Mark Twain and his Family in Fredonia

By Douglas H. Shepard, 2000

 

               Mark Twain was well-known as a humorous lecturer by the time he first came to Fredonia NY in 1870. When he wrote to Olivia Langdon, his bride-to-be, late on the evening of 10 January 1870, he did not yet know he was to be booked to perform at Fredonia on 19 January. However, in a postscript to a letter to her of 14 January, from Troy NY, he wrote, “I talk in Fredonia, N.Y., Jan.19.— (L. McKinstry.)”  Louis McKinstry was the Secretary of the Fredonia Library Association, which brought Mark Twain to Fredonia to speak in the Normal School chapel.

               Although he may not have known on 10 January, his booking agent probably did. When the FLA issued its first announcement for their 1869-1870 lecture series in the Fredonia Censor of 17 November 1869, the entry for 19 January 1870 read “(Probably) SAMUEL L. CLEMENS, (Mark Twain) Subject not announced.” When Mark Twain wrote again in the evening of 20 January from Hornellsville NY, he described his travels. “I left Buffalo at 4 PM yesterday, went to Dunkirk, & thence out to Fredonia by horse-car, (3 miles), rattled my lecture through, took horse-car again & just caught 9:45 P.M. train bound east. . . .” He added “We did have a most delightful audience at Fredonia, & I was just as happy as a lord from the first word of the lecture to the last. I thought it was as good a lecture as I ever listened to — but some of the serious passages were impromptu — never been written.”

               He must have arrived in Dunkirk at 6:20 P.M. on 19 January 1870 according to the Erie R.R. schedule for that date. The horse car was scheduled to leave for Fredonia at 6:30. He spoke, as did the others in the lecture series, in the chapel of the Normal School building. The chapel, which was situated on the first floor at the back of the center section of the main building, could hold an audience of 700 plus another 350 in the balcony. (That was the original building of 1867, which burned down in 1900.) The street railroad line (a single track at the time) ran along Central Avenue to Temple Street, down Temple Street to Church Street and then along Church Street, where it turned to run along the Taylor House (Park Place) to West Main Street. Mark Twain probably got off in front of the Normal School on Temple Street.

               Albert B. Paine in his Mark Twain (vol.1, p.424) reports Mark Twain as having told his sister “I went in there by night and out by night so I saw none of it, but I had an intelligent, attractive audience.” In other words, when he suggested that his family consider Fredonia as a place to move to, it was based entirely on how his audience had responded to his lecture on “Our Fellow Savages of the Sandwich Islands.” Toward the end of 1869 he had begun to think his courtship of Olivia Langdon might meet with success, which led to concerns about settling down after marriage. He would have to give up lecturing and find something more permanent as well as some place closer to the Langdon home in Elmira NY. An early possibility was Stamford CT but his decision to settle in Buffalo with a part-ownership in the Buffalo Express combined with the enthusiastic reception in Fredonia caused him to suggest to his widowed sister that she consider Fredonia. His sister, Pamelia (known as Pamela) Moffett, and her daughter, Annie, were at the wedding in Elmira, and it was there that he mentioned Fredonia. Paine quotes him as having said, “Prospect Fredonia and let me know what it is like. Try to get a place where a good many funerals pass. Ma likes funerals. If you can pick a good funeral corner she will be happy.”

               On 15 February 1870, according to a letter from Olivia Clemens to her mother, Pamela and Annie went to Fredonia “to see if they could find any inducements there that would lead them to move there. . . . We expect them back sometime today [16 February].” After Fredonia, Pamela and Annie returned to St. Louis to prepare for their move. While in Fredonia they had arranged to rent the former Episcopal Rectory, which stood at today’s 29 Day Street. (It was available because the Rector, the Rev. Charles Arey, was married to Sarah Crosby Risley and living at his in-law’s home, today’s 63 Risley Street.) On 21 April 1870, the Clemens clan arrived back in western New York. Pamela Moffett and her son Sam left the train at Dunkirk while Mrs. Clemens went on to Buffalo, where she stayed until 23 May when she joined her daughter in Fredonia. Pamela’s daughter, Annie, remained in St. Louis finishing out her school year and only reached Fredonia in July.

