USA > New York > Otsego County > In old Otsego : a New York county views its past > Part 2
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When he opened land sales here in the spring of 1786 his policies were already firmly developed and he had the assurance of one well versed in that risky business. However we have his own word that in Otsego was his first such venture on his own account. He was born near Philadelphia and had kept a store at Burlington, N. J. At both places lived wealthy men who had interests in New York and Penn- sylvania undeveloped lands. Cooper knew many of them well and had their confidence. There is evidence that he had served in some capac- ity in their enterprises. His experience in this field had certainly been brief but for it he had a unique aptitude and he had learned quickly and well.
He always preferred to distribute land by deed in fee simple and would accept small down payments to attain this end, but money at the time was everywhere scarce and the prospective settlers were mainly poor. Cooper willingly altered his policy to fit the realities and often sold on land contracts. When "articles of agreement" were first contrived is uncertain but Cooper early used them in ways of his own. Under his method no down payment was exacted. A price was placed upon a property and the annual legal interest upon that sum was
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charged as rent. At first these agreements ran for a specified number of years. If the tenant could make an adequate down payment at the conclusion of the term, he could have a deed at the original valuation. Later Cooper substituted "perpetual" leases, whereby on any anni- versary date of the contract, be it soon or late, the same privilege of purchase could be exercised. The rent could be paid in cash or in produce-wheat, corn, beef or pork. These terms were advantageous to moneyless settlers as neither rent or sale price advanced while con- tract conditions were met. Many continued to rent for years and, as the contracts were transferable, some Cooper farms in Otsego were finally sold long after his death at the low prices of pioneer days. (Cooper specifically bequeathed over 13,000 acres of leased county land and some was left in the estate.)
Early purchasers were encouraged to take up more land than they immediately needed. This made for fewer transactions and rapid distribution. It also resulted in lesser proprietors who could later sell off two or three farms at a profit. To these who took at least 250 acres in his first tract and paid off their mortgages in the stipulated ten years, he promised a free lot at Cooperstown. (They could look for- ward to a pleasant retirement.) All this stabilized the settlement. Cooper was long sighted.
His original purchase (with Andrew Craig) is given as 40,000 acres. His subsequent acquisitions in the county brought the total to more than 75,000 acres. There was no actual "Cooper's Patent." He was on the ground too late for that, although any large tract such as his was often called a patent.
His ownership elsewhere had been much greater. His will, made in 1808, states that his lands lay in Otsego, Tioga, Broome, Onondaga, Cayuga, Oneida and Herkimer Counties. As most of these counties were later subdivided, Oswego, Cortland, Tompkins and Hamilton can be added. He had already closed out former holdings in St. Law- rence and Franklin Counties. He owned land even in Virginia. He had at some time possessed New York lands outside Otsego aggregating far in excess of 100,000 acres.
Illustrative of his activities is the group of thirty-three local fam- ilies he led to St. Lawrence County in 1803 to found the present Town of DeKalb. Originally it was named Williamstown for him. The
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party included a few of his most successful settlers here who became the leaders there. Cooper's Falls exists there as Cooperstown does here.
Marked success with his own lands soon brought Cooper further business as land agent for non-resident owners. He accepted these commissions for plots however small or large and about wherever situated. He had such clients in Philadelphia, New Jersey, New York City, Albany, even in London and Paris. An item in 1789 was 52,000 acres in Delaware, Chenango and Broome Counties for Richard Mor- ris, of Philadelphia. The next year he quickly sold 25,000 acres in northern Pennsylvania for eight Philadelphia men, one of whom was Benjamin Rush, famed physician. When Charles J. Evans, of New York City, then sought his services for the sale of more than 50,000 acres in Delaware County, Cooper replied, " ... I did not think of taking any more under my care yet awhile having just got through with three hundred thousand acres," but he entertained the proposi- tion.
William Cooper must be regarded as the ablest and most suc- cessful colonizer during New York State's pioneer era. There is no reason to question his own statement as made in 1807, "I have already settled more acres than any man in America. There are forty thousand souls now holding, directly or indirectly, under me."
