USA > New York > Oneida County > Utica > Memorial history of Utica, N.Y. : from its settlement to the present time > Part 4
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
In the meantime, however, there arrived from England the son of the latter, the late A. B. Johnson, who became an associate of his father. The following is their advertisement of 1802: "New universal cheap wholesale and retail store. B. Johnson takes this opportunity of inform - ing the public that he has, in addition to his former store, opened the above, adjoining the printing office on the Genesee road, where he has received a large and fashionable assortment of dry goods, &c., &c. He continues paying, as usual, the highest prices in cash for seasoned furs,
46
MEMORIAL HISTORY OF UTICA.
flax seed, wheat, pot and pearl ashes." The son never participated in the rivalry so far as to disregard the great object of trade, the acquisition of property, and wielding a very considerable influence over his father ; notwithstanding he was yet much under age he succeeded in impress- ing him with his own views. The result was that more money was realized in the last few years of Mr. Johnson's business than in all the former. But in 1809, soon after the son had attained his majority and several years before his own death, he thought best to retire. He had now for many years maintained his position as a leading merchant, and by trade as well as by some fortunate purchases of real estate had acquired a property of almost $50,000.
Maj. Benjamin Hinman was a native of Southbury, Conn. He served several years with much credit in the army of the Revolution as captain, commissary, wagonmaster, and aid to General Greene. He was one of the thirteen Hinmans who held commissions in that war from the town of Woodbury. On one occasion, when the British threatened to attack the fort at Rome, he was sent thither, and was so much pleased with the character of the country through which he passed that he determined on the expiration of the war to settle there. He came ac- cordingly about the year 1787 and purchased a tract of about 2,000 acres at Little Falls. In 1797 or 1798 he removed to Fort Schuyler. After occupying two or three different residences on this side of the river and keeping a public house a few years across the bridge in Deer- field he finally took up his residence in Main street a few doors east of the square. While living in Deerfield he superintended the construction of the dike across the flats. The former road had been an ungraded and meandering one, following the course of the higher portions of land.
Rev. John Hammond was a Baptist minister who in 1797 was living in this place, his house being on the public square a little below Bagg's Tavern. While here he preached at Deerfield and elsewhere in this vicinity. At this time he is said to have conducted a class on Sunday for instruction in the Scriptures, and may therefore be regarded as a pioneer in the work of Sunday school teaching. He also labored occa- sionally among the Indians; but Elder Hammond was not solely and exclusively devoted to ministerial labors; he was also a land surveyor as were his three sons. Assisted by these sons he surveyed the tract in
47
CAPTAIN MACOMBER AND SAMUEL HOOKER.
the northern part of the State purchased by John Brown, of Providence, and known as Brown's tract.
In the course of this year Capt. George Macomber conducts hither his eldest son and leaves him to manage for himself while he goes back to Taunton, Mass., and after a year or more comes again, bringing with him the remainder of his family. This family claim to be descendants of one of the historic company of the Mayflower, and still cherish as a sacred heirloom a ring that bears the name of Mary Standish.
Capt. George Macomber had previously followed the sea, but leaving this hazardous pursuit now that he was past middle life and responsible for the settlement of a family of ten children he emigrated with them to the new country. As for himself, it being too late to acquire a new profession, he spent the remainder of his days in gardening.
Samuel Hooker was another carpenter who at this time took up his residence here. Originally from Barre, Mass., he had settled in Albany and was engaged in his chosen calling when he was induced to come to Old Fort Schuyler to superintend the erection by the agents of the Holland Land Company of a large brick hotel on Whitesboro street. His son Philip remained in Albany and became eminent as an architect, having been employed in the erection of St. Peter's and the Lutheran Churches as well as the State capitol. The remainder of Mr. Hooker's family removed with him, including his son John, who was also a car- penter and builder. These two were the only persons resident who were competent to project and carry on so important a structure as the hotel. It was probably begun in 1797 and was finished near the close of the year 1799. A more particular account of it will be given here- after. In June,. 1803, when a subscription had been started looking toward the building of Trinity Church, the Messrs. Hooker presented plans which were accepted, and they were engaged to go on with the work until the money had been expended. Beside these and other more private undertakings Mr. Hooker was in 1808 acting as agent for two fire insurance companies. He was an unassuming, industrious, and upright man. That he was much respected in his own church at least may be inferred from the fact that for twenty-one years he was annually elected one of its officers, two-thirds of which time he was a warden. Hooker, son of the foregoing, after following for some years his trade of carpenter and builder, went into the sale of lumber with Seth Dwight.