               The family remained at 29 Day Street, probably hoping to buy it, since Trinity Church had offered it for sale at $5,000 on 24 March 1870. On 23 April 1870, two days after their arrival in Fredonia, Mark Twain wrote to his booking agent that he would be paying $1,000 or more toward “buying a beautiful home for my mother. . . . my sister paying the five or six thousand.”  Mark Twain and Livy visited the family on Day Street during the first week in October 1870. On 4 October he wrote to James Redpath that they would be returning to Buffalo probably on the 6th.  The Day Street property was ultimately sold to a Sarah Greene in March 1871, and by late November of that year the Clemens family had moved to 65-67 Temple Street. On 8 December Mark Twain lectured here again, not successfully, as he himself admitted. He no doubt saw some of his family at that time, but since he spoke in Warsaw NY on the 7th and Erie PA on the 9th, it could not have been a long visit.

               By 4 August 1874, Mark Twain and Livy had left for Fredonia, probably arriving on the 5th. They left Fredonia for Buffalo on 8 August. It was during that visit that he insulted an unnamed banker, an acquaintance of his sister’s, behavior that he abjectly apologized for by letter to Pamela, not to the banker. In 1875 Annie Moffett married Fredonia surveyor Charles Webster. Mark Twain and Livy did not attend the wedding but invited the couple to visit them while on their honeymoon. The newly married Websters returned to Fredonia and took up residence at 65-67 Temple Street. In February 1876 Charles Webster bought 36 Central Avenue, and in November all the Clemens clan moved there.              

               Mark Twain’s next visit to Fredonia was in early September 1879. (He returned from Europe, landing at New York City on the evening of 3 September.) He was writing from his home in Elmira on 8 September 1879. On the 9th he wrote to his publisher asking about some money due him, adding, “I want to know whether to go and visit my Fredonia folks now or wait. . . . ” His next letter from Elmira was dated 15 September 1879 to his sister, commenting twice on the “charming visit.”  If he waited for a reply from his publisher and took at least one day to travel to Fredonia and another day of travel back, he was probably in Fredonia at some time between the 10th and the 14th of September 1879. In the letter to his sister he says he will send $100 “to buy the lot with.” That must have been the lot at Van Buren Point, a resort area being heavily promoted at the time. Pamela Moffett had purchased Lot 9 at Van Buren Point for $175 on 17 August 1878. Mark Twain bought Lot 10 for $115 on 16 September. (The Portland assessment rolls’ valuations indicate there was no structure on Lot 10 through 1884. H. W. Rogers bought Lot 10 on 17 November 1882 and Lot 9 on 10 August 1883. The lot numbers pertained to the Fairbanks map of Van Buren Point, but were changed in the early 20^th century by the Metz map of Van Buren Point. The Metz map remains in effect at this writing.)

               Mark Twain’s last visit to Fredonia was in 1881. In a letter to Mrs. Fairbanks, he said he left Elmira alone on 12 September 1881, stayed overnight in Rochester, and arrived in Fredonia at 3 P.M. on the 13th. The Censor of 21 September 1881 reported on his “little visit last week” and mentioned that he had visited the Independent Watch Company, of which he was a “distinguished stockholder.” (The factory was at today’s 84-96 East Main Street.) He left Fredonia on the 15th for Buffalo. He never returned.

               The rest of the Clemens family who were in Fredonia for some period of time included his mother Jane Clemens, his sister Pamela Moffett, and her two children Samuel E. Moffett and Annie Moffett Webster. Charles and Annie Webster had three children: Alice Jean Webster, Samuel Charles Webster and William L. Webster. Samuel E. Moffett graduated from the Fredonia Normal School in 1878 in the Classical Curriculum. Early in 1880, Jane Clemens fell ill.  Her son Orion Clemens and his wife visited from Keokuk IA for several days at the end of January. During the winter of 1879-1880, Sam Moffett visited in Atlanta, Virginia and Washington DC, returning to Fredonia in May 1880. He went on to California to attend the University at Berkeley, where he became editor-in-chief of the Berkleyan.