DOCUMENT-JACOB MORRIS
(Original owned by Mr. John C. Pearson, of Cleveland, and here printed with his permission.)
WE THE subscribed inhabitants of the Butternuts in the district of old england and County of Montgomery Beg leave to represent to the Honorable-the Council of appointment that we experience much inconvenience for the want of a justice of the peace among us and therefore pray that you will be pleased to appoint Mr. Jacob Morris to that office he being a fit person in the opinion of the people to fill that commission
23rd feby 1788
L. DeVillers
John Tunnicliff
John Johnson
Robert Garret
Joseph Tunnicliff
John Russel
Andre Renouard
Nathaniel Storrs
Robert Edmeston
Notes by Roy L. Butterfield, County Historian
The first New York State constitution, adopted in 1777, provided for a Council of Appointment. This body was composed of the gover- nor, and four state senators, each representing a different section of the state. It appointed many state officers, all militia and county officers and the justices of all courts whatever. Its political complexion often changed and its appointees with it. The Council was abolished under the constitution of 1821, but justices of the peace were not elected by the people until 1826. Previously this office had much wider jurisdiction than it has at present.
Jacob Morris, an officer in the Revolution, came in 1787 to what is now the Town of Morris as agent for the land patent which had been in his family since 1769. The petition here made was acted upon favorably. He was also the first Otsego County Clerk, serving ten years.
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During most of this time he was in the state assembly or senate. Appointed a brigadier-general of militia in 1797, he was promoted to major-general in 1810 but was superseded the next year, his party, (Federalist) having lost control of the Council.
"Old England District" comprised all present Otsego County west and north of Otsego Lake and the Susquehanna River with the exception of the present towns of Richfield, Exeter and Plainfield. In March 1788 the name was changed to Otsego Town with the terri- tory of the three other towns just named added.
All the petitioners lived on or near the "Old Butternuts Road" which ran down the east side of Canadarago Lake following present county and state routes to and down the Butternuts Creek. It existed before the Revolution. Louis deVillers was from France. He kept an early tavern at Elm Grove, a short way north of Morris Village. Andre Renouard was also French. He kept a store in Chaumont Valley, now the western part of New Lisbon. John Tunnicliff, an Englishman, who had had previous residences elsewhere in America, lead a con- siderable party of his countrymen to this area about 1772. Among them were his son Joseph Tunnicliff, John Johnson, John Russel and several of the Garrett family, who gave the name to Garrettsville. Nathaniel Storrs was Morris's next door neighbor. Robert Edmeston was a British army officer who was rewarded for his services in the French and Indian War with a gift from the king of 5,000 acres of unappropriated New York land. He located this on the Unadilla River. His brother, William, had a like amount adjoining, hence today's Edmeston.
DR. NATHANIEL GOTT
WHEN Otsego County was young few of its physicians had attend- ed a medical school. These were then rare in America, the earliest being established at Philadelphia in 1765. The first in this state was at New York City in 1808, the next at Fairfield, Herkimer County, in 1812. No other existed in the state for more than twenty years. Some medical men, well trained in their native lands, were among the European immigrants. A few Americans went abroad for this instruc- tion. For the most part candidates underwent a medical apprentice- ship with a qualified practitioner, observing and assisting him, com- pounding his medicines, reading in his library and at the successful end of such service receiving a certificate to assure future patients of the fledgling's proficiency. This procedure was common far into the 19th century, but increasingly supplemented by laboratory work and attendance upon lectures as medical knowledge enlarged. By the time this county was created new or incoming practitioners were also required to obtain a license from the presiding county judge, who could call to his assistance others to test their fitness if he thought best. Legislation in 1806 provided for medical societies in the state and in the several counties with admission to practice then placed in the hands of the latter. Much of all this is illustrated in the follow- ing individual case.
