USA > New York > Suffolk County > Yaphank > Yaphank as it is, and was, and will be. Containing biographical sketches of all its prominent men, the characteristic proclivities of its "funny" people, its business and business "monarchs," its facilities for enterprise and improvement, > Part 9
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" And the said John Homan has liberty, also, to build a fulling mill thereon, if he sees fit, upon the same conditions and limits."
In 1771, the same gentleman received a grant to build a grist mill near or upon the same dam with his saw-mill : and in the old Record is found the following curious restric- tions and conditions of the grant :
.. " At a meeting of the Trustees on the 4th day of February, 1771, there were present, Jonathan Thompson, Benajiah Strong, William Floyd, Eleazer Hawkins, Richard Wood
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hull, and Joseph Brewster. At this meeting the said Trustees covenanted and agreed with Daniel Homan-that is to say, have granted and given liberty on their part, unto the said Daniel Homan, and to his heirs and assignees. that he or they may build a grist mill on the same stream, and at the place or dam where his saw mill now stands, with the conditions and restrictions following: That the said Daniel Homan shall complete the said mill for grind- ing, within the space of two years from this date ; and also after that time, shall keep an approved miller, and also the said Homan shall take for toll three quarts and no more, out of each bushel of all sorts of grain which he or they may grind from time to time. Also, he shall always keep a bolting mill with a good country cloth, always to be freely used by those who have their grain ground at his mill.
" And, if the said Homan doth make default in the above agreement and covenant, then this above agreement and grant shall be void, and the same shall return to the Town and be the same as if it had not been granted. In witness thereof, I have set my hand of day and date as above written.
" DANIEL HOMAN."
WHY YAPHANK WAS NOT A LOWELL AND A ROCHESTER.
Connected with the Lower Mills is an interesting history. Yaphank would have certainly been a Lowell and a Rochester had James Weeks and William Sidney Smith carried out their scheme.
While the Long Island Railroad was being built, the grain crops all over the country were failures, and wheat and other staple produce were imported from Germany and other European nations.
Messrs. Weeks and Smith purchased the Lower Mills of old Robert Hawkins, in 1836, and began what they should have terminated.
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The failures of the grain crops, and Messrs. Weeks' and Smith's influence in the building of the railroad, originated their scheme.
They intended to bring the railroad in direct connection with their mills, import wheat from Germany, grind it into flour at their mill, and transport it by the railroad over the Island and country.
To make Yaphank a Lowell, they built a woolen factory near their other mills, and again began what they should have terminated. Why Yaphank is not a Lowell and a Rochester, is because Messrs. Smith and Weeks did not make it so !
V.
OUR DIMINUTIVE YALE.
THE YAPHANK DISTRICT SCHOOL AND ITS HISTORY-THE SCHOOL-HOUSE-PAST AND PRESENT.
THE SCHOOL-HOUSE.
This neat little octagonal building, with its pretty obser- vatory as an apex, stands lonely and unadorned in an open, unenclosed lot, opposite the residence of Doc. James I. Baker.
Around and within it are the indelible marks of the ruthless propensities of Young America.
The village school-house ! How meagre and unsensa- tional seems the name of those thousands of isolated repos- itories of learning that sparkle in the quiet valleys, on the wooded hill-sides, and on the plains of our boundless Home of the Free ! How many shouts of genuine happiness, and peals of healthy laughter, have echoed from those cabins of youthful struggles.
How fondly we all-but boys and girls of larger growth -cherish the memories of our school days ! How the heart is stirred when the recollections of those pleasant hours bring back to us the merry voices of playmates who now are sleeping the long, long sleep ; and whose paths of pleasure, and school-books torn and defaced, are forever forgotten in that golden Mansion of harps and sweet rewards !
How the unbidden tears trickle down our cheeks as we stand, in memory, by the little grave of a dear playmate, who laid down his books to die! and how silently the tears
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are vanished by the recollections of the many boyish bat- tles of those pugnacious followers of the "elementary ' Webster !
How we smile as we again "stand at the head of the class," or sullenly walk down the narrow aisle, and shud- der at the stern command to " hold out your hand, sir !"'
How clearly the roguish faces we saw on the " last day of school" are transformed into a panorama of inter- mingled joy and sorrow ! and how distinctly we saw in the boy and girl the coming man and woman.
Why should one speak in scornful depreciation of a country school-house ? Do we ever stop to think, in these times of costly colleges and institutions of classical refine- ment, that men whose appellations are written in letters of living fire, and whose names will never be forgotten, once carved with the traditional jack-knife the rude ontlines of those self-same names upon the rough walls of a log school-house ?