               In early 1881 Charles L. Webster was put in charge of some of Mark Twain’s enterprises in New York City and moved his family there. In the first week in March 1882 he stopped in Fredonia for a few days, expecting to have Annie and the children here for the summer. Instead he rented a summer place near New York City, while Orion Clemens and his wife moved into 36 Central Avenue, where Jane Clemens and Pamela Moffett still lived. The visitors were to remain for the summer. A decision was made for Jane Clemens to move to Keokuk IA to live with Orion and his wife. Pamela Moffett accompanied her and then went on to join Sam Moffett in California. In the first week of September 1882, Charles Webster returned to Fredonia to see them all off and to arrange for E. D. Mixer to rent 36 Central Avenue while the Websters continued to live in New York City.

               Webster visited briefly on 28 September 1884 while on a book-selling trip. Finally, after some years of increasing difficulty working for Mark Twain, Webster and his family decided to return to Fredonia. In December 1887 he made arrangements with Thomas L. Higgins, then living at today’s 20 Central Avenue, to have an exchange of homes, Higgins to take 36 Central Avenue. In February 1888 Webster was here to make the necessary arrangements, including extensive remodeling of 20 Central Avenue. In late Spring 1888 the Webster family was back in Fredonia staying at the Park House (1 Park Place) while the remodeling was being completed. Early in 1889, Charles Webster’s parents began building a house on their land at today’s 186 Temple St. (They had been living on Spring St. for many years.) It was completed and they moved in early in 1890.

               Charles Webster died in April 1891. The children, who may have been privately tutored until then, began attending the “Barker Street School,” District School No.8 on Center Street. The children were Alice Jean, 14; William L.,12; and Samuel C., 6. The three attended in 1892 through 1895. Their grandfather, Luther Webster died in 1893. Alice Jean went on to the Fredonia Normal School and graduated in the China Painting curriculum in 1894. In February 1895 Mrs. Webster and her son Sam went to Florida, where her mother Pamela Moffett was wintering. In July 1896 Orion and his wife visited, returning to Keokuk IA on 22 July. Their nephew Samuel E. Moffett, on vacation, also visited for a few days. He may have come after his uncle and aunt had left, because he was returning to his job in New York City on 29 July. In 1897 Alice Jean Webster graduated from the Normal School in the College Preparatory Curriculum and went on to Vassar.

               Mrs. Webster, William, and Sam wintered in New York City in 1900. Her mother, Pamela Moffett, who had been visiting them in Fredonia, followed them there. In May 1901 William returned from New York City to put the house in order for the arrival  in June of his mother, Alice and Sam. In November 1903 Mrs. Webster and Alice traveled to Italy for the winter, returning to Fredonia on 25 May 1904. They planned to return to Italy in the fall. In May

1904 Mrs. Webster sold 20 Central Avenue and moved in with her widowed mother-in-law at 186 Temple Street. In January 1906 Mrs. Luther Webster died. The property at 186 Temple Street was sold and Annie Webster moved away the following April.

There was one other Clemens connection after this. On April 18 1907, Clara Clemens, Mark Twain's middle daughter, gave a vocal recital in the Chapel of the Fredonia Normal School to good reviews. It was the new building, replacing the one that had burned, but on the old Temple Street site, where her father had begun it all on the evening of 10 January 1870.

Made in Fredonia

A talk presented to Friends of Barker Library and Museum

By Douglas H. Shepard, 2000

 

               What Jutta and Chris have done is to mount an exhibit that gives a fascinating cross-section of the Museum’s own collection and of the craftsmanship, inventiveness, and manufacturing capabilities of the people of our community. What I want to do is supplement their efforts by indicating how many other such activities there were here, and how much more numerous than you might suppose.

               You will be grateful to hear that I’m going to be selective, which means I’m surely going to omit someone or some product that you expected to hear about. So I’ll apologize ahead of time. After the talk I would love to hear from each one of you about manufacturers, craftsmen, or artists I have missed and whom we should at least have on record. Remember, we are always open to receiving Fredonia-related items to consider adding to the Museum’s collection.

