USA > New York > Franklin County > Historical sketches of Franklin county and its several towns > Part 69
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85
660
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
million dollars, and S. C. Wead of Malone was named one of the com- missioners to receive and distribute stock. Again appeal was made to Boston financial interests, and this time not unsuccessfully. The com- pany was organized in 1846, with Mr. Horton one of the directors, and contracts for construction were let in 1847. Work was begun in March, 1848, both at Ogdensburg and at Rouses Point, and was crowded with all practicable energy. The first passenger train into Chateangay, drawn by an engine bearing the town's name, reached that place June 1, 1850, and Malone's first welcome to a passenger train was given September 19th in the same year. A week later trains were running from terminus to terminus. The entire cost of the road, including equipment, was $5,022,121.31 as against the estimate ten years before of a million and three-quarters.
The day that the first train arrived Malone gave itself up to a cele- bration in which almost delirious joy dominated everybody. Remem- bering that the event was the culmination of twenty years of striving, anxiety and sacrifice, that it was felt to comprehend the assurance of a prosperity and growth that would have been impossible without it, and that but few of the people had ever seen a railway train, we may perhaps reconstruct mentally something of the excitement and gladness that prevailed. We may be sure that every one in the community was out to join in the welcome and enjoy the festivities, and it is known by published reports that bells pealed and cannon boomed.
Next followed a tremendous fight for the right or privilege of cross- ing Lake Champlain by a bridge from Rouses Point. Simulating appre- hension that such a structure would impede navigation of the lake, but in fact actuated by the fear that if built all of the products of this sec- tion would seek a market in Boston instead of in New York, and also that it would send our merchants generally to the former city for their stocks of goods, the Legislature at first refused to sanction a bridge, but at length, when some of its opponents were cornered and forced by notice served by William A. Wheeler that unless the bridge measure were passed other enterprises would be blocked, the concession was won authorizing a bridge with a floating draw. The excitement throughout this region at the time was even greater than it had been over the main issue, and at a mass meeting held at Malone to voice local public opinion five thousand people assembled, while at a similar demonstration at Ogdensburg the gathering numbered twice as many. No less than thirty cars were crowded by people from Malone who made the trip to join in the meeting. A few years later the type of bridge now in use was authorized.
661
TRANSPORTATION DEVELOPMENT
How far the benefits which had been expected from the road were realized it would be idle to attempt to determine. Unquestionably they were great and manifold, and probably no point on the line profited more than Malone, to which came the central offices and the shops. The road itself was never a paying proposition, however, and it was not long before stock value sank out of sight, and even the bonds became much depreciated. Contention for operating control has occurred a number of times, and the property has at intervals been managed as an inde- pendent line, by the Central Vermont as lessee, and now is in the possession of the Rutland.
The joy and mighty hopes that the building of the Northern or O. & L. C. R. R. had evoked were succeeded within twenty years by discon- tent because the line was a monopoly, and the conviction seized upon the public mind that a competing road was vital to the locality's needs and interests. Various projects to this end began to be brought for- ward and advocated. The first of these, I think, in 1870, was a pro- posed construction of a road from Fort Covington through Malone to a connection with the Delaware and Hudson system at Ausable Forks. A public meeting was held in Malone to awaken interest, and after glow- ing addresses, unfolding and emphasizing the benefits which would be realized if the undertaking were put through, committees on ways and means were appointed. But nothing further was ever done, or seriously attempted - the men of means who must have furnished the money not having manifested any eager disposition to contribute. A little later the management of the great iron industry at Lyon Mountain and Chateaugay Lake, which was in control also of the narrow gauge railroad from Plattsburgh to Lyon Mountain, submitted a proposition to extend the road to Malone by way of Chateaugay Lake, but at a price which was deemed prohibitive, and no real effort was put forth to raise the stipulated bonus, though a survey for an independent road to Platts- burgh was made. Then for nearly twenty years Malone continued to grumble and growl because freight rates were high, but waited supinely for some one or some interest to come to its relief without cost to it. In 1883 an offer to make Malone instead of Moira the northern terminus of the Northern Adirondack Railroad if our people would contribute $100,000 to the work received but scant consideration because there was no expectation at that time that the road would run farther south than St. Regis Falls, though there was a quasi promise that eventually it would be carried to Fort Covington. In 1887, the narrow gauge railroad having been extended from Lyon Mountain through Bellmont and
662
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
Franklin to Loon Lake, Malone was aroused to an effort to build a line to connect with it at Wolf Pond. But the required money could not be raised, and after making a survey of the route the matter was dropped.
