USA > New York > Westchester County > History of Westchester County, New York, from its earliest settlement to the year 1900 > Part 64
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1,696
P'olham .
1,790
Poundridge
1,191
Rye.
7,150
Port Chester Village
3.797
Somers
1,721
Westchester .
6,015
West Farms . .
9,372
Belmont Village
171
Clairmont
158
Fairmount
508
Fordham ..
2.15]
Monterey
..
118
Mount Eden ..
116
7.798
606
HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
POPULATION
West Farms-Continued
Mount Hope Village
487
Tremont
2,025
West Farms
1,761
Williams's
Bridge
144
Woodstock
307
White Plains ..
2,630
Yonkers .
18,357
Yonkers Village
12,733
Yorktown
2,635
Total
131,348
The steady growth of Yonkers had long foreshadowed the conver- sion of that village into a city, and after the census enumeration of 1870 the important change began to be agitated. The legislative act creating the City of Yonkers was passed on the 1st of June, 1872, and received Governor Hoffman's signature the same day. By this measure the whole of the former Township of Yonkers, excepting a strip at its southern extremity, was incorporated in the new city. The southern strip excluded from the city limits extended from Spuyten Duyvil Creek to a point on the Hudson beginning at " the northerly line of the land belonging to the Sisters of Charity, knowr. as Mount Saint Vincent de Paul." which line was continued east- ward along specified bounds to the Bronx River. The portion of the ancient territory of Yonkers thus reserved continued, however, to belong to Yonkers Township until the 16th of December, 1872. when it was set off by the board of supervisors as a separate township, receiving the name of the Town of Kingsbridge. The City of Yonkers has preserved to the present day the exact limits appointed to it by the act of 1872. It has an area of seventeen and one-half square miles.
At the first election held for city officers, Mr. James C. Courter and Mr. Robert P. Getty were, respectively, the Democratic and Repub- lican candidates. Mr. Conrter received a majority.1 John F. Bren- nan, E. L. Seger, Albert Keeler, William MacFarlane, Ethan Flagg, Il. L. Garrison, Henry R. Hicks, and Z. II. Brower were chosen alder- men. " When the city was incorporated," says Allison, "it had no asphalt avenues and streets, no waterworks to supply water for do- mestie use, for power, and for extinguishing fires, no system of sewers, no firebells, no electric fire-alarm, and no electric lights. There were no steam cars running to Getty Square, no street cars." From the
1 Mayors of the City of Yonkers to the present time: 1872-74. James C. Courter: 1874-76. Joseph Masten; 1876-78, William A. Gibson; 1878-80, Joseph Masten; 1880-82. Norton P. Otis; 1882-84,
Sammel Swift; 1884-86, William G. Stahlnecker; 1886-90, J. Harvey Boll; 1890-92, James Mill- ward; 1892-94. James H. Weller; 1896-98. John G. Prene: 1898-1900. Leslie Sutherland.
TOWNS
607
FROM 1842 TO 1900
first the seat of the city government was the Philipse Manor House, which in 1868 had been purchased by the village from its owner, Judge William W. Woodworth.
The presidential campaign of 1872 is over memorable as the one in which Horace Greeley, the great editor of the New York Tribune, ran against General Grant. Mr. Greeley was for some twenty years a citizen of Westchester County. He was one of the early incomers from New York City after the opening of the railways. In the sum- mer of 1850 he lived with his family on the Todd Bailey estate in the Town of North Salem.1 We have seen that during the same year he took a very prominent part in the steps which led to the settle- ment of Mount Vernon. In 1851 he purchased a farm of seventy-tive acres at Chappaqua in the Town of New Castle. Unlike most other prominent New Yorkers who came to Westchester County to live, Mr. Greeley sought a strictly rural abode without any of the acces- sories of aristocratie pretension. He wished to be a plain farmer, and to prosecute agricultural pursuits in a perfectly serious way. Ilis purposes in moving to Chappaqua were thus eloquently expressed in an address delivered before the Indiana Agricultural Society in 1858: " As for me, long tossed on the stormiest waves of doubtful conflict and arduous endeavor, I have begun to feel, since the shades of forty years fell upon me, the weary, tempest-driven voyager's long- ing for land, the wanderer's yearning for the hamlet where in child- hood he nestled by his mother's knee, and was soothed to sleep on her breast. The sober down-hill of life dispels many illusions, while it develops or strengthens within us the attachment, perhaps long smothered or overlaid, for . that dear hut, our home' And so 1. in the sober afternoon of life, when its sun, if not high, is still warm, have bought a few acres of land in the broad, still country, and, bear ing thither my household treasures, have resolved to steal from the city's labors and anxieties at least one day in each week, wherein to revive as a farmer the memories of my childhood's humble home. And already I realize that the experiment can not cost so much as it is worth. AAlready I find in that day's quiet an antidote and a solace for the feverish, festering cares of the weeks which environ it. Al- ready my brook murmurs a soothing even-song to my burning, throb- bing brain; and my trees, gently stirred by the fresh breezes, whisper to my spirit something of their own quiet strength and patient trust in God. And thus do I faintly realize, though but for a brief and flitting day, the serene joy which shall irradiate the farmer's voca- tion, when a fuller and truer education shall have refined and chastened his animal cravings, and when science shall have endowed
