It Happened Here--  Steuben:  the Man and the Markers 

                                                                         Part II, the Markers

                                                                                Fuller Rd,. cor. NY 274, Remsen

Many years ago the Association of Public Historians of New York State (APHNYS) published a county list of NewYork historical markers, composed mainly of the Department of Education sponsored markers from the 1930's.  Looking at the Oneida County list, one fact leaps from the page. There are a lot of markers with Steuben as the subject,  that direct the public to the Steuben's tomb and Memorial Park, or that claim their historical significance through their association to Steuben!  Though many of them disappeared over the years,  nearly identical signs, like the one above, directed visitors to the tomb and memorial park from roads all over the county -- 21 miles, 20 miles, 17 miles (2 signs),  4 miles,  2 1/2 miles,   2  miles, 1 1/2 miles, "Next Turn Right".  

                                                                        Starr Hill Rd. Co. Rte 57,Remsen

Rte 53, Fuller Rd., Remsen

                        Fuller Rd.,Remsen

About eighteen  more  NYSHM signs give information about Steuben's life or the creation of the memorial park.  We learn who he was; where he was buried; where he was re-buried; his monument; the "sacred grove";  the church who tended his grave;  the person who tended his grave; who created the park;  who dedicated the park; where his mill was; who settled farms on land bought from him; who was his friend and neighbor; who made barrels for him; the creek named by him and the town named for him. 

Important as Steuben was to  the American Revolution you have to wonder about the amount of attention lavished on this place where Steuben spent his retirement and was buried. Probably no European saint has had so much "official" signage dedicated to him, and the total effect is that you almost get the feeling that you are making some kind of religious pilgrimage.  Even the patriarchs of Mount Vernon, Monticello, Hyde Park, or the Hermitage don't get this sort of treatment around their homes/burial sites.  As usual, a little history gives us some insights

When Steuben died in 1793 he was buried wrapped in his military cloak, in a simple wooden coffin. in an unmarked grave, according to his wishes.  But when a road, being cut through in 1804 disturbed his grave, his former aide, Ben Walker had his body removed to another location on the Steuben Grant.  Twenty years later citizens of Oneida county placed a  marble stone inscribed "Steuben" over it.

Large numbers of Germans have always immigrated to America. From the first census of 1790 we can estimate several of the original states  had German populations of close to 10% and 1 out of three Pennsylvanians were of German origin!  The 1850s and 1880s saw huge influxes of Germans.  German language newspapers flourished and Germans were politically active.  In 1857 German-American societies and German language newspapers began a campaign to raise money for a tomb for the Baron. They pressured the Governor's office. In 1872 with New York State's help it was accomplished.

 World War I brought a storm of anti-German sentiment and propaganda. After the war,.the German-American community rebounded, forming or re-forming social clubs often naming them Steuben Clubs to honor the German general that personified the German immigrant  they believed contributed so much to America's freedom;  a man that personified the notion that a German born American could be an American Hero.  In 1919 the Steuben Society of America was formed to educate Americans on the patriotic contributions of German-Americans  and to encourage German Americans to take an active role in civic affairs.  In Chicago, home to a large German population, successful German-American businessmen in 1929 built the 45 story Steuben Club building as a club house for its 2500 members,  with retail space and office suites on the first 21 stories for rental.  Meeting, banquet,  exercise and recreational  rooms, and a pool were built  for club members on the upper floors.  The early 1930's would see German-American social prestige and political influence at a highpoint before the rise of Nazi-ism in Germany would divide the German-American  community  and once again German-Americans would be disgraced by events in Europe.

The Sesquicentennial of the American Revolution in 1926, like the Bicentennial fifty years after it, brought a flurry of interest in American history, encouraged  by the growth of the  Sons  of the American Revolution and the Daughters of the American Revolution.  The "Daughters" founded in 1919, after women were denied membership in the SAR became especially prominent.  Among other "patriotic" activities was a big effort to find and mark Revolutionary war veterans graves, and memorialize events of the revolution with bronze plaques on buildings and stone monuments.  Across New York State and up and down the east coast and beyond, scores (hundreds?) of places would see the installation  of these plaques with the distaff and spinning wheel logo of the DAR.  Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of the governor, herself, was a DAR member. [1

                                                                                          DAR Plaque, Rhinebeck

With German-Americans, the SAR and the DAR and wife, Eleanor behind it, Governor Franklin Delano Roosevelt was more than willing to attach his imprimatur to the project by dedicating the park in 1931.       (FDR, the consummate politician, was also eager to demonstrate that while handicapped by polio, he was not dis-abled so he made a conscious effort before and after his election as governor, to get out of Albany  into upstate New York,   to towns like Deposit, Port Jervis,  Hancock, Owego, Batavia, Dunkirk, Boonville, and Herkimer--towns that may had never seen a visit from a governor or governor-candidate.)

Six years after the  1926  sesquicentennial, in 1932 was the 200th birthday of George Washington.  In the middle of these two commemorations  was the bicentennial of Steuben's birth (1930).  As part of the 1926 celebration New York State issued the first NYSHMs.  The program was unexpectedly popular with public submissions for signs resulting in  59 signs erected in 1927, 31 in 1928 and 9 in 1929.   When attention turned to signage for the park a second program was underway.  For the Washington bicentennial a second release of NYSHMs was funded under the auspices of the New York Dept. of Education. In 1932 a whopping 624 markers were issued and groups supporting the park made liberal use of the program. [2]

[1] Eleanor Roosevelt very publicly renounced her membership in 1933 when the DAR invited, then     dis-invited famed Black mezzo-soprano Marion Anderson to sing at an event at their memorial hall when they realized members of the Black community sought to attend the event, of the (then)  all -White organization.