During the period of Malone's half-hearted and fruitless endeavors Fort Covington and Bombay began to be interested in proposed railway construction, and evinced disposition to pay handsomely for what they wanted. A plan had been advanced in 1866 for a road to be built from St. Lambert, Que., where connection would be had with the Grand Trunk, to Norwood (then Potsdam Junction), where it would join the New York Central lines. Public meetings were held all along the pro- posed route through Franklin and St. Lawrence counties, and the proposition was received with a good deal of popular enthusiasm. There was no constitutional prohibition at that time against giving public aid to private enterprises, and Fort Covington stood ready to bond itself for $75,000 and Bombay for $50,000 as bonuses, and there were a number of individual pledges in generous amounts additional. But for some reason the scheme fell through, though it was revived in 1873, when the towns named voted bond issues aggregating $121,000 to help along the undertaking. However, there was again failure, and Fort Covington was doomed to wait for ten years, and Bombay for fourteen, before their hopes were realized. In 1882 work was actually begun by the Grand Trunk on a road from Montreal to Fort Covington, which was finished in 1883. Four years later the contract was let for continuing the line to Massena, and no town had to contribute more than rights of way to the enterprise.
In 1883 construction of the Northern Adirondack Railroad was begun at Moira, to run to St. Regis Falls, and during the ensuing six years it was extended piece by piece through Waverly, Santa Clara and Altamont to Tupper Lake. When its builder, Mr. Hurd, failed some years later, the railroad was sold in 1894 under foreclosure, and was reorganized as the Northern New York Railroad. It subsequently became the New York and Ottawa Railroad, which is under New York Central control. The management determined in 1896 to extend the line southerly from Tupper Lake to North Creek in Warren county, where it would join the Delaware and Hudson system, and northerly from Moira to Ottawa, thus forming a direct line between New York city and the Dominion capital. But the purpose to build to North Creek was thwarted because State lands had to be crossed, which the courts enjoined. The case was carried to the court of appeals, the railroad company losing. The plan to go to Ottawa was executed, and the St. Lawrence was bridged to Corn-
663
TRANSPORTATION DEVELOPMENT
wall. The first attempt at bridging was a calamitous failure, the bridge having collapsed September 6, 1898. The structure stood 47 feet above the river, which was 40 feet deep, and when it went down it carried many workmen with it. Fourteen were killed or drowned.
The Chateaugay Railroad was extended into and through Bellmont and Franklin in 1886 and 1887, and in 1888 to Saranac Lake, with conversion subsequently to standard gauge.
Ernest G. Reynolds, in conjunction with the Central Vermont, fin- ished building a railroad from Moira to Bombay in 1889, and in 1891 organized a company to extend it to Hogansburgh and the St. Lawrence river. The latter undertaking never went further than a paper stage, however, and the former resulted in a foreclosure sale of the property in 1897. The rails were taken up and sold for old iron in 1900.
In 1890 the Canada Atlantic projected a railroad to run from Valley- field, Que., to Malone, asking Malone to give it a bonus of $60,000 in consideration of building to that place. The stipulated sum was sub- scribed, a part to be payable in materials or in labor, and the Dominion of Canada and the Province of Quebec gave subventions aggregating $184,000. Work was begun and pushed, and January 11, 1892, the first passenger train was run from Malone to Valleyfield and Montreal. The property was operated for a year or two by the Central Vermont, and was then bought by Dr. W. Seward Webb. It has since become a part of the New York Central lines.