1 Scharf, il .. 515.
608
HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
him with her treasures, redeeming labor from drudgery while quad- rupling its efficiency, and crowning with beauty and plenty our boun- teous, beneficent Earth."
Mr. Greeley was accustomed to come up to Chappaqua Saturday morning, returning to the city Sunday morning. lle converted the place into a model farm, and his celebrated book, " What 1 Know About Farming," was the result of his experiences in developing his Chappaqua land. " It was his custom," says Barrett, in his His- tory of the Town of New Castle, " always to vote, both at general and local elections, and it was usual for him to spend the whole day at the polls when the election was important, discussing public ques- tions with those who would gather about him for that purpose." He retired to his farm toward the close of the presidential canvass, and there, worn out by his exertions and sorely afflicted by the fatal illness of his wife, received the news of his crushing defeat. He died on the 29th of November, 1872, at the residence of Dr. Choate, several miles distant from his home. The Chappaqua farm ultimately be- came the property of his daughter, Gabrielle, now the wife of the Rev. F. M. Clendenin, of Westchester.
Westchester County gave Greeley 11,112 votes, against 10,223 for General Grant.
The advisability of annexing a portion of Westchester County to the City of New York began to receive some consideration many years before the formal annexation movement was inaugurated. As early as 1864 it was proposed to combine the Towns of Morrisania and West Farms under a special city charter, but owing to opposition on the part of land owners in West Farms the idea was abandoned. Morris- ania, however, received in that year a village charter, which " con- ferred upon the trustees nearly all the powers of a city corporation without the incidental expenses; and this act enabled the town au- thorities to pioneer annexation by proceeding to make such improve- ments in streets and highways as were demanded by an increasing population flowing in from below the Harlem River." About the same time some new cross streets were indicated in the sections adjacent to the Harlem River, and were numbered in continuation of the streets below the river-a proceeding significant of the general belief in the early upward expansion of the city.
In an article on the history of the annexation movement, Mr. Will- iam Cauldwell, one of the fathers of that movement, says:
" The first positive move in the legislature toward annexation was in the year 1869, when Mr. Cornelius Corson, then a resident of Mount Vernon, Westchester County, and a close adherent to what was known as the Tweed regime, having prepared a bill providing for
Horace Greece,.
है
1 ؟
609
FROM 1842 To 1900
the annexation of the Towns of Morrisania, West Farms, Westchester, and Mount Vernon to the City of New York, had notice of such pro- posed bill given by the late Senator Gonet. I had the honor at the time of representing, among other localities, the Westchester towns in the State senate, and regarding it as an act of discourtesy that such a move should have been made withont consultation, and with- out the request of my immediate constituents, on the spur of the moment I arose in my place in the senate and gave notice that I would, at some future time, present a ' bill to annex the City of New York to the Town of Morrisania.' This sarcasm hit the nail on the head, and nothing further was heard of the Corson bill; for soon thereafter the adherents of the Tweed Ring got to quarreling and battering each other's heads, and the combination was utterly de- stroved." 1
The earliest definite measure looking to annexation was the action of the legislature at the time of the passage of the Yonkers city charter, June 1. 1872, in excluding from the territory of the City of Yonkers all that por- tion of the old Town of Yonkers lying below Mount Saint Vincent. This exclusion was clearly with a view to reserving the section thus cut off for subse- quent incorporation in SAINT JOHN'S COLLEGE, FORDIIAM. the City of New York. On December 16, 1872, a further step in the same direction was taken by the erection of the excised strip into a new " town " called Kingsbridge. Meantime the annexation enter- prise had been fairly launched. In the autumn of 1872 some of the principal property-owners of Morrisania and West Farms held con- ferences, which resulted in the preparation of an annexation bill by Samuel E. Lyon, a well-known lawyer. The bill was introduced in the assembly early in 1873 by William Herring, representative from the 1st district of Westchester County. " The city authorities," says Mr. Cauldwell, "did not take kindly to the project of annexation. and the animosity then existing between the department of public works and the department of public parks nearly throttled the bill