Dr. Nathaniel Gott, one of Otsego County's earliest physicians, was a colorful, perhaps eccentric, character. He was convivial of habit, fiery in temperment and somewhat of a rhymster. He retained the colonial costume of knee breeches, buckled shoes and three-cornered hat to the end of his life and ate his meals from a wooden trencher on the ground that so he did not dull his knife. For such reasons much lore has gathered about his name and in this field lies practically all that has been locally told about Doctor Gott. There is much more to be told, which is the reason for the choice here made. His frequent use of Latin phrases betokens a classical education, in medical prep- aration he at least equalled-and probably excelled-the majority of contemporary practitioners, he had an exciting part in the Revolution, he furnished local leadership to his profession. Further, his mental
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attributes-or his wife's-must have been superior, as among his descendents in every succeeding generation have been persons of far more than average attainments, including educators, lawyers and very many physicians. It is fitting that he be now placed in fuller perspec- tive in the community which he served for more than thirty years.
Nathaniel Gott (1755-1828) was born in the Town of Wenham, Mass., a descendent of one of that first Puritan band which landed at Salem in 1628. In 1771, he began the study of medicine. During the year 1775 he served briefly in his home town militia, including an answer to the Lexington alarm. The following year he began a series of cruises as ship surgeon on American privateers. Between these he continued study with Dr. Amos Putnam, of neighboring Danvers, who had been an army surgeon in the French and Indian War. It was probably on the third of these voyages that his vessel was captured or destroyed in the Bay of Biscay. In some way he gained the European shore, was licensed by the Amsterdam College of Surgeons and was employed at St. Lewis Hospital, Lisbon, Portugal. Later, at the order of John Jay, then Minister from the Continental Congress, he was transferred to St. James Hospital, Cadiz, Spain, to care for sick and wounded American prisoners. He returned home early in 1778. In the Massachusetts Revolutionary Archives is a manuscript affadavit made by Doctor Gott on July 14th, 1779 on his return from yet an- other cruise. In this he charges the ship master with inhuman treat- ment of a marine who was flogged while very ill and then refused food or medical care. The doctor avers that he disregarded the order, but that the marine died.
His service over, he practiced a while in his home town, then joined the general New England movement to newer territories, locat- ing at Guildhall, Vermont, in 1782, at Cheshire, Mass., in 1785 and came to Cooperstown in 1792. His final removal was to Hartwick in 1797 or 1788. He was still there in 1826 and perhaps a little longer. He was a charter member of the Otsego County Medical Society. Eleven years earlier, he had called together the practitioners of the area to consider their mutual problems and acted as chairman at the resultant meeting. These conferences continued at intervals pending the more formal organization.
Like many of his profession in those times, he had often to pre-
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pare his own remedies. In this he was especially skilled. Although constantly attending his patients, while at Cooperstown he was in a drug store partnership with Dr. John Russell, thereafter, at Hart- wick successively with Dr. David E. Hatch and Charles Fraser. How- ever, in business he had small success.
He was married twice, first to Sarah Brigham, also of a notable Wenham family. She died at Cooperstown in 1797, leaving two sons both born in New England. John was a prominent business man of Albany, receiving long and warm obituaries in the newspapers of that city at his death in 1858. Nathaniel, Jr., removed to Clarence, Erie County in 1808 and to Ann Arbor, Michigan about 1828. In the alumni directory of the University of Michigan are the names of many of this family. The second wife was Hannah Bradford, descended from the noted William Bradford who for thirty years in the interval 1621-1657 was governor of the Pilgrim Plymouth Colony.
Doctor Gott died at the home of his son in Clarence. Still in pos- session of the family are the license from the Amsterdam College of Surgeons, the certificate of hospital service at Cadiz, Doctor Putnam's certificate of proficiency, the recipe book of medicines and the "shingle" which hung before his door. Much of his library has been presented to the University of Michigan.
A TRANSPORTATION STORY
OVER the ages men have used many means to move their persons and their belongings from place to place. Human legs were once used much more than now, and quite effectively, but other aids were adopted as circumstances permitted; the saddled horse, wheeled vehicles propelled by animal, steam, electric or gasoline power, transit by air. Some of these have been confined to rails, others are more free. Perhaps the bicycle should be mentioned. All these are involved in Otsego's history. In a new unsettled region, resort was first had to water wherever possible. New York State is unusually fortunate in this facility.
