USA > New York > Wyoming County > History of Wyoming County, N.Y., with Illustrations, Biographical Sketches and Portraits of Some Pioneers and Prominent Residents > Part 17
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From some reports and other documents furnished by E. F. Chaffee it is learned that in the discharge of the duties of his office Judge Stevens, to use his own words, saw "that there was no uniformity of system in the mode or manner of teaching and governing in our schools; that each and all teachers had their own peculiar notions, while but few seem- ed to have confidence in their own method. In fact, the whole method was without a head. I found many young and not experienced teachers, in small and sparsely settled dis- tricts, laboring hard to do something, but having no well digested system of their own, and none borrowed and well arranged, but getting along with detached ideas and forms, often varying them to suit the notions and whims of par- ents."
To establish the desired uniformity, and to make availa- ble for each teacher the best ideas of all the others, he de- cided to call together the teachers of the county, and to in- vite the friends of education to meet with and aid them. Accordingly he "issued.a circular calling on the teachers to meet and hold an institute at the pleasant little village of Wethersfield Springs, in the center of Wyoming county, in October, 1843." This call was issued "with the concurrence of the following town superintendents:" E. Bishop, Attica; N. Tolles, Bennington; A. W. Conklin, Castile: John Smith, China; J. Durfee, Covington; R. Whitney, Gainseville; L. C. Ward, Java; - -- , Middlebury; P. Merril, Orange- ville; C. A. Huntington, Perry; M. A. Hinman, Sheldon; A. Holley, Warsaw; B. Bancroft, Wethersfield.
Seventy-five teachers responded to this call, and so suc- cessful was this first experiment that at this session Judge
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HISTORY OF WYOMING COUNTY, NEW YORK.
Stevens was appointed a committee to memorialize the Leg- islature, through Colonel S. Young, the able State superin- tendent, for future aid in holding similar institutes. In reply to a communication giving an account of this experi- ment and its results, Colonel Young wrote to Judge Stevens as follows:
"State Superintendent's Office, Albany, October 26th, 1843.
I heartily congratulate you and the friends of common school education in your county on the cheering results which have been accomplished and are in the process of accomplishment under your auspices. The continuation of such exertions in such a spirit is all that is needed to make our common schools indeed the nurseries of virtue and the temples of sound knowledge. I trust no obstacles will be permitted to deter or discourage you from the completion of the noble undertaking you have begun. You must rely for your reward, not so much upon the temporary and fleeting popularity of the hour, as upon the approval of your own conscience and the ultimate justice which, in the long run, is sure to be awarded to taithful public servants.
"Yours truly,
S. YOUNG.
"A. S. STEVENS, Esq.,
"Supt. of Common Schools, Wyoming County. Attica." The aid asked was at once granted by the Legislature. From this beginning teachers' institutes have come to be established in most of the States in the Union. Wyoming county, which had the honor of holding the first, has never failed to hold her annual institute since.
A prominent feature in the character of the New England pioneers in this county was the readiness with which they transplanted the religious faith of their fathers in their new home. Religious societies were early established in the new settlements, and these often became the nuclei of pros- perous churches. At first meetings were held in private houses and school-houses, but as soon as these societies ac- quired sufficient strength houses of worship were erected, some of which remain with little change, beyond ordinary repairs, to the present day.
Of pioneer preachers, Rev. Dr Nassau. in an address de- livered before the Wyoming County Pioneer Association in 1879, said:
" I hesitate to mention any of these leaders lest I omit some as prominent and worthy as those named. But such ministers as the first bishops and clergy of the Methodist church did a grand work for their generation. There were Bishops Asbury and Mckendree, Messrs. Fillmore, Grant, White, Bangs, Laning, Cummins, Paddock, Pearce and a host of kindred spirits. Among the able and successful evangelists and pastors of the Presbyterian and Congrega- tional faith were such worthies as the indefatigable veteran 'Father Spencer,' Zadoc Hunn, John Lindsley, Messrs. Axtell, Higgins, Robbins, Eells, Chapman, Stone, the Hubbards, the Parmelees, the Cottons, Williston, Bushnell, Fulton, Ayer, Harrower, Denoon, Bull, Perrine, Fitch, Richards and Hotchkins. And these were representative of many others. The Baptists, Reformed Dutch, Episco- palians, Friends and other denominations were well and faithfully represented on this ground. Praiseworthy efforts to send the gospel to the destitute were made by several local societies.
