USA > New York > Onondaga County > Past and present of Syracuse and Onondaga County, New York : from prehistoric times to the beginning of 1908 > Part 60
USA > New York > Onondaga County > Syracuse > Past and present of Syracuse and Onondaga County, New York : from prehistoric times to the beginning of 1908 > Part 60
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In 1906 the Rapid Transit began the use of Niagara electric power. The power was turned on to the limits of Syracuse on July 2, 1906, and the ears were run by that power on and after July 31, 1906. The Rapid Transit reached an earning power in 1907 of one million two hundred and sixty thousand eight hun- dred and fifty-four dollars, as against one million one hundred thousand dol-
492
PAST AND PRESENT OF ONONDAGA COUNTY
lars in 1906, and carried twenty-four million nine hundred and fifty-thre thous- and four hundred and six passengers exclusive of passes and six million three hundred and eighty thousand seven hundred and ninety-two transfers. There was an average of six hundred and fifty employes, an increase to eighty and seventy-three one-hundredths miles of trackage, with one hundred and seventy- nine passenger cars, twelve work cars and thirteen snow plows. In 1907 seven hundred and thirty-two thousand nine hundred and seven dollars was spent in improvements.
Another failure of railway hopes which had the usual mortgage fore- closure finish was the Marcellus Electric Railroad Company, which was in- corporated on June 8, 1897, with a capital stock of sixty thousand dollars. The road was not completed for trolley purposes. but became of use with a small engine. The Marcellus & Otisco Lake Railroad Company was incorporated in 1905 for two hundred thousand dollars.
It took several roads upon paper and a sensational failure before the operation of a single ear, with considerable litigation and the downfall of several local capitalists. to accomplish the laying of the tracks to South Bay. Oneida lake, for years the hope of suburban trolley promoters. Early in the '90s the work of getting franchises through the town to South Bay was begun. and these were extended again and again with blasted hopes of an immediate railroad. In. 1904 Willard R. Kimball, whose reign in the Rapid Transit offices had ended some time before, began to make things move in the project. Upon April 12, 1905, the State Railroad Commission gave the Syracuse & South Bay Railroad Company permission to build. and the Bay Road Construction Company spent the greater part of the year 1905 in the work of construction, the plans being upon the most liberal seale and com- prehending the purchase of summer resort hotels, rights of way and a pleasure park at the lake. The mutterings of trouble began when work was stopped in the fall of 1905, and with the opening of another year the storm came. There was a flood of judgments filed against the Bay Road Construction Com- pany on January 19, 1906, and then came a year of litigation and strife for control, until, early in 1907, the road was sold upon mortgage foreclosure, Clifford D. Beebe bidding in the property for the Beebe syndicate.
It was also the Beebe syndicate which put through probably the most successful suburban line to Syracuse, the Auburn & Syracuse road, which was first completed to Skaneateles as the Auburn & Skaneateles road, and then to Syracuse. The only previous railroad connection between Skaneateles and Syracuse had been by the Skaneateles steam railroad, which William K. Niver bought on August 1, 1898, which extended five miles to Skaneateles Junction on the old Auburn road to the New York Central. Later the road went into the hands of the Skaneateles Railroad Company. of which M. F. Dillon was made president, succeeding John MeNamara of Skaneateles. on October 21, 1907. The first car over the Skaneateles & Auburn trolley ran on June 23. 1903. The Auburn & Syracuse line operated ten cars in 1907, and the earn- ings for the fiscal year were three hundred and fifty-two thousand dollars.
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493
PAST AND PRESENT OF ONONDAGA COUNTY
The Rochester, Syracuse & Eastern was another immense enterprise in which the Beebe syndicate was interested. The consent to build was given by the State Board of Railroad Commissioners on September 1, 1902. By 1907 the road was operated from Rochester to Clyde, with the work from Clyde to Port Byron well under way.
The electrification of the West Shore tracks by the use of the third-rail system was completed in June, 1907, and then the Oneida Railway Company began the operation of ears between Syracuse and Utica.
The story of the Iron Pier, which was neither iron nor painted in imitation of iron, was one of financial loss from the time it succeeded the old Gehm pier on the shore of the lake nearest the end of Salina street, until the demo- lition of the pier in 1907. The pier was taken by the Syracuse Street Railway Company on May 4, 1895.