               I’m going to work backwards from the present, and so that we don’t get too lost, I have divided our local history into 50-year units: 1800-1850, 1850-1900, 1900-1950, 1950 to 2000. You will see as we work our way back that handicrafts and manufacturing increase which is not to say we have none today. If you properly understand “made” as in “Made in Fredonia,” you know we must include whatever Red Wing is currently processing and selling and whatever is being worked on at the Cliffstar plant on Water Street. And we also should include the pieces offered every year by the Cllege Art Department in its student and faculty shows and sales -- all of it made in Fredonia.

               Some of the booths at the Fredonia Farm Festival offered paintings, woodwork and other local hand-made items. If we look for “Made in Fredonia” for the 1950-2000 period, we should include the Titus memorial marble works, the silk-screened T-shirts, those carved rocks Mark Ruckman was producing, and the new computer Dave Kron made for us just a month ago. On which I typed this very talk. All were made in Fredonia.

               I know Ann Fahnestock did -- and Kathy Peterson does -- weaving. How many others are there I don’t know about? Or the dolls Wilma McAllister made. Or the dollhouse contents by Joyce Dunning in our Museum in the beautiful dollhouse George Weaver made. Or Dick Sheil’s dollhouse version of Longfellow’s home. Or the poetry of Joyce Frazeur he printed himself and had published.

               Which is a reminder of all the other publishing going on here today. The Museum has done some itself.  Until recently the White Pine Press was operating at the old Fire Hall. The Village and the Fredonia Chamber of Commerce have published material about the Village, all “made in Fredonia.” You may not know of the Basilisk Press of Dave Lunde at the College, (many, many small  books of poetry and fiction) but you surely remember the Penny Saver (Complete file saved?)  Or the output of Allen Benton’s publishing house he called Marginal Media, which published  the work of his alter ego  Albert Ezra Fitzwarren, author of such noted works of poetry as The Nature of Nature from Alpha to Zeta. You certainly know the work by Dan Reiff and its second version. How about Collie Middleton (later Collie D. Middleton)?  Laura Foster’s novels. To these published items made in Fredonia, add work by the Arkwright Press, Express Prints and Copy Boy. Also Robert Burgess’s “Bob Tales” illustrated by Edith Curtis. The title page identifies him as Robert Brettle Burgess, U.C.T. A.E.M. That is, United Commercial Traveler After Easy Money. Another writer of our period was Mrs. Yellott writing poetry as Barbara Leslie Jordan. (Comfort the Dream 1955)

               In another area, add the work of photographers like John Slaughter and Dan Sullivan; before them Bob Gregory and the related craftsmanship of Al  Runkel. In the area of the decorative is Jerry Raat’s custom decorating. The awnings made by Open View Window on Water Street, custom engraving by Smith & Smith.  There is also the art work of Mrs. Wise, Larry Urbscheit, Ruth Moos, Diane Leone, Carmen Gilman and how many others? All made in Fredonia.

               Does the craft of the dentist count?  I myself am a living exhibit to the skills of Drs. Ingham and Shorr.

               Woodbury Vineyards should be included within our 1950-2000 window. Winston Wine Cellars which the Stars opened in 1967 and the Cliffstar Corporation formed in 1971. Which is a reminder of Mitchell Foods.  Fredonia  Food Specialities and Sunset Frozen Foods began in1952, Barone Frozen Foods in 1955, Fredonia Pickle Factory in 1958 and De Marco Canning in 1965.

               The heyday of seed companies was in the previous period, 1900-1950, The grandaddy of them all is Fredonia Seed, begun by the Roeschs in 1901, continued by A. F. French then Ostrander and finally the Weavers, George Sr. and then Jr. until it was sold to Stokes in 1984. Soon after Fredonia Seed started, there came the Card Seed Co 1908, Erie Seed 1918, Good Seed 1919, Case Brothers 1924, Empire Seed 1928, Best Seed 1935, Hygrade 1937, Grace Anderson Seed 1941, and Rupert Seed 1946.  That was begun by M/M Don Reinhoudt the elder in 1946. He had done accounting for many of the seed companies and learned the business, so they decided to try their hand. Because they were such a small operation, they had no machinery to help. Mrs. R. told me they filled some 50,000 packets at home by hand. Mr. R. also designed and built wooden shipping/display cases, so those too should be included under “Made in Fredonia” along with the seeds, seed packets, advertising brochures, etc.  About 1948 the Reinhoudts sold to Lewis Crocker who kept it going only two more years.