"The lives of such Christian leaders were a happy com- mentary upon their preaching, devoted, enthusiastic and successful. Then, as now, the minister was expected to take part in affairs of local importance, and in times of peril was often looked to as a champion. It has been said, with truth, that 'the office of Christian ministers was no sinecure upon the Holland Purchase in early years. They encountered the roughest features of pioneer life.'"
It is a notable fact that when the descendants of the Pu- ritans brought hither their religious faith they left behind much of the intolerance and bigotry which had disgraced the Puritan character. When, however, it is remembered that most of these were of the younger classes, the fact is no matter of surprise, for they are always the progressive ones.
It is sometimes thought by those who have beer. reared in what are termed old countries, in the midst of the com- forts and luxuries which the industry of several generations has accumulated, with the best of educational facilities, surrounded by refined society, and feeling, in the language of Burns, "not a want but what themselves create," that their more active brothers who have turned their backs to the land of their nativity, and sought homes and fortunes in the untamed wilderness, have become in a measure outcasts from refined society; that their manners have necessarily become uncouth, and their tastes coarse; and that were they to return they would be hardly fit associates for those who have remained among the refinements of what they term civilized life. They think, too, that the active, toil- some life which these pioneers lead, and the privations and hardships to which they subject themselves, are not com- patible with the development of that intelligence of which they fancy themselves the sole conservators. They some- times heave a sigh of pity over the hard fate of these their loved friends, and if, in after years, they visit these com- panions and playmates of their youth in their distant homes, they do so with the expectation of being put to shame by their roughness and ignorance.
They are surprised to find that though these people are not surrounded by all the luxuries which they enjoyed at home, that though indeed they have limited their wants to very few of these, they are not the rough, uncouth beings they pictured to themselves. They find them in houses that are certainly not built with a view to display architect- ural taste, for they are formed of logs, with stone fireplaces and stick chimneys; but they shelter the inmates from the rains of summer and autumn, and keep out the chilling blasts of winter. They are not fashionably furnished; for in this respect comfort and convenience, instead of style, have been aimed at. The pioneers' fare is simple, but wholesome. No dainties are set before them to tempt the pampered ap- petites of slothful, enervated drones, but plain, substantial food, sweetened by the zest and relish which health and in- dustry impart.
The visitors see, perhaps, that in intelligente these more active ones have quite outstripped them, and that they themselves are the objects of pity, because they were not endowed with the energy that might have enabled them to accomplish what these pioneers have done.
They see, too, here and there houses of worship, not with spires pointing skyward, carpeted aisles, cushioned seats, elaborately carved desks and gilded organs, but plain edi- fices, adapted to the circumstances and wants of the people
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who meet there for religious instruction and worship, and not to gratify their vanity by a display of stylish finery, or to criticise the display of others. They see all these things, and they awake to the consciousness that, notwithstanding the toils, hardships and privations that these pioneers have endured, they are contented and happy.
They look upon the children that are growing up in this new country, and they see that they have inherited the ster- ling qualities of their parents; and that not till several gen- erations of their descendants have grown up in luxurious ease will they become degenerated to the level of those who were left behind by the courageous and ambitious ones who struck out into the forest, and instead of avoiding the obsta- cles which lay in their way battled against them manfully and overcame them.
They look back and remember that their forefathers left their homes, braved the perils of the sea and peopled the rocky hills of New England with a race of which these pioneers are the representatives; and they reluctantly arrive at the conclusion that they are themselves the degenerate offshoots from this stock.
CHAPTER XI.
ORGANIZATION AND SUBDIVISION OF WYOMING COUNTY- CONSTRUCTION OF COUNTY BUILDINGS.