The greatest thing for Syracuse in modern steam railroad history was the building of the artistic New York Central Railway Station. The first office in the new station was opened August 1. 1895, and the station itself was opened for business October 6, 1895. Another item of historic railroad interest was the first run of the Empire State Express on October 26, 1891. The November time table of the New York Central in 1907 showed one hundred and sixty trains a day out of Syracuse both east and west.
Perhaps the most important achievement of Syracuse, in the matter of health and, therefore, finance and the enjoyment of life, was the securing of Skaneateles lake water and the building of the present water system. But the decision to have better water was not reached in a day, and there were many influences with which the. workers for pure water had to contend. It . was when the contract of the old city water company with the city expired in 1885 that opposition to renewal brought on the water campaign and can- vass of sources of supply. Propositions from new corporations and injune- tions from old ones tied up the situation until 1885, when, upon a resolution by the common council, the legislature authorized a commission of investiga- tion. Mayor William B. Kirk appointed E. B. Judson, Alexander II. Davis, James B. Brooks, William II. Warner, Peter B. MeLennan and William K. Niver upon that commission, and in June, 1888, work was begun. The advan- tage of Cazenovia, Oneida and Skaneateles lakes and Sabnon river were in- vestigated, and Skaneateles lake was recommended. The decision was left with the people at a special election, preliminary to which there was a cam- paign of education with many of the city's foremost citizens making cart-tail speeches. The vote favored the project by a majority of ten thousand. three hundred and ninety-two, only nine hundred and ten voting in the negative.
By condemnation the city acquired the old water company's plant at a cost of eight hundred and seventy thousand dollars. There was heroic work at Albany to obtain permission to use Skaneateles water, as that lake was a canal reservoir, and the litigation to extinguish the rights of the mill owners upon Skaneateles Outlet extended to nearly a dozen years beyond the turning on of the water. The awards in the Skaneateles cases came to two hundred and fifty-nine thousand dollars, and were made March 1, 1898. The conduit
494
PAST AND PRESENT OF ONONDAGA COUNTY
line was laid in 1893-94 and the Woodland reservoir built in 1893-95, the estimated cost of the entire plant, including litigation, being four million. two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The conduit line of thirty-inch east iron pipe, nineteen and one-fourth miles long, with its capacity of fifteen million gallons a day, was sufficient for more than twelve years, but in 1906 the agi- tation was begun for a second conduit, which resulted in legislative action in 1907.
The gates at Skaneateles were turned and the water started for Syracuse on June 29, 1894. Upon July 3, following. Skaneateles water was turned into the city pipes and there was a celebration by the whole city.
It is thirty years since the first are light was shown here by Professor Anthony of Cornell. . Upon the top of the Wieting Block this light sparkled to the astonishment of great crowds of people. In that thirty years electric lighting has been at once the subject of more progress, investment and inves- tigation than almost any other public utility. The night that electricity was first shown as a novelty the dynamo was in the cellar of the Pierce. Butler & Pieree store in South Salina street, and was run by that firm's engine. The lamp used was an old-fashioned carbon eight inches long and three inches broad. upon which the sparks would travel from one end to the other, wherever they could find the shortest space. It was this exhibition which put into the minds of well known business men the idea of lighting the streets of the city by electricity, and very soon Pierce, Butler & Pierce engaged in lighting the heart of the city, but upon a very small scale. The apparatus was finally turned over to the Thompson-Houston Company, which established a plant. and in 1884 turned it over to the Electric Light & Power Company of Syracuse. Under the Thompson-Houston Company management the city had twenty-five are lights.
But capitalists were skeptical, and when the Syracuse Eleetrie Light & Power Company was organized only seventeen thousand dollars of the one hundred thousand dollar capital stoek was taken in the city, the Thompson- Houston Company holding the remainder. The first officers of the company were W. T. Hamilton, W. Allen Butler and J. M. Ward, with F. H. Leonard. Jr .. general manager. The original capital was increased to one hundred and fifty thousand dollars in April, 1886, and to three hundred thousand dollars March 28, 1888.
The Thompson-Houston Company bought up the stock of the Syracuse Electric Light & Power Company on May 1, 1892, took control August 18. and September 12. 1892, the Electric Light & Power Company of Syracuse was organized. and the property of the old company turned over to it. On January 1, 1892, Warren H. Girvin became general manager of the light and power company. It was at this time that the plant in Fulton street had its beginning, although property near it had already been occupied by the Thompson-Houston people. The Onondaga Electrical Company was absorbed by the Electric Light & Power Company, the agreement being made JJanuary 24, 1893.