The principal branch of the Susquehanna River has its rise in Otsego Lake. With its tributaries, their extensions and relatively short land carries, the "long, crooked river" was a great early waterway through which much of present New York State could be reached; the Mohawk-Hudson Valley and so Oswego River and Lake Ontario, the Finger Lakes, the Delaware, the Genesee, the Alleghany. All this was well known to the aborigines. White men first found the begin- ning of this system in 1614, when two Dutch traders came over the ancient Indian trail from Canajoharie to Otsego Lake. Thereafter explorers, traders, missionaries, surveyors, armed forces and pioneers followed the same path until the days of toll roads, canals and rail- roads. In the early post-Revolutionary period, rafts of lumber were steered down the 450-mile length of the Susquehanna to Pennsyl- vania cities and to Baltimore, later "arks" carried country produce to the same markets. Sales completed, the crews walked back! Astonish- ing as such foot journeys by ordinary folk now seem, they were by no means exceptional. Many a young Connecticut man used the same natural equipment to select personally his Otsego home to be. Others are known to have gone on like errands on foot as far as Ohio.
Some examples of the use of water courses may be given, both for reaching and leaving this county. In 1769 Richard Smith, of Burling- ton, N. J., came here with a party to survey his Otsego possessions. The careful diary he kept shows that he took a sloop from New York City to Albany, a wagon along the Mohawk to Canajoharie, to Cherry
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Valley and to Springfield, a bateau on Otsego Lake, a canoe down the Susquehanna to Oquaga, this interrupted by the business Smith came upon. Thence the party used the Indians' pack horses and their own feet to the Delaware River at Deposit and again a canoe to reach home. On a trip of over 600 miles described, about 475 were by water. In 1787 Jacob Morris used the same route as far as Unadilla, then up the river of that name and the Butternuts Creek to the home site he had just selected. On this occasion the Mohawk was traversed by bateau. (His experiences are most interestingly recited in a contem- porary letter, reprinted in Hurd's Otsego County History, page 204.) In 1805 William Hodge, three years married and aged 24, left Exeter by wagon for Utica. His objective was Buffalo and the rest of the journey was almost entirely by water, using the Lake Ontario route already mentioned. He became a well-known man at his promising new location. Of interest is the fact that his son Philander returned to Hartwick Seminary for his education. A young Hartwick man nam- ed Holbrook sized up Ohio opportunities in 1818. He sent back a letter describing his journey from Olean on the Alleghany, Ohio and Scioto Rivers to Worthington, Ohio. He likely first used the Susque- hanna and the Chemung, as he says his whole travel was 1030 miles. He found out later that the distance by land was 700 miles, but he probably had chosen the better mode for a man traveling light.
Water courses served very well for exploratory trips, also for freight if continuous to a destination, but household goods and mer- chandise had also to be sent far inland. Land proprietors cut rough roads to their tracts to assist settlers, but federal authorities required better ones before approving postal service. For many years the interior regions were not sufficiently developed to build proper roads by local labor or through property taxation, so "great state roads" were con- structed with funds raised by lotteries approved by the legislature. One of these extended from Catskill far to the west of the state, touching Unadilla. Other stage mail routes, connecting important points, were laid out by the county highway commissioners. These also came to be called "great roads" and there were several in this county. Soon toll turnpikes, built by incorporated stock companies, provided a better way. Two of the most important of these served the county. Both were in operation soon after 1800. The Catskill and Susquehanna Turn-
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pike linked the Hudson with Wattles' Ferry at Unadilla. (At first this followed the Ouleout Creek in Delaware County, so only its western terminus touched Otsego. About 1844 its route was changed from West Harpersfield, coming into Oneonta, but by this time many turnpike companies had ceased operations and maintenance of their rights of way returned to the public.) The Great Western Turnpike was built piecemeal in many sections, parts of three were in this county. The first ran from Albany to Cherry Valley, the second thence through Cooperstown and on West by present Route 80 to Sherburne, the third took the more direct way from Cherry Valley to Cazenovia (now familiar Route 20), with a branch to join the Great Seneca Road at Manlius, the third, fourth and fifth extended these on to such points as Skaneateles and Ithaca, there meeting other systems. Private capital was also needed to construct bridges over the larger rivers and additional toll was there exacted. An example was the Colliersville bridge (present Route 7, a turnpike as early as 1812) . A recent development in transportation is a return to the toll prin- ciple, whereby the traffic pays the cost. Throughout the first half of the past century stage lines were the chief agents in carrying passen- gers, mail and express in this locality.