Do we ever stop to consider, in these days of Yale honors and Harvard laurels, whether the edifice makes the man, or the college course the true gentleman ?
Will my friends in Yaphank accept the flattery, when I assure them, that the noble father of their country-Gen. George Washington-never threw spit-balls within as "grand a room." or stole kisses from the attending belles of as "nice" a school as we have in Yaphank ?
It is a false conception the lads and lassies of modern times maintain, when they believe that architectural gran- deur is the favored producer of superior intellect ; and as everything-ever so humble may it be-has a history, I shall endeavor to give the one coherent with the
YAPHANK DISTRICT SCHOOL-HOUSE -- PAST AND PRESENT.
For many, many years, the young ideas of the past generations struggled to master the rustie classics in a little. . red-painted, boxed-up shanty, bearing the half admissible
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name of a school-house, that stood alone in an old field in the almost extreme upper part of Upper Yaphank.
There old 'Squire Mordecai Homan once "ruled up" the aggravating delinquencies of his home-spun pupils, and there William C. Booth and Brewster Saxton explained the mysteries of the half-explored globe. There William J. Weeks left the head-lights of his boyish propensities. There J. P. Mills, the acknowledged Governor and pomp- ous potentate, engraved the transplendent star of his dry- goods and hardware fame, in the outlines of the dim one his father carved before him. There Richard S. Homan and Noah T. Sweezy, the former now dead, but both once prominent New York merchants, jumped the whirling rope and kissed the village belles. Indeed, nearly every old gentleman now living in Yaphank, and many that have gone down the sunset-way, and many that have made bright names in the world, took their initiatory step in education in that old school house.
Generations grew up, and the advance of railroads and science advanced the tastes of the people. In 1856 the dear old ship that had borne so many minds out of the breakers of ignorance into the sea of knowledge was abandoned as a landmark of old times, and a new and very convenient building was erected in Central Yaphank.
A prime mover in its erection was William J. Weeks, Esq., who, although he suffered much opposition in the movement, at last achieved his praiseworthy object. The busts of Washington, Franklin, Webster and Clay embel- lish the walls of the school-room, and were presented by Mr. Weeks.
Mr. Weeks has in his possession a vast amount of man- uscript matter pertaining to the district affairs, written and compiled during the school war of 1854, '55 and '56. The children were getting education under difficulties. Mr. Weeks took more interest in their welfare than did their parents. He suffered abuse because he wished the district
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to abandon the old shell of a house that stood "conveni- ently out of the way," and build the neat and attractive one that hard work, and plenty of it on his part, at last erected for them. Who thanks him ?
VI.
YAPHANK CEMETERY ASSOCIATION.
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MAKE MY GRAVE IN THE WILDWOOD-WHY ARE OUR DEAD PROMISCUOUSLY BURIED ?- AN ABSOLUTE REQUIREMENT.
MAKE MY GRAVE IN THE WILDWOOD).
are words that never will be heard from the dying lips of the most romantic in the coming age of splendid cemeteries.
The poet Percival may slumber sweetly in his lonely grave at Hazel Green, Wis., with only an evergreen to mark his resting-place, and Edgar A. Poe lie tranquil and calm in an unmarked grave, but the coming poet will never die happily without the important assurance that the awful vault and pale marble will characterize the solemnities of his remembrance.
The living fashionables who love to sleep in the city while in life, as a counterpart, wish to sleep in the "city of the deap" when they roll up the warp of life ; and a weeping willow over a lone grave in the quiet valley has no charm for the repose of their decaying mortality.
The old-time usages of burying the dead, and the manner in which they were distributed, causes us to exclaim :
HOW LONG WILL OUR DEAD BE PROMISCUOUSLY BURIED ?
In Yaphank there are over half a dozen burying plots. Some are family grounds, and some are moss-cov- ered remnants of a broken-down church. Here and there by the road-side, and in the deeper secludes, lay the sleep- ing dead.
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It'was an
ABSOLUTE REQUIREMENT,
when the cemetery movement began in Yaphank, and to the founders of the Association-although many declared it but a speculation-is due much praise for their thoughtful enterprise and consideration.
It was organized according to Statute in 1870. Six Trustees were elected, viz. : John Hammond, Alfred Ack- erly, Samuel Smith, John P. Mills, Sylvester Homan, and James I. Baker. Sylvester Homan was elected President. John P. Mills Treasurer, and James I. Baker Secretary.