B
ETWEEN 1772 and 1784 all but the eastern por- tion of New York was called Tryon county, af- ter the governor of the province, having pre- viously been part of Albany, which was one of the ten original counties formed November Ist, 1683. In 1784 the same territory took the name of Montgomery, in honor of a Revolutionary hero and martyr. In 1789 all the State west of the pre- emption line, which was a meridian drawn through Seneca lake and extending northward to Lake Ontario and south- ward to the Pensylvania line, was set off under the title of Ontario county. A single town, called Northampton, swal- lowed up the entire Holland Purchase.
March 30th, 1802, the county of Genesee was formed from Ontario, and included all that portion of the State west of the Genesee river and a line extending due south from the point where Canaseraga creek and that river unite, to the line between New York and Pennsylvania. The town of Northampton was divided into four; of which Batavia comprised all of the State west from the west transit line- the entire Holland Purchase. The first town meeting in Batavia was held in what is now the town of Clarence, Erie county, about one hundred miles from the farthest extremity of the town.
April 11th, 1804, Batavia was divided into four towns. The one farthest east retained the old name and all the territory east of a meridian from Lake Ontario, which passed just east from the line between Orleans and Niagara coun- ties. The next was Willink, which extended to the west transit line. The next was Erie, which included one tier of
townships in the present county of Chautauqua, and the next Chautauqua, which embraced the rest of old Batavia.
Genesee county was first divided in 1806 by the formation from it of Allegany. In 1808 Cattaraugus, Niagara, and Chautauqua were erected, Niagara including the present county of Erie. When Livingston and Monroe were organ- ized, in 1821, the portions of those counties lying west from the Genesee river were taken from Genesee county. In 1824 the county of Orleans was formed, in part from Gen- esee.
During seventeen years previous to the erection of the county of Wyoming, Genesee county had the form of a par- allelogram, thirty-six miles in length from north to south, with a breadth of twenty-six miles from east to west. Bata- via, the county seat, was located only nine miles, or one- fourth the length of the county, from its northern boundary.
Previous to the erection of Orleans county from Genesee the project of forming a new county from the southern part of Genesee and the northern towns of Allegany was talked of, and application was made to the Legislature for the for- mation of such a county. The subject was not seriously agitated again till 1840, when the Legislature enacted a law authorizing the erection of a new court-house and jail in Genesee county, and appointing commissioners to determine the location of these buildings. The decision of these com- missioners in favor of Batavia was not satisfactory to the people in the southern part of the county, and at a meeting held for the purpose resolutions were adopted expressive of their disapprobation, and in favor of a more central location of the county seat, or a division of the county.
In 1841 a bill was introduced in the Legislature to divide the county; or, rather, to submit the question of a removal of the county seat to a vote of the people, and to divide the county if it was decided negatively. Rather than risk an af- firmative decision by the people, the Batavians instructed their representative to favor a division of the county. On his motion the provision for submission was stricken out; and on the 19th of April, 1841, the bill passed, with only a few negative votes, and became a law. It provided that "all that part of the county of Genesee lying and being on the south side of a line beginning at the northwest corner of the town of Bennington, in the county aforesaid, and running thence east on the north line of the towns of Bennington, At- tica and Middlebury, to the west line of the town of Covington; thence south, on the east line of Middlebury, to the south- west corner of the Cragie tract; thence east on the south line of said Cragie tract, and on the south bounds of the Forty- thousand-acre tract, to the east line of said town of Coving- ton-shall be a separate and distinct county of the State of New York, and be known by the name of Wyoming, and entitled to and possessed of all the benefits, rights, privi- leges, and immunities, and subject to the same duties as the other counties of this State."
The act also provided that the part of the town of Cov- ington lying north from the line that thus ran through it should continue to be a town in Genesee county, and known by the name of Pavilion; and that part south from this line should remain a separate town in the new county, and should retain its name of Covington. It was also pro- vided that such of the officers of the old town as resided in that portion which retained the name of Covington should continue to exercise the duties of their respective offices in
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HISTORY OF WYOMING COUNTY, NEW YORK.
this town, and that a town election should be held on the first Tuesday of the next June for the election of such officers as did not reside in said town.