[2] see "A Marker was Erected".  New York State Historical Markers: It Happened Here.  March 21.2015. The numbers are derived from the photographic evidence derived from the sources quoted in my article. They do not include existing markers whose dates have been obliterated  when they were broken/repaired, or , of course, signs missing or destroyed.  The 27 "Steuben" signs of the APHNYS list are probably a more complete list of those created.   

Marker of the Week  Fortnight (!)  -- Hay Presses

                                                                                       Rt. 66, Ghent

The old expression, "to eat like a horse" is based on the truism that horses eat a LOT!  And their main feed is hay, and they require a substantial amount of hay- bedding to keep them clean and healthy.  When most horses lived on farms or in towns a few miles from farms this was not a significant problem that could not be solved with loose hay piled on hay wagons.  But as cities grew and thousands of horses in cites needed fodder and bedding an industrial solution was necessary.  Fortunately, hay is extremely compressible. By the 1850's many companies were  patenting  and selling hay presses. P.K. Dederick's Sons  of Albany was selling one in 1843. Most presses simply dropped a weight on a box of hay to compress it.  Then more hay was hay-forked into the box and compressed; and more added and compressed until a bale was formed.  Multiple strands of bailing twine (cord)  laid across the bottom of the box was brought up to tie  a compact bale of often 300 pounds. A rope, running through a pulley, connected to a windless, turned by a team of horses or oxen raised the weight. Heavy freight wagons could carry several  bales, and many more could be carried by locomotive flat cars.

Some Resources, beyond the usual Google suspects, I found useful in this last pair of posts:

--Burgess, Michael J.  Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt in Albany. Charleston, SC. 2023.

                                                           

   

 It Happened Here--  Steuben:  the Man and the Markers 

                                                          Part I, the Man

                

                                                   Reconstruction of Steuben's home, State Memorial Park, Remsen NY

Friedrich Wilhelm Steuben of Magdeburg, Prussia was born into the lower nobility of the Prussian Junker military class. Like his father before him, there was little doubt he would pursue the career of a military officer.  (All Prussian boys were required to enlist in the army, but for him it would be his profession.)  At age 16 he was enlisted as an officer candidate, learning the life of a common soldier, gradually working his way up over ten years as an ensign, lieutenant, captain.  As a garrison officer, as a field infantry officer

(he was wounded twice, in two horrific battles), as a staff officer at the company and battalion levels and as a staff intelligence officer Steuben received about the best practical education an officer could get in tactics, strategy and caring for and running of an 18th century army.  Steuben taught himself  mathematics and French--the language used by sophisticated  Europeans in general, and the European nobility specifically.  He was befriended by Prince Henry, King  Frederick the Great's brother  and would befriend Karl Peter Ulrich of Schleswig-Holstein Gottorp. [1] With the Russian Czarina Elizabeth's death, Karl Peter  suddenly became  Czar Peter III, Czar of Russia.  Because of his friendship with Karl Peter, Steuben  could report to his King the new Czar's intention to seek peace.  Steuben was on a fast track for promotion. King Frederick selected him as one of thirteen promising young officers to be schooled in strategy and high command to be taught by the king, himself!  

And then, abruptly, it was all over!  The candidate for high command was suddenly assigned a small garrison post on the frontier and soon after he was downsized out of the army. [2]  Steuben became a courtier in a small German principality of Hohenzoleren-Hechinggen, in effect managing the social calendar of the prince and managing the affairs of the household, while he scrambled to find to find a suitable military position in one of the other armies of Europe. Rebuffed in attempts to secure commissions in armies of Austria,  France, Britain and Baden he was near the end of his rope when he met an agent of Benjamin Franklin.  The American diplomats Franklin and Dean could offer him neither a promise of a commission in the American Army nor any money to travel to America. After initially rejecting the Americans non-offer Steuben returned to Baden only to realize how truly limited his options had become , He returned to Paris where he and the American diplomats padded his "resume" and with the help of a couple of French businessmen/diplomats/ military acquaintances secured for him a personal loan and cobbled together a small retinue of aides and interpreters.  Franklin and Dean  coached him on who he should get to know and what he should say to appeal to the Americans.  In a few weeks the impoverished, minor nobleman, a Prussian captain who once had come to attention of Frederick the Great was now a  "Lieutenant-General of the Prussian Army",  and "advisor to the great warrior king", professing a desire to aid the cause of Liberty and democratic-republican government; a man of "substance",  a man wealthy enough, though unemployed,  to travel with a retinue of servants and translators.  (To Congress, this suggested he could be hired cheaply!) 