It was doubtless this construction which determined Dr. Webb in 1891 to build a railway through the Adirondacks. It was reported at the time that at first he sought to buy the Northern Adirondack Rail- road, which, if successful, would have left Saranac Lake out of the reck- oning, and possibly Malone also. But Mr. Hurd's refusal to sell, or his demand for an exorbitant price, compelled a recasting of plans, which swung the road easterly from Tupper Lake, and so benefited Harriets- town and Saranac Lake, Brighton, Franklin and Bellmont. Dr. Webb's proposition to Malone was straightforward and simple; for $30,000 to be given by the people of Malone and vicinity he would bring a first-class railroad, fully and finely equipped, to Malone - affording direct connec- tions with Montreal and New York city. There is reason now to believe that he would have done all this without a dollar from us, but our people were taking no chances in the matter, and with an earnestness and an enthusiasm never before manifested in any similar public matter pro- ceeded to clinch the bargain. The road was built with a rush, and the first train from Malone to Saranac Lake was run July 16, 1892, and
664
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
the rails completing the line were joined a few months later. For a time through traffic to and from New York was by way of Norwood and over the R., W. & O. R. R., but trains over the regular line were in operation October 24, 1892. The road has been of inestimable con- venience and benefit to Malone and to the county as a whole.
These several enterprises have given railway facilities to every town in the county with the exceptions of Brandon, Duane and Westville.
The progress from the ox-cart and forest trails of 1796, great as it was, still left much to be desired, for good home highways are scarcely less important than railways; and for a hundred years and more we made and maintained our roads by wretchedly inefficient and wasteful practices - commuting highway taxes by pretending to work them out ; applying no trained intelligence in administering even so poor a system as it was; disregarding thoroughness; concentrating effort on cheap repairs that hardly survived a season ; attempting very few permanent improvements; and even in cases where money appropriations were voted failing often to expend them to good advantage. Years of agita- tion, argument and entreaty were required to persuade tax-payers to better courses and to the adoption of real reforms.
It was not until 1898 that the State began to take a hand in highway improvement in a broad way, and it was almost ten years later before Franklin county could be aroused to take advantage of this new policy by providing for sharing in the benefits which the expenditure of a hun- dred million dollars must confer. Even as late as 1904, when other counties had had work instituted in them which was to cost millions of dollars, and for a proportionate part of which Franklin was paying, and when the matter was canvassed tentatively by the board of super- visors, it was manifest that it would be impossible to obtain a majority vote in that body for obligating the county to any expenditure or indebt- edness in any amount whatever for making good roads. But so much was achieved during the ensuing year in awakening public interest in the matter that the board voted in 1905, eighteen to one, to petition for the improvement of a few miles of highways under the plan by which the State undertook to bear most of the cost, and the county and the towns to share equitably in providing for the remainder. In 1907 the super- visors actually made petition for the improvement of certain roads of which a part was to be in every town, and afterward added to the mileage then contemplated until the roads so built or planned measure about 150 miles. That is, the county was committed to action comprehending an aggregate expenditure of at least a million dollars, of which we must
665
TRANSPORTATION DEVELOPMENT
pay locally a part, even for the mileage originally proposed, estimated at $135,200. The same year the State engineer and surveyor had pre- pared plans upon which the petition in question was based, and those plans the supervisors approved. Though there were some votes in oppo- sition, they were determined not so much by hostility to the general proposition as by dissatisfaction with some of the allotments of mileage or selection of routes which the plans specified.
Besides the roads thus arranged for, the State has constructed, or is to construct, roads wholly at its own cost from Malone to Moira; from Nicholville to Moira; from Chateaugay village to the Clinton county line ; from Malone to Duane; in Malone village; and from Chateaugay to Malone - something like 371% miles in all.