1 The Great North Side (published by the North Side Board of Trade, 1837), 22.
610
HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
in the legislature. But Governor Dix saved it by making known most emphatically that he would favor no bill for annexation which did not give exclusive jurisdiction over the streets, roads, and avenues of the proposed new district to the department of public parks. This ended the struggle between the rival departments, so far as the an- nexation bill was concerned, and it became a law." It provided for submitting the annexation question to the decision of the people of New York City and also of Westchester County at the next en- sning election, in November, 1873. Fortunately the momentous issue was determined by the people ou its exact merits, no partisan in- fluences being thrown against the annexation programme. The city gave 55,319 votes for annexation and 8,380 against ; the towns directly concerned-Morrisania, West Farms, and Kingsbridge-cast 4,230 affirmative and 109 negative votes, and in the remainder of West- chester County the result was 9,023 for and 2,643 against. The formal annexation occurred on the 1st of January, 1874. The area added to the city was 12,317 acres. The population of the three annexed towns was in excess of 30,000, and the total assessed value of the property was about $23,000,000. In the words of the act, Morrisania, West Farms, and Kingsbridge were " annexed to, merged in, and made part of the City of New York, subject to the same laws, ordinances, regulations, obligations, and liabilities, and entitled to the same rights, privileges, franchises, and immunities, in every re- spect, and to the same extent, as if such territory had been included within said City of New York at the time of the grant and adoption of the first charter and organization thereof, and had so remained up to the passage of this act."
Morrisania, West Farms, and Kingsbridge, as a portion of the metropolis, became popularly known as the " Annexed District," a name which, though always rather distasteful to the residents, clung to the section until the adoption of the present official style of the Borough of the Bronx. The territory was organized into two city wards, the 23d and 24th. Notwithstanding the guarantee of equal rights, etc., contained in the act, the annexed territory was for many years regarded more as a suburban locality than as a portion of the city. It continued under the administrative care of the department of public parks until 1891, when the law creating a special depart- ment of public works for the 23d and 24th wards came into operation. Up to that time, and until 1895, there was no further annexation from our county to New York City, Westchester County still retaining the Township of Westchester.
In 1874 occurred the incorporation of the Westchester County His- torical Society. This organization has always maintained an active
1
611
FROM 1812 TO 1900
existence. Its annual meetings are held on the 28th of October, the anniversary of the battle of White Plains.
In 1876 two distinguished New Yorkers of Westchester County antecedents were candidates for president of the United States- Samuel J. Tilden and Peter Cooper.
Mr. Tilden several years previously had become a resident of Yonkers by purchasing from Mr. John T. Waring the magnificent Greystone estate. This continued to be his conutry home for the remainder of his life, and he died there ou the 4th of August, 1886. One of his last publie appearances was on the occasion of the dedi- cation of the new monument to the captors of Andre at Tarrytown, September 23, 1880. He was the presiding officer. His Greystone estate is now the property of Mr. Samuel Untermyer, the prominent New York lawyer. Westchester County gave Mr. Tilden, at the elec- tion of 1876, 12,050 votes, a majority of 2,476 over Mr. Hayes, his principal opponent.
Peter Cooper, in his boyhood, lived in Peekskill. where his father con- ducted a small beer brewery. He went to New York City at the age of seventeen to seek his fortune, and was not subsequently, to our knowledge, connected with our county.
Six new villages were incorporated between 1870 and 1880-Tarrytown (1870), Irvington (1872), Dobbs SAMUEL J. TILDEN. Ferry (1873), Mount Kisco (1875), North Tarrytown (1875), and Hastings (879). It is noteworthy that four of these places belonged to the Town of Greenburgh, while a fifth was located on its borders.
Population of Westchester County in 1880:
TOWNS
POPULATION
Bedford
3,731
Mount Kiseo Village
728
Cortlandt .