48
MEMORIAL HISTORY OF UTICA.
Seventy acres of lot No. 96 were on the 2d of January, 1897, bought by Richard Kimball from Jedediah Sanger, of New Hartford, who had himself bought of James S. Kip. This farm, which Mr. Kimball occupied until 1804, lay chiefly on the eastern side of Genesee Hill, but extended in part across to the western side nearly as far as the pres- ent Aikin street, where it bordered on the southern. line of Judge Coop- er's purchase. The farm-house, which since Mr. Kimball's day has been the home of numerous successive tenants, stood nearly on the site of the sumptuous mansion of Irvin A. Williams. At present it stands on the street which in after years was named in allusion to the early owner of the territory it traverses, though in allusion merely, since contempt for a name so wanting in honorable belongings as Kimball has changed it to Kemble. This owner, having sold his farm, went back to Con- necticut.
We have arrived at the spring of 1798, a period which to their suc- cessors is an entirely arbitrary one, yet which to the inhabitants of our settlement was the beginning of a new epoch. They had begun to realize the need of a more formal civil organization, and moreover as- pired to have their place recognized by a name that should be both more distinctive and more easy to speak than the accidental one it had thus far borne. As a curious illustration of the nature of fame the orig- inator of the name of Utica cannot be admitted as past all doubt. The common report goes that the inhabitants were assembled in the public room of Bagg's Tavern and the question was raised of a designation for their soon to be incorporated village. A number of names were pro- posed. Some of those present were in favor of retaining the present one ; one individual liked Indian names and wished that the village should take the patronymic of the noble Oneida chief, Sconandoa ; another preferred a more national hero and would have it called Washington ; another who was in search of briefness would call it Kent, an euphonious term and full of pleasing memories to the descendant of English ancestry. This latter had strong advocates, but was defeated by the ridicule of a citizen of whom we now hear for the first time, but of whom I can pick up nothing more except that his name was Little, and that he afterward drowned himself.
Finding agreement by other means impossible it was resolved to de-
49
UTICA NAMED AND INCORPORATED.
cide the name by lot. Each person present deposited in a hat the name of his preference written on a slip of paper, and of these there were thirteen. The name first drawn was to be the accepted one. And so the lot fell upon the heathen name of Utica, the choice of that eminent classical scholar, Erastus Clark.
In due time came from the State legislature the act of incorporation already applied for. This act, passed April 3, 1798, defined the bound- aries of the village and gave the citizens the right of self government under five freeholders duly elected as trustees, and who were invested with the powers usually granted to small incorporated villages. And yet these powers were quite restricted, amounting to little more than protection against nuisances on the highways and the prevention and extinction of fires. In its title the village is named by the name it had previously borne; in the body of the act it is named only by its new one. And thus was Old Fort Schuyler merged into Utica.
CHAPTER II.
THE FIRST VILLAGE CHARTER.
Counties Erected -- New comers of 1798 -- Notes from Dwight's Travels - The Holland Land Company -- The Phelps and Gorham Purchase - The first Hotel - Its Proprietors - Religious interests and an early Preacher - The Village tax list for 1800 - Notes of another Traveler - Highway Improvements - Business Develop- ment - The year 1801 - Recollections of the Welch Population - General character- istics at this early Period - Settlers of 1801-04 - Petition for a new Charter - A Map of the Village in 1806- General Features.