               Closely allied to Seed Co’s in this 1900-1950 period are the food processors. The biggie of course is the Cudahy Packing Co. opening a local plant in 1914 called Puritan Pure Food Products Corp. which evolved into today’s Red Wing.  But we should also mention, in alphabetical order other food processors who were active in Fredonia in this period:  Bedford Products, Bison Canning, Brocton Preserving, Buffalo Frosted Foods, Card Wine, Cider & Vinegar Co., Colonial  Wine, Drago Macaroni, Eagle Canning, Elardo Macaroni, Empire Distributors, Excelsior Canning, Farm King, Fredonia Fruit Juice Co., Fredonia Macaroni, Fredonia Preserving, Genuso Grape Juice and Catsup, Gervas, Gioia, Bellanca, later Joy, Bellanca, then Gioia Brothers, Gleason Grape Juice, Grape Ola, Peter Lanza & Co., Frank LoGrasso Macaroni, Lazarony Cider, Old Chautauqua Packing Co., Salsina Canning, William D. Smith, Spear Wine Co., United Wine, Gerardo Vinciguerra, H. T. Wilbur.

               By 1907 Dr. Fenner’s People’s Remedies operation was making flavoring extracts under Mr. Mau. There were other wine makers too: Charles Bemus at 281 Central (Wolfers old house moved from 178 Central in 1868 so Wolfers could build the brick house.)  F. E. Cooke’s United Wine Co. on Cleveland 1900-1917, Bill Russo began wine making in 1914. Other made in Fredonia food products came from Barone’s nut shelling business, and numerous local dairies.

               Leaving foodstuffs, we move to A. F. French’s Fredonia Veneer Factory which began in 1912. The veneer culls were used to make grape baskets -- another thriving industry. That bldg burned in 1914. I mentioned the flavoring extracts before. The print shop at Fenner’s was named Gobe Printing Co. in 1903 and did color printing and turned out cookbooks, pamphlets, etc.  A draughtsman named John L. Telford, probably working in McKinstry’s Censor print shop designed letter heads such as the one for Arthur Maytum’s grocery in 1900. (SHOW)

               Publishing calls for writers and for 1900-1950 we have Grace Richmond and Jean Webster. In photography there was Burton & Cook 1907, Russell McLaren 1918. His son took over about 1946 until 1969. We are lucky to have so much of their work saved. Less artistic items made in Fredonia came from the Empire Mfg.CO. 1901-1911.  And don’t forget Luke Kellogg who invented a combination lock in 1908 and patented it in 1910. (15 Terrace Street). Of course, Frank Dinsmore’s wonderful Clothes Dryer -- here thanks to the Boltzes, and we should mention the seed display rack invented and patented by George Weaver Sr. The first of its kind in the industry.

But the previous period, 1850-1900 was also an active time for inventive minds. One was Justus Hinman who invented and built a 3-wheel buggy with a hood (1857). The hood wasn’t a new idea, but the tricycle effect was supposed to prevent tipping over on tight turns. He isn’t heard of again, so it may not have worked.

Back in 1850 John Hamilton was manufacturing chemical soap. Of course water had already been invented, so he then jumped to the next stage which was a new kind of clothes drier. Apparently it replaced the wooden bars of the old fashioned kind with rope covering some 50 to 75 feet. 1883 Benjamin F. Frey patented a “Fredonia Washer” (17 Hamlet Street) In the same year, 1883, Park & Parker manufactured it. In 1884 U. E. Dodge invented a coal sifter to separate the unburned coal from the ashes without getting yourself dirty.