They are so classified that two Trustees are elected every year. Four acres of land were purchased at a cost of about five hundred and fifty dollars. The object of the Associa- tion is to make a permanent burial-place, free from denom- ination or church ; also, that plots could be purchased and controlled, which is prohibited in church-yards.
A neat, substantial fence has been erected, and as the funds increase. the grounds are to be ornamented and mnade attractive.
Every person purchasing a lot becomes a member, and consequently enjoys a voice in its proceedings. No profits can accrue to any individual member, but be used in grad- ing, fencing, &c .. or be invested by the Association as per Revised Statute relating to Rural Cemeteries.
VII.
TEMPERANCE IN YAPHANK.
THE NOBLE CAUSE AND ITS SUSTAINERS-A BRIEF SKETCH.
THE NOBLE CAUSE AND ITS SUSTAINERS.
Early in the Fall of 1872, a movement was started by some enthusiastics to found an order in Y -.
The foes of the bottle besieged the philanthropy of our church supporters, and begged sympathy and assistance. The young indefatigables read the reports of the extent of the good work in neighboring villages, and soon became stirred into the preternatural longing to unfurl the same glorious pennant over this obscure home of-not decidedly unquestionable " spirits."
The pillars of the church were absolutely conservative. Its supporters, with bank accounts amounting to many thousands, were too poor (?) to experiment in nonsensical undertakings, and no sunbeams ever fell from that quarter. Everywhere rang the war cry of temperance. The warriors of "spiritual peace " were digging up the tomahawks of total abstinence, and were laying the corner-stones of sobri- ety in every hamlet and village around us ; but no "red war on red wine " was begun in Yaphank.
Were we to be ever exempt from the allurements of the fiery fiend ? Were our sons to go out into the world with the bad example of Christians as their "cloud of fire ?"
The rumsellers smiled upon us, and the habitual drunk- ard gave us the hand of reformation, but Christians refused us aid ! The men who humbled themselves in prayer, and whose hopes were beyond "the things of earth," stood
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aloof and smilingly predicted failure. Sneers and jeers echoed from lips wet with the " dews of Heaven," and tem- perance received an unwelcome greeting in the precincts of Christianity.
Our young people-God bless them-organized, and be- gan the slow, tedious march, unaided by mature minds. They added their link to the great fraternal chain, and be- gan drawing the fallen from the pits of drunken degrada- tion. They clasped hearts and hands of commiseration with other orders, and avowed themselves champions of a truly great cause.
The good ones guarded the contribution box to the in- terest of the "Missionary Fund," and cheerfully sent aid and healing balms to the far-off South Sea Islands.
Dear reader ! can it be that they paused to think of the broken homes, the broken hearts, and the broken ties rum was rearing up around them ? Can it be that they heard the cries of the innocent ones that were hurled into the cold, cold world to fight its battles alone ? Could they have heard the widows' lamentations and the orphans' cries that arose in their midst, when they poured out the "milk of human kindness" for untamed and unappreciating heathens in the far-off' Indies ? No, it cannot be ! It cannot be that these followers of the "only true and living" thus de- nounced the cause unworthy, and its sustainers unscrupu- lous, after earnest meditation !
It must have been a prejudice against moral improve- ment, or an hereditary inclination to sleep the sleep of tra- ditionary Rip Van Winkle, that caused their wicked oppo- sition ; for we don't find them among the Rumsellers' Union, or among the mass of bloated sots.
Temperance ! ah ! what has it done !
It has torn down old breweries and drinking hells, and unfurled the stainless flag over polluted sod ! It has made thousands of homes happy and peaceful, and gladdened thousands of broken hearts! It has dried the widow's tears and hushed the orphan's cries! It has hurled its
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shafts of conviction through tavern windows, and snatched that buyer and seller of human souls from behind his glit- tering vases of deadly poisons, penitent and reformed be- fore the world ! Temperance has done all this ! aye, more ! and yet the high and good worked detrimental to the cause !
Do they term it a Christian spirit? Do they believe God will uphold them ? No ! Temperance is a humane cause. The Bible tells them so, their each conscience tells them so, and their observation confirms it all.
Without it, America with her vaunted power and wealth, would follow imperial Rome and down-trodden Ireland, and the fate of every town would eventually be the fate of an- cient Babylon.
It was not my intention to give my readers a temperance lecture, when I began ; thus I will forbear ere I weary my patient reader with superfluous additions to an historical sketch of Division No. 73. The public is our jury, and you, dear reader, must officiate as your own judge. You can easily define the spirit that rules Yaphank, and as easily picture the obstacles that always obstruct our way to improvement.