N JOT the settlement of Old Fort Schuyler alone dropped at this time the name which had previously attached to it; the territory in which it was located received likewise a new christening in the spring of 1798. The former county of Montgomery had already by successive acts of the legislature been curtailed of its vast dimensions, and the counties of Chemung, Ontario, Tioga, Otsego, Herkimer, and Onon-
7
50
MEMORIAL HISTORY OF UTICA.
daga had been one after another erected. Whitestown at the date in question was still a part of Herkimer County, though diminished in size by the setting off of several independent towns. By an act passed March 15, 1798, Herkimer was itself divided and the additional counties of Chenango and Oneida were formed. Whitestown now fell to the belongings of Oneida, and Utica was but an inconsiderable though in- corporated village in this still extensive township.
Of the first seven years of its corporate life all records are lost ; they were burned in the fire which on the 7th of December, 1848, consumed the council chamber and the most of its contents. A like fate has befallen the early town records of Whitestown. The times of adoption of a few streets of Utica, which were copied from the latter before their destruction, are the sole items saved. The newspapers of that date are quite barren of news merely local ; engrossed with foreign concerns their editors gave little heed to events that happened directly around them ; still less did they think to cater for those who at this day might study their sheets to seek out the past. Thus of village affairs our ignorance is nearly complete, and we know scarce one of the names of those who then were in rule. From a manuscript saved we gather that Francis A. Bloodgood was treasurer in 1800 and 1801 and Talcott Camp in 1802. We know also from subsequent minutes that at the first freeholders' meeting held under the charter of 1805 the trustees were present. But who the trustees were and what had been their official acts has perished forever. On the occasion of the fire which burned the store of Messrs. Post & Hamlin in February, 1804, a card was issued by the trustees of the village in which they present "their warm thanks to the fire com- pany and to the citizens and strangers in general for their eager exer- tions in saving the property of the sufferers and in extinguishing the flames." So far as we know this card is the only evidence left us that as a corporate body the trustees ever existed, and the thanks accorded the firemen the only proof that their powers had once been in exercise, as they would seem to have been in organizing the company. For as- sociate enterprise the time was much too new, and institutions, commer- cial, manufacturing, or benevolent, awaited a more established order of things. Dismissing then the expectation of obtaining any light from records written or printed upon this infantile portion of the civic life of
51
THE NEWLY NAMED VILLAGE.
Utica we must go on as we have begun with the narrative of the com- ponent parts of the population and be content to infer the tenor of the public acts from the character of the actors.
It so happens besides that the period of the first charter covers the advent of many whose healthful influence was felt throughout the entire village history, who, like some already sketched, were men of nerve, fortitude, and energy, honest in principle and in conduct, wise and dili- gent in their own behalf, yet zealous for the interests of the place of their adoption. These for their private worth and their public deeds should be held in perpetual honor. And though of the period in question there is little of the heroic to relate, though it may have been " a day of small things," its actors were steadily laying the foundation of a greater future, were forming for themselves and their village a reputation for thrift, en- terprise, and virtue which their descendants glory to inherit, and were preparing to become partakers in most of those local and general under- takings that have given prosperity to town and county.
Turning to the fresh comers of the newly named village the first we notice is Thomas Skinner, a student of law. A graduate of Williams College in the year 1797 we find him the next year prosecuting his studies and boarding at the house of Talcott Camp, on Whitesboro street, in company with his preceptor and former fellow townsman at Will- iamstown, Nathan Williams. It was not long before they were part- ners in practice and were still further united by the marriage of the lat- ter to Mary, the sister of Mr. Skinner. Far short of Mr. Williams in force, learning, or legal acumen he surpassed him in fluency and grace as a speaker. He had a fine imagination and a classical taste improved by the choicest reading. Possessing skill also as a writer he became one of the principal contributors to the Columbian Gazette. In 1807 he was the attorney of the village and somewhat later held similar re- lations to the Utica Bank. For some years he acted as treasurer of the Presbyterian Church and was also a village trustee. His oratorical repute and his skill as an advocate secured him at one time a nomination to Congress, but he was beaten by that abler man, Thomas R. Gold.
The year 1798 is signalized as that in which was established the first newspaper in Utica. This was the Whitestown Gazette, which had been first set up in New Hartford in 1793. Four years later its publisher,
52
MEMORIAL HISTORY OF UTICA.