In America, the Baron played his part superbly.  Gregarious, affable, down-to-earth yet courtly and refined,  he was adored by Boston society and likewise, he sailed through the scrutiny of Congress, in exile, now meeting inYork, Pennsylvania,  General Washington was a bit more reserved as he was just recovering from the "Conway Cabal," a conspiracy to throw Washington from office led by Thomas Conway and Horatio Gates.  (In York, Steuben had met and dined with Gates several times and they appeared to have "hit it off",)  Yet at the Continental Army's winter camp at Valley Forge Steuben worked his way into Washington's favor, by serving as an observer/critic of the Army's operations, sending Washington frank, astute, insightful reports/recommendations.  After Conway resigned the army, Washington was able to appoint Steuben Inspector General.  (Conway's plotters in Congress had previously gotten Conway appointed as Inspector General to enable him to build a case for Washington's dismissal.) 

 Steuben's most important task was to train Washington's Army to fight effectively as a modern 18th century army. It was not so difficult to train up a dozen or so men to form a compact line of battle; to load and fire their muskets in a tight devastating volley and to do it again, quickly!  (Once every fifteen seconds was the objective.) But it was more difficult  to train the same dozen or so men to  go from  a column along a line of march to form a line of battle or to advance or withdraw, or  advance or withdraw at a 45 degree angle or to wheel in a straight line around an end soldier to turn the line of battle 90 degrees.  And be ready and in position at all times to deliver the compact devastating  volley at a moment's command which could turn the tide of battle.  But of course, 18th century battles were not fought with squads of  a dozen soldiers, but  with regiments each with four to ten dozen men which needed to move as one, and brigades composed of several regiments.  To accomplish his training, Steuben trained a model regiment composed of the best leaders from each of the regiments and when they were trained sent them back to train their regiments, under Steuben and his aides watchful eyes. Then the General organized regular brigade and even army-wide maneuvers. Besides his training role, Steuben was 'Inspector' General, in charge of overseeing the daily operations of Valley Forge, a camp that had become the third largest city in America!  Though he could only recommend changes to Washington, the Commander rarely failed to act promptly on them. From the distribution of rations and supplies, to the placement and construction of redoubts and other defenses, to improvements of an important bridge into camp, to the relocation of latrines-(and enforced use of them), to standardization of regiment sizes, to the assessment of penalties for soldiers infractions Steuben's direct influence was felt. 

    Rt52, west of Rt 84  between Beacon and Fishkill  

In June British General Clinton decided to move his army from Philadelphia to New York. Washington had now enough confidence in his trained army to send them against a British main army in open battle.  They struck against the rear of Clinton's column at Monmouth Courthouse, NJ.  When  the British counter-attacked Washington's general commanding the operation, Charles Lee, lost his nerve, ordering a general retreat.  A furious Washington, with Steuben's help turned the retreat around driving the British from the field but the British were able to complete their withdrawal to New York.  Washington's army joined  General Heath's army north of the City and forming a wide arc into New Jersey with a main concentration of forces at Middlebrook and a winter encampment at Morristown. Though constantly on the move, as Inspector General, Steuben established quarters at the main supply and repair depot in Fishkill, New York.

Steuben had trained the Valley Forge Army but the army in the North and the Continental forces operating in the South had still not been trained and with the short term enlistments, new solders were arriving and old ones leaving constantly. Under Washington's authority he would write a drill manual and book of army regulations covering virtually every aspect of army life. Providing consistency and uniformity throughout the Army, it would be used, unrevised  until 1814.  Next he turned his attention to the problem of supply and accountability.  There was no system. The problems of loss, misallocation and graft were serious.  Soldiers whose enlistments had expired often took their government issued uniforms, muskets and ammunition home with them when they left the army, leaving nothing for their replacements!  Steuben required all officers to maintain account books detailing when, where and from whom they had received supplies and when where and to whom they were issued. And even individual soldiers were required to keep records of when supplies/equipment was acquired and used/ disposed of.

In the months that followed, while Steuben still ran the inspector general's office, and acted as Washington's personal representative for crucial issues before Congress, the Commander-in-chief  several times appointed Steuben as a divisional commander  for an upcoming operation or to head an advance guard, so respected and trusted was he that Washington  no longer worried that his other generals might feel slighted by the assignment of this foreign officer. Following the surrender of Lincoln's army at Charleston and the disastrous defeat of Horatio Gates at the battle of Camden in South Carolina, Washington sent Nathanial Greene to try to rebuild the southern army. He sent Steuben as his second in command.  While Greene mobilized the remnants of the shattered southern army to wage guerrilla  war on the British Cornwallis, leading him on an exhausting chase throughout the Carolinas, gradually degrading his forces, the Baron in Virginia, focused on recruiting, training  and suppling new soldiers for Greene's army.  It was frustrating work for the Virginia legislature, short-sidedly continued to maintain small poorly trained, poorly equipped militias hoping these would be enough to turn away British attacks on their doorstep and did little  to supported Steuben's effort to build the Continental army to defeat the British.  Several times large British raids penetrated deep into Virginia, sweeping aside militia attempts to stop them.  One result was that Steuben's Virginia supply depot and equipment shops were burned.  Suddenly, fortune turned in favor of the Americans. Cornwallis, partly to escape Greene's troublesome attacks plunged into Virginia and established himself the port city of Yorktown, to rest and refit his army.  But then a large French fleet defeated a smaller British fleet and temporarily seized control of Chesapeake Bay.  Meanwhile the French expeditionary force, landed at Providence, Rhode Island met up with  Washington's Continentals on the Hudson and the two armies raced to Virginia to turn Cornwallis' temporary haven into a steel trap.  As the armies marched, Washington gave Steuben command of one of his three divisions.  After a few days, and some serious cannonading by the French and Americans, Cornwallis surrendered his 7000 man army.