               Turning to the arts, we had Julia Parker Clark, Clara Lane, Rufus W. Lester who did a bust of Capt. Cushing, Harriet Mason Ely who did shell and waxwork and taught painting at the Normal, Mrs. Darling who taught Kensington painting, Lizzie Lester who taught French decorative art and Mary A. Bunnell. All making works of art in Fredonia.

In photography we had G. R. Martin, Mr. Tarbell, Damon P. Clark, Salmon P. Halstead ,B. W. Ladd, Beckwith and Whitney, Charles Pringle, Jr., and Harry McNeill. When Barker Library first opened in 1882, McNeill was the one who lent an album with photos of the old settlers that he was just then in the process of creating. When he died in 1890 he was succeeded by E. R. Hough and Charles O. Mason. There were also Arthur White, Montgomery & Cook, Clarence A. Gibbs, C. H. Sisson, Amos Wight, Maud M. Adams, and John and Mary Korb, a brother sister team at 39 East Main.

Clearly there was no dearth of creative activity in Fredonia in the 1850-1900 period. In July 1910 Louis McKinstry, in a  talk about the period of the 1850s said “Our Village has not the relative importance in the county it had [then] There is not such a diversity of manufacturing as we had then...”. What he was talking about, for example, was Clarence Lewis who established a handle-manufacturing factory on Chestnut Street. (It was Lewis, Tunstall & Co. in 1873)  He had Charles Luke working for him by 1883. They made axe, hammer, sledge and pick axe handles. In 1891 Charles, Henry and John Luke bought it from Lewis family and  it became the Fredonia Handle Mfg. Co. In 1896 they moved to Cleveland Ave. and just to finish the story, in 1899 it was C. F. Luke & Son and in 1900 Benjamin Luke.

               There were a slew of carriage makers like Mason & Dickinson 1852, later Mason & Parker 1855. Francis  B. Parker at East Main and Cushing. Mason & Dickinson built one of the first omnibuses to run along the plank road, Dunkirk St., (Central Ave.) to and from the new RR depot in Dunkirk. Another company was Hascal Taylor in Center St. in 1856. In 1858 Festus Day joined to make it Taylor & Day. 1864 added Thomas H. Prushaw to make Taylor, Day & Co. In 1873 they built a new 3-story building that Charles Pringle Jr. made photos of. In 1875 Taylor sold out to H. D. Crane to create Day, Prushaw & Crane. In 1886 Prushaw bought out Day to make Prushaw & Crane. The company was sold off in 1888, but not before the bookkeeper Miss Prushaw met and married young Arthur Maytum, grocer. The rest, as they say, is local history.

               The carriage works called for painters to decorate them. They are the same people who decorated the fire parade wagons and hose carts. They also did signs -- like Aaron Barmore who did a large gilded sign for Case & Zahm’s hardware store in 1886 and for Maytum’s grocery, now a proud possession of the Barker Museum. There were lots of other interesting signs “made  in Fredonia” such as the one at Howard’s jewelry store which was a large watch in a frame with effigies of Father Time on either side.

               On a larger scale, after Addison Crosby took over his father’s business in 1857, he built a 25-horse steam engine for Colburn’s flour mill and he apparently put wheels on one of his own steam engines and chugged it down Temple Street frightening the horses. Much more sedate were the broom factories. One near Laona, on Eagle Street extension (near Dunn Street) was V. Dunn & Sons.  Thomas Wellman worked for them. In 1890 Wellman Bros. bought it and moved the business to the Street Railway Co.’s building on Center Street, At that time, L. L. Crocker had a grape basket factory there . By December Crocker needed all the space, so the Wellmans bought the former marble shop (112 East Main) from Harrison Parker (son of the late Francis B. Parker who had had the carriage factory across the street) and moved the broom factory there.

               Another active business in the period was ink making. The earliest I’ve seen is W. D. C. Brown’s “Chemical Writing fluid” 1873. In 1875 the Victor Ink Co. began making and selling Paragon Ink at 59 West Main. In the same year the very aggressive grocer Jesse Starr began the Empire State Ink Co. (Starrs later began publishing a newspaper, the Up-To-Date, primarily to advertise their grocery. One premium for subscribing was the Village Directory of 1899-- the first one with the modern numbering system. The Museum has I think the only copy as well as a file of the newspaper. Its predecessor was Perry Bartram’s 1883 Directory using a numbering system he devised. He just happened to make house numbers as well that you were welcome to buy. There may be some affixed to older houses in the Village under coats of paint. If you find one that doesn’t match your current house number, let us know.