But after much trouble, expecting aid where we only re- ceived jeers and opposition, it has steadily moved into the brilliant ranks of the noble army, and at last throws out a beacon-light to guide the "reeling" ships safe over the Bottle Rocks, with forty enthusiastic, hard-working mem- bers to defend against the taunts of the foe, and to keep ever brighter the Heaven-directing beacon.
A BRIEF SKETCH.
In March, 1873, the first officers were duly installed by E. H. Hopkins, Grand Scribe of Eastern Grand Division of New York, and P. G. W. P. William T. Parsons. The order was instituted in the main body of the Presbyterian Church, and from the 15th of that month temperance has been a bright reality in Yaphank.
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From March 15th, 1873, until April 1st, 1874, the meet- ings were held in the basement of the Presbyterian Church, when an unpleasantness arose between certain members of both societies, and the Division was compelled to vacate the bricked-up repository of goodness.
Until July 14th, 1874, the homes of members were abiding places, when, through the influence of the Worthy Patri- arch then elected. and the kindness of Doc. James I. Baker.
ommodious Baptist Church was secured as a hall. The church was moved to Comsewogne soon after, and the Divi- sion was again "adrift " The inhospitality of Yaphank is plainly apparent when it is obviously known that people don't only "leave the place," but take their houses too.
ROSWELL V. DAVIS.
This much-esteemed young man, who, by the way, is an untiring temperance man, has engraved his name and mem ory in his many indelible deeds of kindness, on the hearts of all who are fortunate enough to have made his acquaint- ance. "Tis the moral worth of a true man that endears Ros- well Davis to his friends, for he has no foes. May his sky never darken, may the flowers ever bloom in his pathway through life, and may he ever find friends in those he has befriended. God bless his efforts !
The following are the names of all the W. Ps. and R. Ss. who have officiated since the date of organization, March 15th, 1873 :
TERM. WORTHY PATRIARCHS. 1873. TERM. RECORDING SCRIBES. Ist .-- ALFRED REID, Jr. 1st .-- W. H. REID. 2d .- CHARLES W. TRAIN. 2d .- . .. 3d .- R. E. HAMMOND. 3d .- A. E. REID.
4th .- S. F. HOMAN. 4th .- ADDIE E. TRAIN.
No. Charter Members 11
No. Initiations 24
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TERM. WORTHY PATRIARCHS. 1874. TERM. RECORDING SCRIBES.
5th. - CHARLES W. TRAIN. 5th. - A. E. REID.
6th .- Doc. E. H. S. HOLDEN. 6th. -- " . . .
7th .- ROSWELL V. DAVIS. 7th .- " .
8th .- L. BEECHER HOMAN. 8th .-
No. Initiated. 14
No. Expelled 1
No. Withdrawn 3
No. Members 45
VIII. OUR RELIGIOUS HOMES.
THE CENTRES OF CHRISTIANITY IN YAPHANK-THEIR HIS- TORY, ETC.
What would the world be without its sanctuaries and Sabbath-schools? How long would our laws be enforced and decorum sustained, if it were not for God's temples that dot the land ? Men would trample each other down in the great struggle for wealth and position, and women would become crazy in the hot-beds of vanity and vice. fashion and frivolity. Christianity is the great barrier that keeps our lusts within control, and that curbs our wild passions for emoluments and glory.
Men and women love to have a place where they can as- semble together and exchange the whirl and excitements of the race for wealth and fame, for the nourishing and solid food that so stimulates the crazed mind and wearied body.
Six days of bustle and trade upon the streets and in the marts causes the reasonable minds to pause on the seventhi. and exclaim : "How hard would be the drudgery of life if it were not for the sweet rest and sweeter words God gives us on the Sabbath !"
How the tired man and jaded beast must love the peal- ing Sabbath bells ; and how sweet the voices of God's ser- vants must break upon the ear as they pour out the cheer- ing nectar, that the business world may sip and gather up strength for the six toilsome days that surely come.
Thus it is the sanctuary-where the bread of life is broken and where the burdened heart is relieved-that makes us respect the laws of the land, and causes us to turn our eyes
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from the fading things of life and toward the great inevit- able and Him who so wisely vouchsafed to man, a day and place to change and cheer his heart.
THE YAPHANK PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH.
The Presbyterian Church, at Yaphank, was erected in the year of our Lord 1851, by the Presbyterian Society of Yaphank.