                              Rt.9D Beacon

Following Cornwallis' surrender,  Washington's army returned to its lines on the Hudson to continue a watchful eye on the British Army occupying New York. Across the river from the main cantonment  near Newburgh, Steuben set up his headquarters in Beacon.  From there he continued his work as Inspector General and  consulted with Washington on his recommendations to Congress for a peacetime army. (Both envisioned a small professional army to maintain posts on the frontier and larger professionally trained state militias that could be activated for emergencies.)

As peace loomed Steuben worked to form a fraternity of Revolutionary War officers, the Society of Cincinnati [3] but came under criticism for advocating that sons of members could become members, as the public rejected any notion of an organization that might result in a new class of nobility. 

After the war's end both Pennsylvania and NewYork granted Steuben citizenship.  Worn out by long years of arduous service Steuben retired, living in New York where he could petition Congress for compensation for his past services that had been vaguely promised him. His supporters encouraged him to ask for awards of from $8000 to $45000. Finally, he received $2000.  The General leased a large house for entertaining, spending extravagantly on renovations but had to let it go as he continued to live beyond his means. In 1786 he became president of the German Society a support  organization for German immigrants, a post he held to his death in 1794.  New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and New York all gave him grants of undeveloped land.  The Baron sold off his New Jersey and Pennsylvania properties but moved to his 16,000 acre tract north of the Mohawk River to become  a tenant farm landowner.  Intending to build a large estate in the future, Steuben built a several room log cabin until his finances improved.  But with land  so cheap and accessible following the revolution, most tenants did not stay long and others bought their farms from him.  Steuben's enterprise did not prosper.  

      Rt. 20, Duanesburg, cor. of Duanesburg Churches Rd.

Two of the Baron's most trusted aides, Benjamin Walker and William "Billy" North regularly stayed with him, assisting him through much of his retirement. Steuben expressed great affection for his "kids" though both left his regular service to pursue careers and have families.  He formally  adopted both, leaving most of his property and assets to them.  A  new secretary/companion  John Mulligan  would be with him when the Baron died in 1794.

Benjamin Walker has a NYSHM near his grave in the Forest Hills Cemetery in Utica.

[1]  Prince Henry was widely recognized as a homosexual.  Czar Peter III was "polyamorous" and had a strained relationship with his Czarina Catherine.  After a reign of only 186 days he would be overthrown by plotters led by her.  She would reign as "Catherine the Great" and he would die mysteriously with the cause reported by the royal court as "hemorrhoids".

[2]In the hot bed of court intrigue, rumors including allegations of pederasty swirled about the name Steuben.  His chances for advancement on the continent rapidly dimmed.  The Baron never denied his homosexuality, but not pedophilia.  He lived discretely, never marrying and developing close emotional (paternalistic? romantic?) friendships  to several younger adjutants and aides throughout his life.

[3] Cincinnatus was a roman farmer/soldier who when Rome was under attack accept the position of Commander/dictator. then surrendered the position once the emergency was over, returning voluntarily to his farm.

   Next Time--   Steuben: Part II, the Markers ( or, as  important as Steuben was to the American Revolution,Why were there at least eight New York State Historical  Markers directing motorists to his home in retirement and at least eighteen more detailing his life in retirement,  his gravesite and his tomb!?)                                                                                                             

 

                     It Happened Here--Knifetown, N.Y., U.S.A

In the United States many towns and cities got their identities from the predominate products manufactured in them.  In New York State there are many examples of this.  Schenectady became the "electric city" because of the electrical generation and distribution equipment, not to mention early electrical appliances manufactured there. For Corning it was glass; For Glens Falls it was paper;  For Amsterdam it was carpets;  For Gloversville, well....    (Cooperstown doesn't fit--It was founded by William Cooper and had no special connection to barrel production.)

In Orange County, New York,  little Walden became known as "Knifetown".  Walden began as so many other towns in the Northeast began, as a textile mill town with its founder,  Jacob T. Walden being attracted to the area by power of the Wallkill river as it surged through the Wallkill gorge.  By the early 1820's Walden had dammed the Wallkill and several woolen and cotton mills were in business.  But, by the end of the 1840's the mills were struggling and closing.  Leaders in the community, however, had heard of a group of cutlers, originally from Sheffield England, who were dissatisfied with their situation  in Mattaewan, (Beacon) New York and looking to relocate.  The skilled knife makers had been recruited with the promise of higher wages to form the core of the workforce of the Waterville (Connecticut) Knife Factory but when told they would have to buy/maintain their own tools sixteen of them revolted, each chipping in $200 of their own money and moving to Mattaewan to form the New York Cooperative Knife Company in 1852.  The Walden community leaders were able to offer them a modern factory with ample water power to run belts and pulleys to power saws, turn grinders and polishers, operate trip hammers and lathes--turning what for centuries had been a handicraft operation into a machine shop business. To seal the deal, the leaders, themselves, offered to transport the business across the Hudson  to Walden in1856.  