The cost of ordinary repairs and of maintenance of both of these classes of highways is borne wholly by the State except that each town has to contribute $50 per mile per year for suchi portions as lie within it, the aggregate of town contributions having amounted in 1917 to $5,200. The sinking fund for cancellation of the county's obligations for the work calls for an annual levy of $3,216.81. to continue for fifty years. Yet more, the towns have increased their fermer usual highway taxes until the total now runs more than $90,000 a year, and, besides, a number of towns have bonded themselves in considerable amounts (Altamont for $20,000. Brighton for $15.000, Franklin for $13.500, and other towns for from $5,000 to $7,000 cach) to make improvements on the most approved lines of particular highways within their own respective boundaries. The town roads in the county aggregate 1,377 miles, and, though most of them are much better than they used to be, and some really high-class, many still continue very poor.
Having awakened at length to the importance of good roads, and having come to an appreciation of the greater ease and lessened cost of marketing products and of pleasure travel which they afford, the county determined in 1910 to have more of them than could be secured through State action or assistance, and the supervisors voted a bond issue of half a million dollars for the construction of about 135 miles of exclusively county roads, the mileage to be apportioned as equitably as possible among the towns, so that each should share in the benefits as well as in meeting the cost. Substantially all of this fund has now been expended -most of it in building macadam highways, but a part in making really excellent graveled roads. The average cost per mile under this plan has been between $3,000 and $4,000, or hardly more than a quarter as much as the average expenditure for State roads; and, of
666
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
course, they can not be expected to be as durable as the latter. Some of them are already badly worn, but it is planned to repair or recon- struct wherever necessary in order to preserve the work. The county is paying $10,000 a year for retirement of bonds, about $21,000 for inter- est charges, and $40,000 for repairs and maintenance, a total of more than $71,000. To the repair and maintenance item the State adds $20,000, so that the available amount for this purpose is $60,000 annually.
With the development of our highways has come, all within less than twenty years, a greatly increased use of automobiles. The number owned in the county as shown by the records in the Secretary of State's office was 2,346 on the first of February, 1918, or one to every 19 inhabitants, exclusive of Indians. Twenty-three agents are pushing sales even faster than they can get their orders filled by the makers. Of the total number no less than 1,984 are distinctively pleasure motors, 23 are operated by dealers, 147 are in use as hacks or on stage lines, and 188 are employed by draymen or by merchants in delivering goods. At an average of only $500 each for the pleasure cars (and some of them cost more than three times that), the investment is a million dollars, or ten times as much as Malone tried vainly to raise upon two or three occasions thirty and forty years ago for additional railway lines which were felt to be of vital importance. Yet now the people rush with eagerness into automobile buying, some even mortgaging their homes to raise the money, when ownership of a car entails constant expense for upkeep and is also an ever-present temptation to other expenditure. Still, added to the facilities which the railroads afford, these motor cars are in fact an important factor in our transportation system, though of course they make a tremendous wear upon the roads.
It is a far cry to these from the ox service upon which the pioneers were wholly dependent, when a week's time was required for a round trip to Plattsburgh for supplies, or even from the use of horses. The steers and oxen, indispensable at one time, have practically disappeared, and one is moved to wonder if the horse also is to go. Some types, indeed, have almost gone already, notably the fine drivers. Less than a generation ago sales of well matched, finely bred spans of horses here were numerous every year at from $500 to $1,500, and now it would be difficult to find a single such pair ; and even handsome, fast-gaited single animals are very few. Draft horses are more common, and if sound and of heavy weight are in good demand. It is an interesting question whether, with the exception of the type that now seems indispensable for
667
TRANSPORTATION DEVELOPMENT
farm work and for lumbering, the horse is doomed to such disappearance as we have seen in the case of the ox and the steers.
A single word of suggestion may not be impertinent. When the great war ends France and England, and not improbably Germany as well, will naturally look to this country to stock them with horses. The supply in the West is not large, and might it not be good policy for our farmers to breed more, and be in position to profit through such demand ?
CHAPTER XXIX THE FENIAN RAIDS
Malone was a point of rendezvous both in 1866 and 1870 for the forces which were to overrun and possess Canada as a means of freeing Ireland from British oppression.