By an act passed April Ist, 1846, "the towns of Eagle, - Pike and all that part of the town of Portage in the county of Allegany, lying on the west side of the Genesee river, bounded as follows-on the east by the Genesee river, on the south by a line running due easterly from the south line of the town of Pike until it intersects the Genesee river, and west and north by the original lines of the said town [of Pike]-from and after the passage of this act shall be and the same are hereby annexed to the county of Wyoming." No other change in the boundaries of the county has been made.
When the name of the post-office at Middlebury village was changed, the late Judge Skinner, who was an admirer of Indian names, proposed several, and among them "Osceola " and "Wyoming." The latter was adopted, and afterwards, in 1841, was made the name of the county. The original name in the Delaware tongue was Maughwauwama, and was applied to a region on the Susquehanna river. According to Heckewelder it was compounded of Maugh- wau-large-and wama-plains. The Iroquois word with the same meaning is Sghahontowanno. By the early settlers in the Wyoming valley its Indian name was corrupted suc- cessively to Wauwama, Wauwamick, Wywamick, Wywaming, and finally Wyoming.
The act of 1841 provided that the first term of the courts of common pleas and general sessions should be held at the public house at East Orangeville; and that the subsequent terms should be held at such places as the judges should direct, till a court-house should be so nearly completed as to be, in the opinion of the judges, suitable for holding such courts; and the temporary county clerk's office was to be kept in such a place as these judges should direct. The circuit courts and courts of oyer and terminer were to be held at the places appointed by the county judges for hold- ing their courts. It was also provided that these judges should determine the form and device for a county seal. Pursuant to this statute the court convened at the place designated on the 21st day of June, 1841. At this session there were present Hon. Paul Richards, first judge; Hon. James Sprague and Hon. Peter Patterson, judges. At this court an order was made that the device for a county seal should be "the figure of an American eagle surrounded by a circle, upon which is engraved in Roman letters, 'Wyoming County Clerk's Office.'" In 1849 this device was changed. It is now the goddess of liberty, surrounded by a circle with the words WYOMING, N. Y., SEAL.
Masonic Hall, in the village of Warsaw, was the place des- ignated for holding the next term of the court. At this hall the sessions of the court were held till the June term in 1843, which was held at the court-house. The first session of the circuit court and court of oyer and terminer was held on the 15th of December, 1841, Hon. N. Dayton presiding.
Until the completion of the clerk's office, the county rec- ords were kept in a small building on the east side of Main street, Warsaw, north from the Bingham House.
The commissioners named in the act to determine the location of the court-house, jail and clerk's office, were: Peter R. Reed, of Onondaga; Davis Hurd, of Niagara, and John Thompson, of Steuben county.
As usual in such cases the question of the location of these buildings excited a deep interest in different localities. Warsaw had strong supporters by reason of its accessibility, its nearly central location and the business interests that ex- isted or that were springing up there. Wethersfield Springs was advocated because it was more nearly the geographical center of the county. At that time the villages of Warsaw and Perry were more nearly equal in size than they now are, and, as usual in such cases, were rivals. Many of the people in Perry strongly urged the claims of Wethersfield Springs, because they foresaw that the location of the county seat there would leave the rival villages with more nearly equal" advantages. After visiting the different towns in the county the commissioners, upon due deliberation, decided in favor of Warsaw.
The board of supervisors of Wyoming county were em- powered by the act of incorporation to appoint, at a special meeting, three commissioners to superintend the erection of the county buildings. These commissioners were John A. McElwain, of Warsaw; Paul Richards, of Orangeville, and Jonathan Perry, of Middlebury. The lot upon which the court-house and clerk's office were erected was a donation to the county from Hon. Trumbull Cary, of Batavia. The contract for building them was awarded to Josiah Hovey, and the work was superintended by his son-in-law, P. Pixley. The jail was built in 1841 and the court-house in 1842. The act authorized a loan from the State to the new county of $10,000, and prescribed the terms of its pay- ment. The cost of the three buildings did not exceed the amount of this loan.
The court-house is a brick structure, fronting on Main street, just north from the business portion of the village. It has a convenient court-room and the usual jury room. The county judge and surrogate and the sheriff have their offices in this building. The clerk's office, a fire-proof building, also of brick, stands a short distance south from the court- house, and a finely shaded lawn lies in front of both. The jail is a wooden structure, standing west from the other two. All these are sufficiently distant from each other for safety in case of fire.