                                                                               34 North Montgomery St., Walden

                                                                                                                                         W. Main  St. cor. Orchard, Walden

The business thrived. After a few years, in order to meet demand and expand, the partners decided to turn the company into a joint stock company.  New York Knife Company became the major cutler for the Union Army, making forks as well as table knives. Their pocket knife/jack knife business burgeoned.  In the 19th century, every man (not just craftsmen, tradesmen, and farmers) carried a pocket knife.  Even middle class businessmen, merchants, lawyers, teachers carried pocket knives.  It probably started when quill pens needed to be routinely trimmed to write legibly, before they were replaced by steel pens; and  continued as fingernails needed to be trimmed, packages and letters opened, pencils sharpened and     twisted cigar ends cut off so they could be smoked.  Starting in 1911 New York Knife became the official supplier of scout knives for the Boy Scouts of America, a contract they held for over a decade. [1]   At the peak of their production  by 1900  they occupied twenty eight buildings, employed 400 people and produced  1 1/2 million   knives in a year.  One of their buildings, built up from the Wallkill gorge was seven floors tall, and had its main entrance at street level, on the seventh floor!

                                 Oak St. at the Bridge, Walden

The Walden Knife Company was said to  have been initiated by a dispute over a baseball game!  For several years knife-makers at New York Knife held baseball games between workers from different floors during lunchtime.  At one game, an argument between players turned into a general row.  The new plant manager, Thomas Bradley Jr. stepped in to breakup the fight declaring anyone playing baseball henceforth at lunch would be fired!  Several workers walked off the job, declaring they would start their own company.  Beneath the surface of the dispute, of course, were underlying strains. Bradley was trying to turn a machine assisted craft business into an assembly plant where lower skilled workers , responsible for only one or two operations,  worked together to assemble  a completed product, employing more complex machines to take over more of the production.  In 1874 the  Walden Cooperative Knife Company would open, a short distance from New York Knife. 

                                                                                                                E. Main St.  Walden

                                               

In 1892 George Shrade patented a pocket knife, the blade of which could be conveniently opened with one hand by pressing a button. Shrade went to the New York Knife Company to manufacture his knives (known today as the somewhat infamous "switch blade") before making improvements to its mechanism,  and striking out on his own in 1904, in Walden

                                                                                   

                                                                    

                       Orange Ave, cor, Main St., Walden

                                                                                                     

The growth of the American market for pocket knives attracted the attention of European manufactures who began to make serious inroads in the American market.  Thomas Bradley, Jr., a Congressman at the time and friend of President McKinley convinced him to include protections from imported knives in the 1897 Dingley Tariff Act.  The people of Walden erected a statue of McKinley in 1924 with money donated by Bradley. 

 By 1913, 19% of Walden's entire population worked in one of Walden's knife factories.

World War I saw a further increase in sales but after the war,  sales slumped as Winchester and Remington Arms entered the cutlery business in desperate attempts to augment their declining ammunition sales.  Walden Knife closed in 1926. The stock market crash in 1929 followed by the Depression, led to New York Knife's closure in 1931 

Shrade Cutlery managed to hang on until it moved to Ellenville in 1952. [2]

Marker of the Week  Fortnight (!)  --William Floyd ?

William Floyd, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris, John Hart, Abraham Clark, John Morton, George Clymer, William Paca, Thomas M'kean, Jason Smith, George Taylor, George Ross, Thomas Stone, Josiah Bartlett, Mathew Thornton, Thomas Nelson,Jr., George Wythe, William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn, Thomas Heyward, Thomas Lynch, Jr.,  Arthur Middleton, Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton.   These are exactly half of the people who signed one of America's most important documents.  Can you guess which one?  Let me give you some additional names to jog your  memory.

      John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson.

Oh! That Document!  As we celebrate another Independence Day and remember our Founding Fathers and the genius of our democracy, that was given its philosophical rationale in the Declaration of Independence, and its structure  in the U.S. Constitution, perhaps, we should pause to remember the common politicians;  the men who put aside  their generally successful personal and business lives to come together to represent the hopes and prejudices, grievances, shared fears and aspirations of their communities and their sections of their states, to provide  input and the momentum for the  documents that would become the frameworks of our Democracy.  (In the stories we tell ourselves about our military history we have done a pretty good job of upholding the stories of our common soldiers, perhaps we should do the same for our common politicians-qua-public servants!)

NYS Rte 64, Floyd, Oneida County

William Floyd had a prosperous farm he ran in Brookhaven, later established as Mastic on Long Island. He abandoned a formal classical education to take on a practical education when his father died at an early age and he had to manage the extensive farm. Socially and politically Floyd was tied more closely to his Yankee friends and relatives across Long Island Sound, in Connecticut  than to the more loyalist leaning inhabitants of New York City.  He served three times as a trustee of the Town before being elected to the Provincial Council and then in 1774 to the first Continental Congress.  With the rest of the New York delegation he refused to sign the first draft of the Declaration of Independence until he heard the sentiments of his constituents, signing the final document.  Soon afterwards,  Washington and army were forced from New York.  Floyd and his family sought refuge  with relatives in Middletown, Ct., his farm taken over by a regiment of British cavalry. During the war,  Floyd was given the rank of Major General of New York Militia but served in administrative posts seeing that local militias were properly provisioned, and coordinated with the Continental Army while also serving as a delegate in the Continental Congress.. Seven years later Floyd returned to his house and farm, finding both in ruins.  In 1794 he bought a large tract of land outside of Rome, New York and built a house closely resembling his house in Mastic.  A colleague once described Floyd as "one of the good men who never quit their chairs ", in other words, not a speech-maker, not a public orator but one through private conversations made their  positions known, representing their constituents and doing the hard work of democracy.   

