fredonia. The slate composing the bed of this stream has a blueish color, and some of the layers are exceed- ingly fragile, requiring only a few years exposure to be converted into a clayey soil. The lower strata, however, resist atmos- pheric agencies, and are sometimes used as a building material. When recently broken it emits a strong bituminous odor, and it frequently contains thin seams of a substance resembling bituminous coal. Most commonly, however, this bituminous matter occurs in patches, having more the appearance of detatched vegetable impressions than of a regular stratum. The escape of this gas is indicated by bubbles upon the surface of the water, both in this creek and on Lake Erie. It is some- times accompanied by petroleum, which forms a pellicle upon the surface of the water. The gas burns with a white flame tinged with yellow above and blue near the orifice of the burner. It is used at Fredonia and Westfield for illuminating the vil- lages and is supplied in ample quantity at the former place for all present purposes. The bituminous matter, through whose fissures the gas is so copiously disengaged, burns with a flame entirely resembling that of the gas. With the slate containing this bituminous matter, there alternates a sandstone, which everywhere contains small cavities, filled with petroleum, which gives out a strong bituminous odor. This liquid substance appears originally to have been diffused throughout the whole mass of the rock, both sandstone and slate, and to have given to it the peculiar character it now possesses. This gas is evolved at Barcelona and Van Buren Harbor, on Lake Erie : at Buffington's well ;* in the town of Sheridan, six and a half miles from Fredonia; and on the west branch of Canadaway Creek, four miles south-east of that village. Formerly a light
* Budington's well is a boring. Sie feet deep, made on the shore of Lake Erie. i short distance below Barcelona, in search of salt water, on the supposition that if the level of tide water was reached, salt water would be found .- [Natural History of Jer York, Part Ill., Mineralogy, by Lewis C. Beck; and Warren's Historical Sketches of Chuntanque County.
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CHAUTAUQUA COUNTY.
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house at Barcelona waslighted with the gas which escapes in that locality ; but since the light house was discontinued the village of Westfield has been supplied from this source. The origin of this gas is attributed by competent authority* to the action of heat upon the bituminous matter, from which it is evolved, or the decomposition by heat of animal and vegetable remains in what are now crystalline and metamorphic rocks. "Or it may be," says Prof. Beck, "that the same matter which in the upper strata is solid or liquid, is, at great depths, the gas kept in a lignid form by the pressure of the superincumbent strata. A fact which I observed at Fredonia, confirms this view, and in my opinion proves that there is, at some distance below the sur- face, a vast reservoir of gas, the evolution of which is prevented by the pressure exerted upon it. The fact to which I refer is, that when the water in the creek is low, bubbles of gas are of- ten observed, which disappear entirely when the water has risen, as after a rain. [t] And again gas may be obtained at almost any part of the bank by boring to the depth of twenty or thirty feet.[1] So common, indeed, is this occurrence, that many of the wells in the village of Fredonia are strongly charged with gas. It may also be added, that there are fre- quently to be observed in this vicinity, disruptions in the strata of slate, which have probably been caused by some expansive force exerted from beneath." This same gas is found issuing from strata from fifteen hundred to two thousand feet in thick- ness, and not less than four hundred miles in extent. Upon high ground, in a ravine on the west branch of Canadaway Creek, three miles south of Fredonia, upon what is known as the Frank farm, is a spring of light carbureted hydrogen, which is in constant ebulition. Sulphur springs are of frequent occur. ence in the county, and apparently have some connection with the emission of carbureted hydrogen. In Fredonia many springs of this kind have been discovered ; but they are said to lose their sulphurous character in a short time. This, how- erer, is not the case with those found elsewhere. On the shore of Lake Erie, about a mile cast of Van Buren Harbor, a spring, highly charged with sulphureted hydrogen. issues from the slate rock, nearly on a level with the lake. The water is cold and clear, but not very abundant in quantity. Its specific gravity is 1.00193 at 60 deg. F; and it contains minute por-
* Prof. Lewis C. Beck, in Natural History of New York, and Rev. Dr. Armstrong, Principal of the Fredonia Normal and Training School.
+ It is proper to state that by boring wells the gas has been diverted to them and Horasegen is not indicated by bubbles on the surface of the creek as formerly. " the reservoir at Fredonia is full the surplus gas may be seen to bubbl- up with usherable force.
; This assertion is disproved by the experiments instituted by Mr. Elias Forbes, President of the Fredonia Gas Company.
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tions of carbonate of lime, sulphate of lime and sulphate of soda. Another spring of a similar kind occurs near the sand- stone quarries at Laona ; and others are found in the town of Sheridan, a mile and a half from Lake Erie.
The soil of this county is composed chiefly by the decompo- sition of its underlying rocks. The valleys and low northern slopes are deeply covered with northern drift and alluvium, con- taining a large proportion of calcareous matter; while upon. the higher grounds it is spread sparingly, and in many of the higher places it is wholly unknown. In consequence of its absence the character and productions of the soil of the hills and valleys are quite different. In some parts of the county underlaid by the portage group a deficiency in this matter is indicated by a different growth of timber, and a corresponding change in the products of the soil. When first cleared the land produces good crops of all the grains, but wheat does not always prove a sure crop after a few years cultivation. The soil derived from the lower part of this group is a stiff clay; but as we ascend the arenaceous matter increases, and the broken frag- ments of the sandy strata become intermixed with the finer materials, giving it the character of a clayey gravel, which is locally known as flat gravel, to distinguish it from that of the valleys, where the fragments are rounded by attrition into the form of pebbles. In the valleys and on the low northern slopes of the portage group, the soil produces wheat with the same facility and equal certainty as the formations north of it. As we ascend to the south, the wheat crops are less abundant and certain, and give place to the coarser crops and to pasturage. For the latter purpose the soil is superior to that north of it, and the evidence is fully substantiated by the important dairy interests of this section. The soil resulting from the decompo- sition of the Chemung group of rocks is a compact clayey loam, which, with the great abundance of the angular fragments of the rock, gives it the character of flat gravel. All the hills and a large portion of the higher ground are covered with it. Many of the lower valleys have evidently been overflowed with a quiet water, from which the fine loamy deposits have been made .*
*Bear. Cassadaga and Mud lakes have once been much more extensive than now ; and by successive drainage, they have left marks of their subsidence along the slop- ing hills around them. The valleys of Cassadaga and Couewango creeks have evi- dently been extensive lakes, as would appear both from the nature of the materials in the bottom of these valleys, and from the evidences along the elevated grounds bordering them, as also from the narrow outlets worn through rocky strata. In the valley of Chautauqua Lake we find satisfactory evidence of its former great ele.Va- tion in ridges or terraces of gravel and sand, which are particularly well defined up- on the north side. Examinations about the outlet reveal the cause of this greater af -- vti n in the destruction of his former outlet, which was nearly in an easterly direc- then from the Cassa leg ; where, as now, by the accumulation of large deposits of gravel, it is turned in a southorly direction, and only joins the Cassadaga valley by a channel excavated through the solid rock. This direction is seen very clearly by
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