12,664
Peekskill Village
6,893
Fastehester
8,737
4,586
Greenburgh
8,931
3,025
Harrison
1,491
Lewisboro.
1,612
Mount Vernon Village
Tarrytown Village
1
612
HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
TOWNS
POPULATION
Mamaroneck ..
1,863
Mount Pleasant.
5,450
North Tarrytown Village.
2,684
New Castle
2,297
New Rochelle.
5,276
North Castle
1,818
North Salem
1,693
Ossining
8,769
Sing Sing Village
6,578
Pelham . ..
2,540
Poundridge
1,034
Rye.
6,576
Port Chester Village
3,254
Searsdale
614
Somers .
1,630
Westchester.
6,789
White Plains.
4,094
White Plains Village
2,381
Yonkers City
18,892
Yorktown.
2,481
Total
108,988
The loss of population as compared with 1870 was the consequence of the transfer of the three Towns of Morrisania, West Farms, and Kingsbridge to the jurisdiction of New York City. The population of these three towns in 1880 was 42,898, a growth of about 10,000 since 1870.
From 1880 to 1882 the governor of New York was the Hon. Alonzo B. Cornell, a descendant of Thomas Cornell, the grantee of Cornell's Neck ( 1645), and a son of Ezra Cornell, the founder of Cornell Uni- versity. Governor Cornell has at various times been a resident of this county.
In the sensational transactions in national politics which began with the nomination and election of James A. Garfield to the presi- dency in 1880, Judge William II. Robertson, of our county, was a conspicuous figure. The nomination of Garfield by the Republican national convention was a compromise between the faction which favored Mr. Blaine and that which, under the leadership of Roscoc Conkling, urged a third term for General Grant. At the Republican State convention held to select delegates to the national convention Conkling had overcome all opposition and secured the choice of a delegation bound by the unit rule. Judge Robertson, however, with several other friends of Blaine, undertook to dispute the Conkling supremacy and break the unit rule. The determined spirit thus shown by an element of the party in New York was one of the in- strumentalities which prevented Conkling from forcing Grant's nomination and led to the selection of Garfield. After Garfield's
613
FROM 1842 To 1900
inauguration one of his first acts was the appointment of Judge Robertson as collector of the port of New York. This gave mortal offense to Mr. Conkling, and impelled him to resign his seat in the United States senate and appeal to his New York constituents for vindication-a proceeding in which he was joined by his colleague, Mr. Platt. Hence resulted the bitter feeling which first caused a lunatic to assassinate the president, and subsequently brought the
WILLIAM H. ROBERTSON.
Democratic party back to power. JJudge Robertson's part in the political strife of those memorable times has been reviewed with great fairness and discrimination in a public address by the Hon. Chauncey M. Depew.1
In the year 1880 works for increasing New York City's water supply from Westchester County were commenced, which are still in prog- ross; for although the new Croton quednet was completed in 1891.
1 See Smith's Manual of Westchester County, 05.
614
HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
the great dam, which is to convert the present Croton Lake into a body eleven miles long, is not yet finished.
