CENTRAL / WESTERN NEW YORK TIMELINE / 1815

Jan 1

Dr. William Kirkpatrick, superintendent of the Onondaga Salt works at Salina, reports 1814 revenue of $8,976.45 on 295,215 bushels of salt. Other revenues amount to $940.00.

Mar 3

Catatunk Dock Navigation Company is organized, capitalized at $70,000, to improve Catatunk Creek from its mouth, at Owego Creek (shortly before the latter empties into the Susquehanna River near Owego) to its northwest branch. The work is never done.

Mar 23

Rochester Theological Seminary professor Ezekial Gilman Robinson is born in Attleborough, Massachusetts.

Mar 31

The Seneca & Susquehanna Lock Navigation Company is organized, capitalized at $300,000, to connect Seneca Lake to the Chemung River, near Elmira. The work’s never done.

Apr 11

The Ontario County town of Honeoye changes its name to Richmond. ** The town of Porter holds its first recorded town meeting.

Apr 18

The village of Auburn is incorporated.

Apr 20

The Cayuga and Seneca Canal Company is chartered, to connect Montezuma and Seneca Lake.

Jul 4

Jonathan Ingersoll begins publishing the first newspaper in Tompkins County, the Seneca Republican, in Ithaca.

Jul 26

Elizabeth Wadsworth is born in Geneseo to James and Naomi Wolcott Wadsworth.

Aug 10                       

The approximate date Ganiodaio (Handsome Lake), Seneca half-brother of  Cornplanter, on the Onondaga Reservation near Syracuse, New York, at about the age of 80 (exact birth date unknown).

September

Ship owner Jacob Townsend and his son Sheldon C. Townsend sail from Oswego, late in the month, to Niagara, aboard the schooner Genesee Packet, commanded by Captain Obed Mayo.

Sep 12

New York State purchases Grand Island and other small islands in the Niagara River from the Seneca Indians for $1000.

Oct 6

The Genesee Packet arrives at Niagara.

Nov 12

Suffragette Elizabeth Cady Stanton is born in Jamestown.

December

Rochester carriage manufacturer James Cunningham is born in County Down, Ireland.

Dec 15

Rochesterville's first census is taken; the population has reached 331.

State

The price for Genesee River wheat reaches $15 a barrel. ** The approximate date Samuel De Veaux opens a store in Le Roy, that will one day become the Wiss House Hotel. ** Historian-physician Dr. William Seaver becomes the first physician in Darien. ** Businessman Nathaniel Rochester moves from Dansville to East Bloomfield. ** The approximate date the shipbuilding firms of Townsend, Bronson & Co. and Porter & Barton merge to form Silas Thompson & Co. at Black Rock. Thompson moves there. His firm will build the Michigan and Red Jacket and become part owners of the Erie. ** New York City mayor De Witt Clinton presents the state legislature with a “memorial” pressing for a trans-state canal, predicts it will make his city a world commercial leader. ** Ira Chubb begins building a farm in the Yates County Town of Barrington. ** The first church in the Oswego County town of Hannibal is organized by the Baptists. ** The house of Dr. Ives, a dentist, on the East Seneca Turnpike, east of Jamesville, begun in 1812, is completed. ** 98,905 men are currently enrolled in the state militia. ** Over the next three years 80 religious revivals take place in central and western New York. ** The state levies a two-mill tax on real and personal property of every town. ** Catharine Beddoe, wife of Keuka Lake landowner John Beddoe, dies at the age of 35. ** Bluff Point in the fork of Keuka Lake, part of the Steuben County town of Wayne, is transferred to the Ontario County town of Jerusalem (later part of Yates County). ** Master Commandant Melancthon T. Woolsey purchases the brig Oneida for the U. S. Navy. It will be used to transport troops between Oswego and Sackets Harbor. ** Phineas Staunton, released from a Canadian jail after being wounded and captured on the Niagara frontier during the war, returns to his home in Middlebury (now Wyoming). ** Elisha Williams settles Waterloo. ** The approximate date the Seneca Lock Navigation Company constructs an artificial cut at the Seneca Lake outlet. ** Albion now has a post office and school. ** The approximate date blacksmith Leonard Stoneburner buys 22 acres in the future Corbett’s Glen area of Brighton and turns to growing vegetables. ** Engineer James LeRay du Chaumont has a stone house built in Cape Vincent – the first such in the settlement – for his family. ** The State Board of Agriculture is formed. ** The landing at Tryon on the south end of Irondequoit Bay falls into disuse by sailing vessels due to the buildup of weeds.

Batavia

The Holland Land Company builds a limestone fire-proof land office building. It will become the Holland Land Office Museum. Total cost for the building and a retaining wall behind the building for the Tonawanda Creek - $8,593. ** Trumbull Cary is appointed postmaster, taking over the position held by his brother Ebenezer. ** The village takes over the entire building that had housed the courthouse and a tavern. ** Hinman Holden builds a three-story frame inn in the Town of Batavia.

Buffalo

The city is rebuilt. ** The Buffalo Baptist Association is organized, with 21 churches and 2,512 parishioners. ** George Coit has a Federal-style house built, on Virginia Street. ** Former Connecticut medical student Albert H. Tracy begins practicing law in Buffalo.

Pittsford

The first newspaper in the Monroe County area is published here. ** The approximate date Vermont transplant Caleb Hopkins builds a house on South Arab Street (later Clover Street). ** Methodist circuit preachers begin coming through.

Rochesterville

The First Presbyterian Church of Rochester is founded. ** Elisha Johnson lays out the first Court Street. ** Lyell Street is created. ** Josiah Bissell and Hervey and Elisha Ely build the Red Mill, near the western end of the Genesee River bridge at Main Street. ** The village's first wedding ceremony is celebrated. ** Flour Merchant Wickens Killick is born. ** Brothers Francis and Matthew Brown start the Genesee Manufacturing Company at the upper falls of the Genesee River. ** Settler and school commissioner Enos Blossom helps found the first Allens Creek school - four others will follow on the site – on land belonging to Eleazer Bingham. The first trustees are William Penfield (son of Daniel) Matthew Dryer and Jacob Stoneburner (son of Leonard).

Steuben County

The board of supervisors resolves to cease paying Indians the bounty on wolves and panthers. ** The board directs the sheriff to make improvements to the jail in Bath.

London, England

Sarah Eyre Piffard, wife of future New York State pioneer David Piffard, dies in her late forties.

© 2011 David Minor / Eagles Byte