 

[1]  The Scout knife was a part of the Boy Scout official uniform, not carried in a pocket but hung prominently via a snap hook from the belt of the uniform, earned after showing proficiency in its proper care and safe use. (Boys might carry toys, but a (young) man carried  tools. --a minor but meaningful symbolic step on the path to manhood.

[2] In this article I have not tried to document all the mergers and changes in ownership of these companies, only to mention a few of the developments and some interesting (I hope) facts about them.

--Beside the usual "Internet Suspects" rounded up I found these particularly informative: the summary and analysis sections of  Joseph Sepko. New York Knife Company , Cultural Resources Site Examination of New York State Museum Site 10935 .  2002

--Fred W. Pyne Descendants of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence,. " William Floyd"

  dsd1776.com/signer/swilliam-floyd/

              It Happened Here- "Giants in the Earth"

As the eighteen century turned into the nineteenth century the opening of the vast North American continent spawned interest  in the great number of species discovered and yet-to-be discovered.  American naturalists such as John and William Bartrand  (botanists) and John James Audubon (naturalist /ornithologist) began their explorations, categorizing and recording their discoveries through drawings, paintings and collections.  Charles Wilson Peale was a successful portrait artist who painted the portraits of many early American leaders, including Washington, Franklin, Jefferson and Hamilton, and many Continental Army officers.  He also became a proficient self taught taxidermist who built an extensive collection of American animals.  These became the core of his " Philadelphia Museum" along with other natural science specimens he had acquired in his travels.  

At the same time, interest in the natural sciences was burgeoning in Europe. French author and naturalist Georges-Louis Leclerc Comte de Buffon wrote a massive compendium of natural history that ran to  thirty six  volumes with another fourteen volumes contemplated.  In the ninth volume he put forth a theory that the animals and people of the new world were smaller and inferior to the animals and people of the old world (Europe/Africa/Asia) because of the  Americas "colder, wetter climate" and it would/could not be otherwise.  One American who took exception to this was Thomas Jefferson.  Jefferson corresponded with Buffon,  directing James Madison to measure an American  weasel to compare it with its European counterpart  and even going to the extraordinary lengths of sending Buffon a stuffed Vermont bull moose! Jefferson was also aware of the of the exceptionally  large bones coming out of the Kentucky "Big Bone Salt Lick" (see NYSHMs: It Happened Here "Marker for a Mastodon"  Feb. 11, 2014.)  (He had several samples in his house, Monticello)  Since the notion of species extinction had not been widely circulated he would undoubtedly advised Lewis and Clark to keep an eye out for these critters on their expedition of discovery in the Louisiana Purchase.

Much closer to home,  Jefferson heard about farmers uncovering large bones in  swamps near Newburgh, NY.  John Masten, the farmer who owned one of three swamps  had accumulated a large number of the bones that he kept in  his granary and let  curious people in to see them, for a fee.  Jefferson sent  Masten an offer to buy them but it was declined.  When Charles Wilson Peale heard about the bones, Jefferson encouraged him to pursue their purchase .  Peale was able to succeed where Jefferson failed, going to the Montgomery farmer, offering him $200,  (about $4000, today), gowns for his wife and daughters and a double barrel shotgun for his son,  for the farmer's bone collection.  Another $100 secured the rights to excavate the swamp for any bones that might be found.

                                                                             At the Barber Site, Rte 17k, Montgomery, across from school

In the spring of 1801 Peale set out for New York's Orange Co. with a $500 dollar loan from the American Philological Society, a couple bilge pumps from the U.S. Navy and some U.S. Army tents (probably courtesy of President Jefferson's influence) to hire local workers in what has been called the first U.S.  scientific expedition. Encountering a flooded site (to the depth of 12 feet!) he devised an ingenious device. A continuous chain [1] with buckets attached would run down into the flooded sump to carry water up above the edge of the excavation where they would empty their contents  into a sluice-way that  would drain the water off, away from the site.  The series of buckets was connected to/powered by a belt /rope connected to a large wheel in the center of which was a treadmill where a crew of three workers walking , would turn the wheel, powering the belt of buckets. 

   A Swampy pond, Behind Marker, Probably the excavation site

 Remarkably efficient,  the invention, Peale calculated, could evacuate 1440 gallons per hour, and it was such a novelty he discovered farm boys were lining up to work the curious device--walk the treadmill, for free!  Between 1806 and 1808 Peale would paint a picture, The  Exhumation of the Mastodon  that clearly illustrates his invention.  In the months that followed, Peale was able to excavate marl swamps at the Barber and Millspaw farms as well as the Masten property and recover enough bones to recreate two mastodon skeletons.  His son Rembrandt Peale and servant (slave), Moses Williams assembled the skeletons, recreating missing bones carved from wood and part  of a cranium  and tusks from  paper-mache. 

The skeletons created a sensation.  Building a separate room in his museum and charging a 50 cent surcharge, Peale quickly recouped his debts and expenses from the expedition. His museum helped precipitate a wave of  enthusiasm both for legitimate museums of natural science and history, and public (pay to view) exhibits of freaks and oddities of dubious authenticity.  Undoubtedly, proud of his acquisition, he would paint two self portraits. In one he shares his portrait with a giant bone from one of his mastodons; in the other he dramatically lifts a curtain to reveal his museum with a mastodon standing behind his artist's pallet. 