Complaints about the insufficiency of the old aqueduct began to be expressed as early as 1875, but the city officials were slow to embark upon the necessarily elaborate and costly enterprise required -a new aqueduct from the Croton River. In 1880, however, the ancient project to obtain a supply from the Bronx watershed and the Rye Ponds was revived, leading to the construction of the so- called Bronx River Conduit from the dam near Kensico Station to the receiving reservoir at Williams's Bridge. This work was con- eluded in 1884. The quantity of water thus provided, however, afforded only incidental relief, and it was recognized that a grand new aqueduct was indispensable. On the 1st of June, 1883, the legis- lature authorized the construction of the necessary works, and on the 24th of June, 1891, the second aqueduct was finished and turned over to the department of public works of New York City. Since 1SSS the building of subsidiary basins and reservoirs in Westchester and Putnam Connties has been steadily prosecuted. It was originally proposed to construct the new Croton Dam at Quaker Bridge, but that plan was abandoned, and in August, 1892, the contract was awarded for the Cornell Dam, now approaching completion, about a mile and a half above the Quaker Bridge site. No fewer than seven of the townships of Westchester County have made extensive contributions of land for the purposes of the new works, involving the extinction of several settlements. On this point a recent writer says:
"The additional land required for the construction of the New Croton Reservoir has been taken from the Towns of Cortlandt, Yorktown, New Castle, Bedford, Somers, Lewisboro, and North Salem, in West- chester County, covering an area of 6,398.244 acres. From the Town of Cortlandt, 752.654 acres were taken; from the Town of Yorktown, 1,752.932 acres were taken; from the Town of New Castle, 154.697 aeres; from the Town of Bedford, 801.860 acres; from the Town of Lewisboro, 850.236 acres; from the Town of North Salem, 351.823 acres; from the Town of Somers, 1,925.042 aeres, making a total of 6,398.244 acres. Takings, under provisions of Chapter 490 of the Laws of 1883. were commenced in the years 1892, 1894, 1895, and 1897. " Many attractive residence localities in the territory taken will soon be, if not so already, among the things of the past. What was known as the Village of Katonah, in the Town of Bedford, has be- come extinct, and is now only a matter of history; its buildings, appraised and sold by order of New York City, have vanished ; many of the frame dwellings and business structures were removed, intact,
615
FROM 1842 TO 1900
one mile distant south to the new settlement where old residents of Katonah are establishing new homes and a new resident village, to be known as New Katonah. Whitlockville and Wood's Bridge, also in the Town of Bedford, will pass out as did old Katonah, and its people will find habitations elsewhere. The thriving locality of Purdy Station, or a greater part thereof, shares the fate of Katonah, and will lie in peace hereafter as a part of the bed of the new reser- voir; Purdy Station, within the Township of North Salem, and Pine's Bridge, in the Town of Yorktown, lying close to the borders of Croton Lake, attractive and popular as a summer resort, and famous as the scene of numerous hard-fought and exciting political conventions, held in the interest of all parties, likewise will be submerged. Croton Falls, in the Town of North Salem, will contribute a portion of its territory, a section lying near and just west of the Harlem Railroad station. A tribute has also been laid upon Golden's Bridge, in the Town of Lewisboro, and it will relinquish a portion of its land, near the railroad station. The Huntersville section of the Town of Cort- landt, well known to sportsmen, as it is famous for its excellent trout brooks; the Quaker Meeting House locality, in the Town of New Castle, the Wiremill Bridge, in the Town of Cortlandt, and other localities of historic interest, are among the places that will be ex tinguished and ' go under with the flood.'
" To give some idea of the amount of property recently acquired in Westchester County for this reservoir. mention is made of the fact that the distance around said property is seventy-five miles, Not only handsome residences and choice building sites, but church edifices and public school buildings, are among the property con- demned. As might be expected, numerous cemeteries were found located within the territory required and taken; at the expense of the City of New York bodies were removed from these cemeteries and re-interred elsewhere in accordance with the wishes of relatives or friends. The old highways on the condemned land, taken by the city, have been left open for public travel until such time as the city shall substitute others, which right the city is now endeavoring to obtain from property-owners." 1
The daily delivering capacities of the three aquednets leading through Westchester to New York City are, according to Wegman: Old Croton Aqueduet, 95,000,000 gallons; Bronx River Conduit, 28,- 000,000 gallons; New Croton Aqueduct, 300,000,000 gallons-total. 425,000,000 gallons. With the completion of the works now in their last stages, the supply obtainable by New York City from the Croton watershed will be exhausted, and it will be necessary to seek new
1 Smith's Manual of Westchester County, 27.
616
HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
supplies from other quarters. Already there is a demand for addi- tional works. In the early part of 1900 great public interest and not a little bitter feeling were excited by the action of the city au- thorities in arranging with the so-called Ramapo Water Company for a further supply on the basis of $70 per million gallons. The Ramapo Company, a private corporation, proposed to bring water to New York from the west bank of the Hudson River, and had made preparations toward securing a monopoly of rights in the section whence it designed to draw its supply. The price which it proposed charging for its water was deemed exorbitant-hence the public indignation and the present defeat of the plan. On the other hand it is the general opinion of experts that the city's water problem will again become serious before many years pass by. According to a report submitted to Controller Coler in May, 1900, embodying a careful study of the whole matter, the pres- ent supply will safely meet all demands for five years to come, and if proper measures are taken to curtail the ex- cossive waste of water now prevalent, a period of ten years of abun- dance can reasonably SCENE IN PEEKSKILL DURING THE BLIZZARD OF 1888. be calculated on; but in either eventuality the need of immediate steps to secure new supplies is insisted on.
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