William McLean, removed it here, changing its name to the Whitestown Gazette and Cato's Patrol, the addition having reference to the younger Cato, who was the defender of ancient Utica. Mr. McLean was a native of Hartford, Conn., where he was born December 2, 1774, and could not have been long out of his apprenticeship when he started his paper. He was assiduous in his devotion to business until the year 1803, when he sold out to two of his apprentices, Messrs. Seward and Will- iams, and moved back to New Hartford.
Under date of November 22, 1798, John C. Hoyt "begs to inform the public," through the columns of the Whitestown Gazette, " that he has commenced business as a taylor at the shop formerly occupied by William S. Warner, opposite Bagg's Inn, Utica, where he hopes to give satisfaction to all who may favor him with their commands." His shop was on the southwest corner of the Genesee and Whitesboro roads. Here he continued his business for more than twenty years, reared a family, and gained the respect of his fellow townsmen. He was twice a trustee of the village and was likewise a trustee of the Presbyterian Church, and was an upright and benevolent man.
The appearance of the place at the period in question we have a picture of from the pen of an intelligent and trustworthy traveler. In the year 1798 Rev. Timothy Dwight, D.D., president of Yale College, made a tour through this portion of the State, and in the published vol- umes of his travels, wherein he has condensed the results of this and a somewhat later journey, he thus discourses of Utica : " Utica, when we passed through it, was a pretty village containing fifty houses. It is built on the spot where Fort Schuyler formerly stood. Its site is the declivity of the hill which bounds the valley of the Mohawk, and here slopes easily and elegantly to the river. The houses stand almost all on a single street parallel to the river. Generally those which were built before our arrival were small, not being intended for permanent habita- tions. The settlers were almost wholly traders and mechanics, and it was said that their business had already become considerable. Their expectations of future prosperity were raised to the highest pitch, and not a doubt was entertained that this village would at no great distance of time become the emporium of all the commerce carried on between the ocean and a vast interior. We found the people of Utica laboring
53
SOME INTERESTING DESCRIPTIONS.
and in a fair way to labor a long time under one very serious disadvant- age. The lands on which they live are chiefly owned by persons who reside at a distance and who refuse to sell or to rent them except on terms which are exorbitant. The stories which we heard concerning this subject it was difficult to believe, even when told by persons of the best reputation. A company of gentlemen from Holland who have purchased large tracts of land in this State and Pennsylvania, and who are known by the name of the Holland Land Company, have built here a large brick house to serve as an inn. The people of Utica are united with those of Whitesboro in their parochial concerns."
With reference to the sanguine and seemingly fallacious expectations of the settlers, and to the obstacle which in the opinion of this author hindered the rapid growth of their place, I add a single sentence from the recorded notes of an early resident. He says : "The inhabitants always entertained a very hopeful opinion of their village, and real estate was in more request and at higher prices than in the surrounding villages. This was much induced by the withholding from sale of the Bleecker estate, which covered a large part of Utica."
A noteworthy fact mentioned by Dr. Dwight is the existence of a large brick house then recently erected for an inn. The magnitude of the structure for the time and place, the expectations of its owners, and the fact that it remains today almost the only landmark of Utica as it was upwards of ninety years ago will justify us in devoting a few para- graphs to its history.
On the 2d of November, 1795, the agents of the Holland Land Com- pany bought of Thomas and Augustus Corey 200 acres of great lot No. 95, which purchase, or a part of it, was commonly known afterward as the hotel lot. Within two years the company proceeded to erect upon it a large brick hotel, which was not only the first brick house in the village, but the first of its size in the county and probably in the State west of Albany. Indeed it may be scarcely an exaggeration to say there was not its like anywhere between the Hudson and the Pacific Ocean. The site selected was near the shingle-sided farm-house of the Coreys on Whitesboro street, and was probably as swampy a spot as any in the vil- lage-a veritable flag-pond. The contract for the erection of the build- ing was made with Samuel Hooker and John, his son. As we have
54
MEMORIAL HISTORY OF UTICA.