 Over the years the museum would  move several times and have its ups and downs.  At one point it  would occupy the former Pennsylvania State House Building, "Independence Hall." In 1849 Peale's children would break up and sell the collection to pay off accumulated debts.    One of the mastodons was dismantled with parts of it ending up in many hands.  P.T. Barnum bought many of the exhibits.  It was thought the other mastodon was destroyed when Barnum's American Museum in New York burned  in one of two  fires in 1864 or 1865.  However, in recent years it was discovered that Peale's children had taken the surviving intact mastodon to Europe in hopes of finding a buyer.  There it had languished in storage for years until  German naturalist Johann Jakob Kaup bought it for  the Grand Ducal Museum of Hesse  purchasing it at a bargain price.  During World War II the museum in which it was housed in  Darmstadt  was extensively damaged in the bombing raids but the mastodon survived with only its paper-mache tusks having been destroyed. In 2020 it would return to the United States for a visit as part a of Smithsonian sponsored exhibit.

                                                                             ******

While  broadly, the Enlightenment, and more specifically interest in the natural sciences had created interest in finding the first "giants in the earth" in New York State, our second "giant in the earth" was "discovered" as the result of interest in--or more accurately-- opposition to, another social-cultural movement, the "Second Great Awakening"some six decades later.   George Hull was a cigar-maker and businessman, born in Connecticut's tobacco-leaf growing region, but raised in central New York in an area which, because of the intensity of religious fervor being generated there became known as the "burned over district".  Growing up, George had worked for a couple preachers doing work for them on their farms.  Both experiences had left him feeling exploited and cheated, and though he had been brought up reading the bible and could quote quite  extensively from it, he became disinclined toward religiosity.  As an adult, his cigar business suffered from inattention as he pursued various get rich quick schemes while unpaid debts and unpaid taxes mounted. Seeking to escape his debts, he moved his family to Wisconsin after setting his home and business on fire to collect the fire insurance [2].  There he reestablished his cigar manufacturing business, employing others to sell his cigars. When one of his salesman, an in-law working in Iowa began having financial difficulties, Hull visited him to help him straighten out his business affairs (and get payment for his most recent consignment of cigars.) While staying at the salesman's home Hull was joined by a traveling revival preacher, the family had invited to stay with them , while he was holding tent-revival meetings in their town. Over several days, Hull and the preacher  had extensive conversations.  The preacher believed in the literalness and inerrancy of the Bible--positions which infuriated Hull.

One of the biblical passages Hull and the preacher debated was Genesis 6:4. "There were giants in the earth those days..."  A few days after their conversations, Hull began to formulate a scheme. If he could "create " a giant, bury it somewhere to have it "discovered," then he could create a sensation with biblical literalists and lead them to declare they had found proof of the bible's veracity.  Then,  after he had created a suitable hullaballoo he could reveal the hoax, embarrassing the religionists that had used the giant as a proof of the bible's truth.  Additionally, he expected to make a large amount of money by charging admission for people to see the giant, and even after the hoax had been revealed, charge people again who still wanted to see the hoax to see if they, themselves, would have been fooled . (This, of course, was something P.T. Barnum had been doing with great success.)

To finance his scheme, Hull burned down his heavily insured cigar factory for its fire insurance  and moved to Iowa where he obtained a large block of  native gypsum and partnered with a Chicago marble dealer and a couple of stone carvers to create a 10 foot recumbent  naked figure modeled  after Hull himself!  He had it shipped by railroad in a box labelled "farm machinery" to Binghamton.   Re-boxed  in a sturdy iron-bound crate, Hull's Giant  was transported by Hull and several accomplices by night in a heavy army wagon to the Cardiff, New York farm of "Stub" Newell, a distant relative.  There it was buried, tucked under the root of a long dead tree to make it appear as if it had been in the earth a long time. 

                                                                         

                                                                             U.S.Rte. 20 by Bailey Rd., Cardiff

 After nearly three years Hull contacted Newell to tell him it was time to dig a new well on his property.  "Stub" directed the well diggers to the spot he had chosen and guess what they found!  News of the discovery exploded! Within 24 hours hundreds of people from farms all around the area had visited the site.  Newell rushed to buy a large tent and hire family and neighbors to take money and control the crowds. Within a week thousands would visit and secondary businesses began to appear as farmers wives showed up along the roads to sell pies and sandwiches to visitors and farmers abandoned their fields to shuttle the curious in their farm wagons from Syracuse to Cardiff and back for sizable fees, or,  to and from Tully and Lafayette, nearby towns serviced by the railroad. Within a few weeks omnibuses were making scheduled runs from Syracuse, hot meals could be obtained along the roads entering Cardiff and slabwood-board "taverns" were offering adult refreshment for the thirsty.

Debates began immediately.  Was the giant a  "petrification" or an ancient statue from a long lost, (apparently) caucasian civilization? [3]. Early visitors to the site, state geologist James Hall, Jr. and John Boynton, a scientific lecturer with  experience in paleontology doubted that it was a natural phenomenon citing lack of case evidence that soft tissue could petrify and lack  of stratigraphy in the area consistent with the gypsum giant.  On the other hand, antiquarians, the forerunners of archeologists, were at a lost to connect the giant to any known culture or connect its sculptor to any group of people.  A hypothesis that Jesuits might have sculpted it to impress their Indian converts  simply didn't merit any credibility.   For his part, George Hull was disappointed that the multitudes of biblical literalists were not rushing forth to proclaim that here was proof of the factuality of the Old Testament's stories. 