The decision of the commissioners in locating the county seat at Warsaw, just and equitable as it was, of course did not give universal satisfaction.
At the annual meeting of the board of supervisors of Wyo- ming county on the 21st day of November, 1877, the follow- Ing preamble and resolutions were presented:
"Whereas, The county buildings of this county are old and out of repair ; and
"Whereas, The present alte is in an inaccessible and unhealthy locality; and
"Whereas, The people of the county would be greatly accommodated by their removal to a more convenient, accessible and healthy locality; there- fore
"Resolved, The county buildings and the county seat of this county be re- moved from the village of Warsaw to the town of Gainsville; and be located at or near what is known as East Gainsville, in the said county, somew bere near the junction of the Erie and State Line railroads; and that this resolu- tion be submitted to the people of the several towns on the last Tuesday in February next, the day on which the annual town meetings are to be held in said county ; that a separate ballot box shall be kept at each of the polls in the towns of said county for the reception of the ballots on maid question : that the ballots on said question shall be printed or written in the following manner, viz .: 'Resolution : For Removing the County Seat,' and ' Resolution: Against Removing the County Seat.' And that the proper town officers shall make a return after canvassing the same to the county clerk of said county, whose duty it shall be to declare the result in the county, and publish the mme according to law."
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WYOMING COUNTY POOR-HOUSE-REAL ESTATE DIVISIONS.
These were adopted by a vote of 12 to 3, the minority not being permitted to delay action. These proceedings fell upon the people like a thunderbolt from an unclouded sky. They were amazed, as no such action had been called for, none had been anticipated. But it was forced upon them, and they must decide the question at their next town meet- ing. The excitement was intense, and much bitterness and ill feeling was manifested during the canvass of the question by the rival parties. Town meeting was held on the 26th of February, 1878, and the following is the official vote on the question:
TOWNS.
WHOLE NO. OF VOTRE
FOR REMOVAL
AGADIGT REMOVAL
Arcade.
184
Attics.
450
Bennington.
190
198
Castile ..
501
415
86
Covington ...
196
84
181
Eagle ..
417
184
158
Middlebury
84
Orangeville
14
PerTy .
Pike ....
178
8beldon
50
Warmw.
808
Wothersdeld
Totals ..
2,967
8,828
Here was a majority of 336 against removal, while the law requires a vote of two-thirds for removal. By the census of 1875 it appears there were 8,685 persons of voting age in the county, so that 2,375 persons did not vote at all on the ques- tion; had they all voted for it, and no others against it, the measure would still have lacked several hundred votes of the number necessary for its adoption.
The county poor-house is located in the town of Orange- ville. On the 8th of July, 1843, the county purchased from Jonathan Gates sixty acres of land for $720. Additions have since been made to this farm from time to time, till it now includes 280 acres. It is now valued at $25,000.
The first building, erected in 1843, was 24 by 48 feet, one and a half stories in height. It was occupied by the paupers of the county, forty-seven in number, in the autumn of that year. Other buildings were added from time to time, and in 1862 the building for the keeper's dwelling and superin- tendent's office was erected-a wooden structure, two stor- ies in height, 36 by 40. The original buildings, except one barn, have been removed and commodious ones erected in their stead.
The principal buildings now used are the lunatic asylum -a detached two-story edifice, 36 by 38, erected in 1864; the idiot asylum, also detached, a one-story structure, 24 by 40, erected in 1874, at an expense of $1,200. Each asylum has a large and commodious yard, enclosed by a close, high board fence. A men's building was erected in 1876. It is a wooden structure, two stories in height, 24 by 40, and its cost was about $1,500. The dining hall, erected in 1878, is a two-story building, 24 by 42, the second story of which is divided into sleeping rooms. The lower story is divided into two dining rooms, one for men and the other for wo- men. The women's building, also erected in 1878, is a two- story structure, 28 by 56. It and the dining hall cost $3,000. These are all commodious structures, well ventilated, and substantially and tastefully finished. The women's building and the insane asylum are heated by furnaces, and pure spring water is brought to the grounds and into most of the buildings from a distance of a fourth of a mile.
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