When the ambitious projects for the state's extensive canal sys- tem were under consideration, Otsego made strong bid for the use of the Mohawk-Otsego Lake-Susquehanna route as part, but was finally by-passed and all the former main objectives (Oswego, Binghamton, the Finger Lakes, Olean, etc.) were reached by several extensions of the Erie itself and by a canal from Kingston to the Delaware at Port Jervis. The Erie Canal was of tremendous importance to New York's. commerce and to farmers near its route, but long brought ruinous. competition from the western states to such more remote regions as Otsego County.
Steam engines could go on rails where canal boats could not. They could also operate throughout the year, a privilege denied to canals. Railroad construction began in the 1830's and at just about the Civil War period reached this county. Local steam roads were built and operated at first by comparatively small companies which later consolidated with major organizations. The only main line with any considerable trackage in the county is the Delaware & Hudson which
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closely parallels the southern boundary. The Ontario & Western and the Unadilla Valley ran close to the western boundary, but in Che- nango County and are now defunct. Spurs from these two and the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western do-or have-ended at Coopers- town, Cherry Valley, Edmeston and Richfield Springs. With the advent of steam railroads, what little was left of river traffic promptly disappeared.
The production of electric current on a large scale brought another change. Successful operation of trolley cars in cities led to interurban lines. Otsego's part in this development was a company which existed under a succession of names, ending as the Southern New York Power & Railway Company. Its right of way was from Oneonta up Otego Creek to Hartwick and east to Index, where there was a "Y," with the one prong extending to Cooperstown and the other to Richfield Springs, later to Herkimer. Operation began in 1901 and the service was of great benefit during the brief succeeding years of the heyday of interurban trolleys, but the carrying of pas- sengers ceased in 1931 and the tracks were converted to steel needs with the coming of World War II.
During the present century we have been living in the gasoline and rubber era. Its vehicles, like the automobile, the bus, the moving van and the airplane, are too familiar to need mention, but additions to this story can be foreseen as the atomic age matures.
IMPROVING THE MIND
OTSEGO pioneers kept intellectually alive from the very first despite the hardships and severe physical labor they constantly faced. Two excellent illustrations are found in the establishment of common schools for the young before there was any official requirement to that effect and in the founding of subscription libraries for the use of all ages almost before the families were decently housed. These ends were both accomplished through the voluntary cooperation of the residents and through their own efforts alone.
In order to present clearly the early status of schools, some back- ground should be given. The first state constitution, adopted during the Revolution, made no reference to education. The Board of Regents, established in 1784, had control only of academies and col- leges and so began at the top-or wrong end- of the educational ladder. Elementary education was left, as it long had been in New York, to the parents and the churches. In 1795, for the first time, public appropriations were made for common schools, but that law was in effect for five years only and whether or not a community maintained a school was entirely a local option. The state did begin to invest sums to produce eventually a school fund but not until 1812 were district schools obligatory. Jedediah Peck, of Burlington, who as a legislator had valiantly sought this goal a decade or more earlier, was chairman of the commission which then framed the measure.
Yankee Otsego parents did not wait for the compulsion of law. As soon as a half-dozen families were settled within reasonable dis- tances a school on the New England pattern sprang up. Naturally such schools reported to no one, but many references to them are made in old letters, diaries, recollections written later by persons who attended them, to religious meetings held in existing school buildings and the like. How many of these community schools may have been maintained in the county cannot be told but enough are known to testify eloquently to Otsego citizens' respect for education. Levi Beardsley, born 1785, mentions in his Reminiscences the one of his boyhood at Richfield (Monticello) and a library there as well. Some of the first required school meetings in 1813 were held in school houses
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