seen they were carpenters and architects of Albany who, being invited to undertake the job, came here and made the place their subsequent home. The bricks were made by Heli Foot, of Deerfield. After suffi- cient earth had been removed there were laid, as foundations for the superincumbent stone and brick, hemlock logs placed lengthwise along the sides and ends. Perishable as such a foundation may seem it served well for a while, but in process of time these timbers settled consider- ably. Fortunately this settling was uniform, so that while it diminished the height of the building it did no material injury to the walls or the flooring. When completed it was a square, three-storied structure with a four-sided roof. It contained, besides the usual public rooms and numerous lodging apartments of a house of this nature, a large ball room in the second story of the west end and a room which was soon occu- pied by the Masonic lodge. It was an immense edifice for the time and place, and loomed above all the story and a half wooden houses of the village like a palace among hovels. Upon its front was displayed in chiseled letters which no subsequent repaintings have been able to wholly obliterate : "Hotel."
Ten years before, in July, 1788, Messrs. Phelps and Gorham bought from the State of Massachusetts the title to the Genesee country, so called, containing more than a million of acres now included in the sev- eral counties, and began to offer these lands for sale. Within two years, as we learn from the census of 1790, there were already settled upon them a population of upwards of 1,000, and this amount was annually augmenting. The Military tract, southwest from Utica, and the Hol- land Land Company's purchase, lying beyond that of Phelps and Gor- ham, were soon after likewise thrown upon the market and like it were being speedily peopled. The rapidity, in fact, with which Western New York was now filling up is paralleled only by the rapidly growing West- ern States of the Union.
Another evidence of the tide of emigration that was now flowing to- ward this western El Dorado may be seen in the following, culled from the " Annals of Albany": In the winter of 1795 1,200 sleighs loaded with furniture and with men, women, and children passed through Albany in three days, and 500 were counted between sunrise and sunset of February 28th of that year. All of them were moving westward. We are not then
55
THE FIRST HOTEL AND ITS LANDLORDS.
surprised to learn that in the experience of the small taverns of Utica it was by no means uncommon to have not only all the beds of the house, but the floors also, crowded with guests, and are ready to believe that a hotel of large dimensions was a thing of necessity. But the Holland Land Company had another object in view. They were owners of ex- tensive tracts of land north and also southwest of Utica, and still broader ones at the west, and it is to be presumed that they were desirous of a house where they could detain some of these many emigrants and more easily tempt them to a purchase and a settlement.
The precise era when work was begun upon the hotel cannot be accu- rately determined, though it was probably in 1797. But if there is a doubt as to the time of commencement of the work there is none as to the date of its completion and occupancy as a hotel. On the 2d of December, 1799, it was formally opened by its first landlord, Philip J. Schwartze. Not long after the inauguration of the hotel, probably in the year following, a street was opened southward from it and intersecting the Genesee road at the upper part of the village. This it was hoped would divert the travel from the west and bring it directly to the doors
of the company. Naturally it took the name of Hotel street.1 The proprietorship of Mr. Schwartze was of short continuance, for within a year he was succeeded by Hobart Ford, whose stay would seem to have been as brief as that of his predecessor, since he died on the Ist of December, 1801. Later proprietors were Thomas Sickles, a major of the Revolution who had been an assemblyman and a judge in Rensse- laer County before coming to Oneida; Henry Bamman, who gave to the building the name of York House and kept it until the success of the canal drew away travelers from the river and so diminished its pat- ronage ; and Seth Dwight, a previous merchant and auctioneer of the vil- lage who opened it as a boarding-house. During the war it was for a time garrisoned with soldiers, but has since been successively a board- ing-house, a young ladies' seminary, and a private residence.
Up to the year 1801 the only existing (and continuous) religious soci- ety was that which had been organized at Whitesboro in 1793 under
1 The absence of parallelism between the two sides of this part of Whitesboro street and the deep bay which exists on its northern side are portrayed on extant maps made in 1708 and 1800. 'This wide space was doubtless designed for the easier movements of stages in front of the hotel. Its convenience made it, down to a comparatively recent period, a parade ground for military com panies and a rendezvous for partakers in civil displays.
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.