495
PAST AND PRESENT OF ONONDAGA COUNTY
The capacity of the plant finished in 1893 was forty-four two hundred- horse power boilers; six one thousand and fifteen hundred horse power engines and about eight thousand horse power dynamos and power engines. The chimney was the largest in Syracuse, being two hundred feet high, eight feet core and twenty feet square at the base. The production capacity was one thousand are lights, twenty-five thousand incandescent lights and fifteen hundred horse power for railways, motors, etc. In 1893 the com- pany furnished the power for the consolidated street ear lines.
The history of lighting, municipal and private, and efforts to form new companies as well as control those occupying the field, has been unusually variegated and interesting. The Onondaga Gas Company made a start by laying mains on April 15, 1891, and that was the last the public heard of it. The old Gas Light Company was sold out on October 15, 1895, and the Syra- ense Gas Company was incorporated. Upon January 7, 1896, the Boston bondholders obtained control of the Electric Light & Power Company. During this period, as at all later times, both the electrie light and gas companies were busy with extensions and enlargements of plants to the needs of a growing city. In 1899 the Electric Light & Power Company put up another power house in Fulton street at a cost of thirty thousand dollars.
Upon February 26, 1900, the gas and electric light and power companies were consolidated, and with the new century the people had the habit of paying all bills at one office and breaking out sporadically with discussion of the feasibility of municipal ownership and the value of investigation. On February 8, 1889, a bill was introduced in the Assembly providing for inves- tigation as to the advisibility of municipal ownership of light and heating plants, but that was as far as the matter went then. Dollar gas came in after considerable agitation on December 1, 1904. Attorney Ceylon II. Lewis was put at the head of the company, and it came to one of its most properous periods. In 1903 and 1904 the lighting company was supplying an area of thirty-five square miles. In 1905 the lines were extended to Fayetteville and the new works of the Haleomb Steel Company at the State Fair grounds gates, and that same year twelve three hundred and twenty-five horse power boilers were installed in the Fulton street plant. Mr. Lewis resigned and the John J. Cummins regime came in on January 23. 1905. In 1905 there was another agitation as to the price of lights which resulted in the hearing before the State Lighting Commission. The preliminary hearing took place on January 20, 1906, and a decision was reached on September 6, 1906. which redneed the price of electricity to nine cents a kilowatt until October 1, 1907, and after that eight cents; the rate of gas to ninety-five cents a thousand instead of a dollar, and the rate of street lighting to not more than sixty-eight dollars per lamp a year, a reduction of seventeen dollars and seventy-seven cents from the old contraet.
Then followed the attempt to lease the entire plant to the United Gas Improvement Company of Philadelphia, through the Onondaga Lighting Com- pany, a new corporation to be organized by the United Gas Improvement Com- pany. The terms of the lease were of such a character that it would be possi-
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PAST AND PRESENT OF ONONDAGA COUNTY
ble to considerably increase the fixed charges which must be met by the busi- ness transaeted by the Syracuse Lighting Company. The existing fixed charges of the Syracuse Lighting Company amounted to three hundred and sixty thousand dollars per annum. The hearing before the State Commission was had at Albany on December 28, 1906, and later the Commission reported adversely upon all the applications of the lighting company. However, prac- tically all the stockholders of the Syracuse Lighting Company agreed to the change in control under an agreement and deed of trust and a new regime in lighting affairs eame in with 1907, but subject to the new laws of the state under the Public Utilities Commission. An important part of this fight before the State Commission on Gas and Electricity was made by the Committee of the Chamber of Commerce, consisting of F. R. Hazard, Charles W. Snow. George W. Driscoll, Donald Dey, Giles HI. Stilwell, Nicholas Peters and F. B. Seott, working with Mayor Allan C. Fobes and Corporation Counsel Walter W. Magee.
In 1907 there was another agitation for municipal ownership with an application pending for a franchise to take up Niagara power. Mayor Fobes on January 29, 1907, appointed a lighting commission to investigate this sub- jeet, the members being Charles W. Snow, Chairman, William H. Warner, Prof. John II. Barr. George W. Driscoll. Dr. John HI. Matthews, Adam Volles and Peter Eckel. Upon September 3 following this commission reported adversely to municipal ownership.