Our people must have had an understanding of the sim- plicity of true religion when they modeled and erected their little temple of worship. As God came not in the whirl- wind, but in the still, small voice, why would He not meet and commune with them in their fifteen-hundred-dollar church, although no frescoed walls reflected his brilliancy ?
God has visited us ; notwithstanding our wickedness as a people ; although so many profess a Godly life, and fall far short of a Christian reformation, God has not forsaken us. For many years the prayers of our good people ascended up against the mighty. Revivals were sustained and en- joyed, and the good work went grandly forward. The times were becoming faster. Steam usurped dull-edged tools, and hovels were transformed into palatial mansions. Was it not natural, then, that our good people began to look upon their box-like house of worship with disgust, and to sigh for that conical connection necessary to all similar structures-a steeple ?
I am not aware that the towering spire looks down upon more sincere worshippers, or upon a more happy and Godly place. I do not believe the prayers are offered more fer- vently or more impressively because our good Samaritans erected a miniature Babel that points heavenward. But, I do believe that the aristocratic vanity of the Presbyterian Society was somewhat appeased when the first peal from the bell in the little tower rang o'er the wooded hills that surround our village, and the weather-cock first revolved to the four winds of Heaven.
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In 1851 the church was dedicated by the Rev. Ezra King and Winthrop Bayles ; and Winthrop Bayles then pre- sided over the church, and enrolled his name among
THE CLERGYMEN OF THE CHURCH
that have officiated since its erection. After Mr. Bayles' retirement eame Francis Drake. Mr. Drake was an ener- getic, whole-souled, working Christian, and unmurmur- ingly sacrificed his health and happiness in favor of ecclesi- astical progress.
Cruel was the abuse he suffered from the men that then were a terror to the whole Christian community. Long nights he sleeplessly passed in fear and anxiety, knowing not when the wild whoops of enemies would echo from the gloom. His nights were passed in dread, and his days were never happy after his foes began their persecutions. In his home they abused him. and upon the street they never ceased to annoy. His brow became furrowed with trouble, and his jokes were never as pointed after that or- deal of fear.
What had he done that he deserved the abuse ? What was the magnitude of his crime that his actions had stirred the ire of those that pursued him !
The blow to his nervous system was severe, and he never recovered. In the West he went to preach, and in the West he died. In the service of his Master he was stricken down, and in the cemetery at Sonthold, L. I., he calmly sleeps. No more will he tremble with fear, and no more will the taunts of foes break his slumbers. While the perse- cutors are still unsummoned, the flowers bloom o'er the grave of the martyred Drake-a true disciple while on earth. and a bright star in heaven.
CHARLES STURGES.
Charles Sturges was next called to expound the biblical consequences of sin, and to fill the place vacated by the la- mented Drake.
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FACTS AND FANCIES.
Different in habits, different in taste, and heterogeneous in preaching, was the slow, unenthusiastic Sturges from the restless, ambitious and eloquent Drake.
Mr. Sturges preached mechanically ; Mr. Drake preached inspiringly. Both were Christian men, and both labored to achieve the one grand object-the diffusing of true religion. One was impulsive, and sometimes indiscreet, and the other calculating and slow. One was allowed to groan in the toils of persecution, and the other to pray out his religious engagement upon a tranquil bosom.
Mr. Sturges came among us with a glowing record of well-doing as a missionary in the lands of religious dark- ness. He had entered the homes of bigoted idolatry, and in their primitive veneration of hewn gods, had touched and turned the poor heathen's heart. God nourished the seed he sowed, and Doc. Sturgis was welcomed to the can- nibal's home as an angel sent by the only true Great Spirit to soothe their spiritual woes, and force the scales from their eyes. With this bright recommendation as a minis- tering angel, he came to "our little church in the wild wood."
He remained until the mother church began an aggres- sive movement, and until the holy bonds that had long held the two together, were severed by mutual consent, when he sought pastures green and waters still up in the mountains of the Empire State ; and that old revivalist and veteran soldier of the cross,
CLARK LOCKWOOD,
brought us the "Balm from Gilead."
Mr. Lockwood is still as anxious, still as faithful, and more engaged in the field he has chosen, than ever before marked his success.
God also suffered this good man to pass through the fur- nace of slander, and, like his predecessor, Drake, to be the victim of a jealous intrigue.
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He is known all over the Island as a free-thinking, inde- pendent Christian, and far have his triumphs extended, and many a weary heart has he made glad.
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