The word " Fenian " is the Irish " Feinne " anglicized, and " feinne " was the legendary band of warriors in Ireland led by Find MacCumail. Plans for the organization of the Fenian Society were formulated in Paris as early as 1848, and an organization known as the Irish Revolu- tionary Brotherhood was actually effected in 1853 through the efforts of James Stephens. Its aim was to be the conversion of the people of Ireland into a soldiery that should be capable of coping with the British army, and so to establish an independent republic based upon universal suffrage and peasant proprietorship of the land; the lands of hostile landlords to be confiscated, but those of others to be paid for at a fair valuation. As stated in the Britannica, John O'Mahoney was the organ- izer in the United States in 1858, and the purpose of the American movement was to supply money and arms to the Irish branch. , It was five or six years, however, before it attracted much attention or mani- fested particular activity. Members of the society are said to have bound themselves by an oath of "allegiance to the Irish republic, now virtually established," and to have sworn to take up arms when called upon, and to yield implicit obedience to the commands of their superior officers. There were ramifications of the society in every part of the world.
In accordance with the original plan to prosecute operations in Ireland itself, considerable numbers of Irish veterans of the American civil war flocked to Ireland at once upon the close of our conflict, with the inten- tion of inciting and leading an uprising there. But informers kept the British government apprised of the society's plans and acts, so that many of the plotters were arrested. Some were sentenced to death, though penal servitude was substituted. The hazards and difficulties of procedure on Irish soil having been thus demonstrated, the American organization split, and W. R. Roberts became the leader of the faction here which contended that revolt in Ireland could not be successful, and which determined to direct activities from the United States, particu-
[668]
669
THE FENIAN RAIDS
larly because, whether with or without reason, it was believed that, still smarting from England's sympathies and aid to the South, our authori- ties and people would give the undertaking, if not support, at least a passive attitude when actual invasion of Canada should be attempted. That assumption was apparently justified in part at least by the event, for there was no official interference with the movement until operations were actually in progress. Drilling, the purchase of arms and ammu- nition, and the raising of money were permitted without sign of objec- tion or warning from Washington to desist, and individuals who had grown up in a traditional spirit of enmity to England, surviving from the war of the revolution and that of 1812, and intensified by the boundary dispute and England's course in having permitted confeder- ate privateers to be fitted out there, encouraged the Fenian leaders in almost every possible manner - even by the contribution of money to their cause. This was especially true of politicians who sought to acquire or hold the Irish vote through such attitude. John A. Macdonald's " Troublous Times in Canada " gives the best account of what happened thereafter that I have anywhere seen, and I condense from it.
Fenian circles or lodges were organized in every possible corner of the United States, with the hope of arousing Irish enthusiasm and inducing contributions. Military companies and regiments, under the direction of Irishmen who had gained distinction in our civil war, were formed wherever practicable, and drilling and parading occurred almost openly. Even servant girls and day laborers gave generously from their scanty earnings, and the system of solicitation of funds was thoroughly organized and assiduously prosecuted. Besides, money was raised in this country in 1866 by the issue and sale of bonds in the name of the Irish Republic, which were to be payable when Ireland was a nation again. With the funds so realized arms and ammunition were pur- chased, and preparations made for an invasion of Canada.
In March, 1866, the Fenian Council made announcement that such expeditions would assemble at Detroit, Rochester, Ogdensburg, Platts- burgh, and Portland, Maine - the Ogdensburg and Plattsburgh divi- sions to demonstrate against Montreal, and eventually against Quebec. Bases were to be established in Canada where reinforcements would mass and organization be effected (one of them at Prescott), so as to prevent interference by the United States authorities. The Council claimed that by April first it would have fifteen million dollars at its disposal, and that the Fenian army would then number thirty thousand men, who would be increased within a fortnight to eighty thousand. A
670
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
navy would be created on each of the lakes, Huron, Erie and Ontario, and upon the conquest of Canada, which a single campaign was to accomplish, the war would be extended in 1867 to the ocean and Ireland.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.