The Bureau of Gas and Electricity was established in 1907, and the first offiees taken were in the new Court House. Henry J. Blakeslee was the first superintendent named. In the latter part of the year Superintendent Blakeslee made a count of the lights in the city, and on December 20 reported one thousand three hundred and eighty-eight street are lights upon twenty- one eireuits. " It was necessary for the superintendent to travel two hundred miles in the making of this count.
Many attempts and propositions to organize other companies than the one which had the franchise for lighting and power, have been heard -- but only heard. The Steam Heat & Power Company had a plan to pipe natural gas from_Baldwinsville, and on December 20, 1897, received a franchise. In the spring of 1907 came the proposition to furnish light by Niagara power, but this was considered only a collateral incident of the electric light contract fight.
The telephone is both a barometer of increase in prosperity and apprecia- tion of telephone facilities. From a branch office of the Central New York Telephone and Telegraph system, popularly known as the Bell. the city has become an important center with many administrative offices and an investment which places it among the leading industries. Some idea of the growth of the use of this 'phone in Syracuse alone can be gained from these figures :
--
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GLOBE HOTEL BLOCK IN EARLY '80s.
1.
DURSTON BLOCK AND OLD ALHAMBRA IN THE EARLY '80s.
PAST AND PRESENT OF ONONDAGA COUNTY
497
Number of Telephones in Service.
.
January 1, 1901
1,808
Jannary 1, 1902
1,958
January 1, 1903
2,611
January 1, 1904
3,016
January 1, 1905
4,957
January 1, 1906
6,831
January 1, 1907
10,400
January 1, 1908
10,000
It was in 1897, after a sensational fight in the Common Council for sub- ways, made by Eugene Hughes & Co., that the Central New York Telephone Company asked that it be given the privilege of laying its own subways. In September, 1896, the Council had granted three subway franchises, which would force all telephone companies to go into the subways of the applicant, Eugene Hughes & Co. Mayor James K. McGuire vetoed the franchises, and. on the night of September 28, citizens crowded the Council chamber to pro- test. Speeches were made by Donald Dey, president of the Business Men's Association, Daniel Crichton, John William Smith of the West End Business Men's Association, Daniel Rosenbloom, John McCarthy, Rev. F. W. Betts and A. R. Gillis. The Council adjourned the matter from meeting to meet- ing, but the taxpayers, without reference to party, were watchful and sue- cessful. The following year was devoted to a subway campaign, the Bell company not objecting to putting its wires underground but to paying toll in the subways of others. On July 12, 1897, the franchise to lay subways was granted to the Central New York Telephone Company. Mayor McGuire vetved this franchise, but on August 2 his veto was overriden, and five days later the contract was given to John Dunfee to build the first telephone sub- ways in the city.
From the Wieting Block the Central New York Telephone Company moved to its own building at 311 Montgomery street, which was outgrown and disposed of to the Onondaga Historical Association in 1905. Then was begun the new building to the south of the old one, at a cost of two hundred thousand dollars, which was by necessity followed by the building added in 1907. The Syracuse building is the general headquarters for three telephone companies, the Empire State, the Central New York and the New York and Pennsylvania companies. Syracuse became the headquarters for the Central New York lines in 1904.
In 1905 the Bell company began doing things by doubles, doubling sta- tions, capacity, employes and call averages. The daily call average in 1904 was twenty-six thousand five hundred and sixty-six, and in 1905, fifty thousand one hundred and sixty-nine; the employes average in 1904 was two hundred and seventy-nine, and in 1905 it was four hundred and eighty-six; the wages paid in 1904 made a total of one hundred and seventy-two-thousand eight hundred and sixty dollars, and in 1905, two hundred and eighty-five
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PAST AND PRESENT OF ONONDAGA COUNTY
thousand seven hundred and thirty-two dollars. In 1905 fourteen miles of conduits were laid. and in 1906 there were twenty miles put down. This practically meant a subway service for double that number of miles of streets. for the distributing plan is from poles placed in the center of blocks. In 1906 there were nearly nine hundred employes, about three hundred and fifty being in the building, with a weekly payroll of nearly ten thousand dollars. The annual report of the Central New York Telephone & Telegraph Company, made at Utica in 1908, showed twenty-six thousand one hundred and twenty- nine stations in 1907, as against twenty-eight thousand one hundred and twenty in 1906, the difference being accounted for by the increase in price for home telephones.
In 1907 a count was made of all poles, telephone, telegraph, trolley and lighting in the city, an ordinance requiring each to be named and numbered, and it was reported that there were nineteen thousand in all.