Hull could only sit back and watch the money roll in, while, operating behind the scenes, he negotiated through Stubs Newell the sale of the Giant. Eventually one of several competing syndicates of investors won out, buying a 3/4 share of the Giant for $40,000 (over $1million, today) [4]  and exhibiting it in Syracuse and Albany. Rumors of the deal caught the attention of P.T. Barnum whose offers to buy it from them were rebuffed. Undeterred, Barnum sought to have his own  Cardiff Giant.  He arranged to buy a copy, advertising it as the real Giant, introducing it to New York City via a spectacular parade up Broadway to Wood's Museum, the successor to Barnum's American Museum, destroyed a few years earlier. (Eventually the fake petrified giant, that inspired this fake-fake would inspire perhaps as many as a dozen other fakes to be displayed in ever smaller venues in traveling circus sideshows, carnivals, and county fair midways across the U.S. for decades to come.)

George Hull was "spot on" in his anticipation of the high levels of curiosity his Giant would create (not to mention its profitability) but he over-estimated the impact it would have on religious discussion and debate.  The fact was, by the end of the 1860's, the "Second Great  Awakening"in New York  had mostly run its course.  All those people susceptible to calls for personal salvation had pretty much sought it out;  the Millerites who predicted a date for the resurrection of Christ, had seen the date come and go with no apparent resurrection; the Mormons had largely left the state, taking their revolutionary ideas with them. What was mainly left was fatigue and skepticism.  In the absence of any compelling narrative as to what the giant was, or how it got there, skepticism grew about the giant, as well.  What else could it be but a Hoax!  Rumors and stories containing circumstantial evidence of a flim-flam began to circulate.  Who was this mysterious George Hull who was seen several years before and now was back again?  Why did Newell suddenly decide he needed a second well when he only had a couple cows and a few other farm animals, when he had a perfectly good well and why did he direct the well diggers to dig to the depth of 4 feet, exactly the depth of the giant?  Despite Hull's secrecy, people had observed Hull transporting his mysterious cargo in the iron-bound crate. These and  other stories came to light.  At first Hull ridiculed the stories circulating. Hull protested that he was an honest tobacconist who was expanding his business by selling tobacco growing farm machinery to his farmer-suppliers.  But then following the sale of the Giant  to the syndicate investors,  local bank employees reported Stub Newell had transferred $ 9.400  to George Hull,  After that it was only a matter of time before the story all came out, including confessions by the sculptors.

Though discredited, the Giant continued to make money for a series of owners, though with decreasing popularity.  Finally, after a disappointing showing at the 1901 Pan American Exposition in Buffalo, the Giant was retired to a barn in Fitchburg, Massachusetts.  In the twentieth century the Giant came in and out of retirement a couple of times for exhibition in state fairs before suffering the indignity of serving as a kind of oversized coffee table at the home of an eccentric newspaper publisher. It was bought by the Farmers' Museum in Cooperstown (now known  as The Fenimore Farm and Country Village)  in 1948,  where it continues to be exhibited.

                                                   Marker at the Fenimore Farm,  Rte 80, Cooperstown

[1] The chain pictured in Peale's painting appears akin to a colonial surveyor's chain with extended links.

[2] Hull led a life filled with petty crime, shady business deals, tax evasions and various grifts. In one of his earliest grifts , he partnered with a co-conspirator who would sell hotel patrons marked playing cards.  Then Hull would arrive in a day or so to engage the patrons in  "friendly" games of poker and use the patron's own marked cards they had bought to clean them out of cash.  Arson, however, was probably his most serious crime.

[3] Remember, Hull had modeled the stone figure after himself.  Local Onondaga Native Americans, who were among the first to view it had a rich tradition of legends and folklore that included giants but when they saw it, they concluded it was "no Indian" and pretty much lost interest in the debate.

[4] Different sources cite different amounts.

--articles on Charles Wilson Peale's Mastodon abound on the web.  Two that I found especially helpful are--- Sellers .Charles Coleman. Unearthing the Mastodon.  American Heritage. Aug/Sept. 1979,  vol.30  Issue 5.   and   Sues, Hans-Dieter.  The Story of Charles Wilson Peale's Massive Mastodon.  Smithsonian Magazine.  May 6,  2020.

--again, articles abound on the Cardiff Giant but a short book A Colossal  Hoax by Scott Tribble, 2009 is exhaustively researched and most thorough.

Marker of the Week  Fortnight (!) --Winifred gets her                                                                              Marker

On July 22, 2013 I wrote a blog (still available on the web) about Winifred Goldring the first women to head a major governmental paleontology department in the world.  In addition to a forty year career marked by many significant scientific discoveries in her field she fought a long and difficult battle against gender discrimination, battling not only for fair compensation but for an equal opportunity to "do good science". I regretted at the time of the piece that although during the George Pataki administration in 1998  a commission had been created to honor pioneering women through a series of historic markers, she was not among those chosen.

This past weekend this was rectified when the New Scotland Town Historical Society, the Pomeroy Foundation and the N.Y.S.Parks and Recreation Department erected a sign at the Thatcher Park Visitors Center, Rte 157, Voorheesville.