The Independent Telephone Company, to take over the independent telephone system of the Syracuse Telephone Company, which had its central exchange in the Snow building in South Warren street, was incorporated June 29, 1905, with a one million dollar capital stock. In 1905 about twelve miles of subways were laid and the palatial Crouse stables remodeled for an exchange, being occupied early in 1906. The Independent Company was formed as a part of the Independent Telephone Securities Company, which controlled lines in Utica and Rochester, besides toll lines and smaller exchanges in the state. In 1907 and 190S there was a reorganization of the company.
Syracuse as an economic body may not have reduced taxes or the public debt in a score of years, but it at least has something to show for its dili- gence in expenditures. In that period it built the city hall, already out- grown; achieved the finest water in the country, with water works now need- ing an additional conduit; laid more than sixty-five miles of pavements. for it was not until 1889 that the first asphalt was put down in the city; dug more than one hundred and fifty miles of sewers; bettered that by nearly twenty miles in the length of water mains, and reached a bonded debt of seven million three hundred and forty-six thousand dollars, with more than four million and eighty thousand dollars productive assets. The outgrowth of public buildings and system, although reflective of short-sightedness in building, is also a matter of congratulation for by those things is the city's growth more readily guaged. The enumeration of new schools, demands of the fire and police departments, expenses of the department of publie works, engineering, charities, etc., all tell of the healthy growth of the city. There may be many claims as to this and that accomplishment by the succeeding Republican, Democratic and Republican administrations, the possible extrava- gances under the White charter which began the century so liberally. some ground for the charges of the results of excesses in politics, but it will be ad- mitted by the unbiased eritie that the eity has fared as well under one admin- istration as the other when it comes to the consideration of the spirit that does things.
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499
PAST AND PRESENT OF ONONDAGA COUNTY
During Mayor Willis B. Burns' administration in 1887, Burnet Park was surveyed and four and one-half miles of driveways were graded there at an expense of twenty thousand. William B. Kirk became mayor in 1888, and then began the actual work of securing the new water system. In 1888 the charter was amended to do away with the board of city anditors, and their functions were transferred to the common council. The second year of the Kirk administration the financial operation of the eity departments was simpli- fied by including the expense of maintaining the board of health and police and poor departments directly in the city budget instead of having it put first in the county budget and afterward paid by the city. In this year the act was obtained authorizing the bonding for three hundred thousand dollars to build a new city hall and police station. Also legislation was obtained creating the Twelfth. Thirteenth and Fourteenth wards. In 1888 sheet as- phalt pavements were laid in West Onondaga street from South Salina to Baker streets; Townsend, from James to Willow streets, and James street was paved part with asphalt and part with sandstone block.
William Cowie became mayor in 1891, the period when the city was authorized by the legislature to own its own water plant and bring water from Skaneateles lake, with an issue of three million dollars in bonds.
During Mayor Amos' administration in 1893, four miles of pavement were laid, including one and one-half miles of sandstone block in Washington street, which was laid by the New York Central. The old hoist bridge over the Oswego canal in North Salina street was constructed and the new South avenne bridge across the creek was put in. It was in March, 1893, that the Burnet heirs began their futile attempt to recover the park property from the city.
Five miles of pavement went down in 1894 and nearly the same amount in 1895, the last year of the Amos administration. In 1895 the adoption of the new State Constitution made it necessary to increase the assessed valuation of property in the city. In 1894 the total assessed valuation was forty-eight million, six hundred and sixty-five thousand, three hundred and eighty-five dollars, and in 1895 the valuation was sixty-four million, eight hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars.
During the six years of the MeGuire administration, from 1896 to 1901, inelusive, the number of schools was increased from twenty-eight to thirty- three; the salaries of teachers from one hundred and ninety-seven thousand, two hundred and seventy-three dollars to three hundred and two thousand. nine hundred and thirty-seven dollars; the number of teachers from three hundred and thirty-six to four hundred and eighty-five, and the number of pupils from twelve thousand, five hundred and seventy-eight to twenty-one thousand and ninety; the fire engine houses from ten to sixteen, and the number of firemen from eighty-nine to one hundred and fifty-six; the number of police from eighty-two to one hundred and thirty; the paved streets from sixteen and one-half miles to thirty-eight miles; the flushing system for pave- ments was introduced, and the street eleetrie lights increased from seven hundred and twenty-seven to one thousand. three hundred.
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