               I got away from the ink making game. In 1888 M. M. Fenner bought out the Victor Mfg. Co and began making writing ink in the People’s Remedies building at Center and Barker streets, where his patent medicine business began in 1869. There’s another very important product of the period, the Howard Bros. watches, under various names. They began selling watches about 1865 and actually making them from 1875 in a small building behind the Baptist Church. In 1876 they bought Pettit’s and Barker’s Eye Salve Co.  In 1880 they moved the building to East Main Street and added to it. They did so well that in 1882 they built a new building on Cleveland Avenue just for the Eye Salve manufacture. In the same year they bought Mr. Durrell’s tapping machine and moved it to Cleveland Avenue from Dunkirk. So they had watches of various kinds being made, patent medicines, and machine nuts threaded on the new high speed patented machine. However in 1886 they moved to Peoria IL. Replacing them were the Taber Felt Factory (felt boots etc.) in 1887 and the Glidden Felt Collar Pad Co. in 1888 which took the Cleveland Avenue building. So add winter boots and horse collar pads to the “made in Fredonia” roster.

               Another category is the seed companies such as Dodge & Hinckley, then Hinckley and Matteson. (Hinckley was involved with O. H. Kelley in establishing the first subordinate grange in Fredonia). David Wright also started a seed packet business in 1851 and bought out Hinckley in 1880. To those add the Gardner Brothers on East Main Street, I. W. Losee in 1867, Eliza Denton 1873, and S. M. Skidmore 1883.

               However the really significant business in Fredonia in this period was the food processing industry. Initially the cans were made locally. Food was processed, put in the cans, the lids with a tiny air hole were soldered on, and the last bit of air was expelled. Then the hole was plugged with solder. So when we talk about canned goods “made in Fredonia” we mean the can as well as its contents.

               Some of the old fruit drying operations, an earlier method of preserving, appeared from time to time: 1867, 1878, 1881. In addition to canning there were other food-related processes such as cider and wine-making and others. In roughly chronological order of beginning date: Silas Clark mfg. 1859, L. M. Wheelock cheese factory 1881, Sunset Canning Co. 1882 in 1898: Tony Liberty’s Macaroni factory, Bert Flagg Wine making on Center Street, (became White & Flagg), Dr. Wm. Park wine cellar on Eagle Street, Henry T. Wilbur on Central Avenue (where Fenton Hall is). In 1899: U. S. Canning Co.- and Meyer Star’s winery leased from Wilbur. It operated as Fredonia Products Co. until 1902 when the Stars bought the old winery at 200 Water Street.)

And always keep in mind that as far as Made In Fredonia goes, the above operations besides involving people making cans, also included those making grape baskets, barrels, boxes, shipping crates, excelsior for packing, labels, letterheads, billing slips, advertising matter, etc.

               Finally we come to the last segment, the first in our history: 1800-1850.

               We can begin with the fine arts -- painters like Corbin Kidder who painted M/M Levi Barker , L. S. Watkins who did various portraits, Tompkins Matteson who did the Discovery of the Witch Mark, Amos Wight again and Alvah Bradish, Frederick Young who painted M/M William Cutler on the wooden panels, in the Belden gallery. In an allied field, the earliest photographers, included daguerreotypists like Dr. J. P. Clark 1844. Also include the signs done by local craftsmen : A. N. Clark had the sign of the Golden Pestle.  Clark & Havens could be found at the sign of the Mill Saw. And there were other decorative pieces like the weathervane of the 1820s now at the Winterthur Museum.

               Another kind of bringer of beauty was Grandma Brigham, according to Fanny Risley Brigham, who brought root cuttings from Madison County when she came in 1808 and had her flower bed around a high stump near their log cabin. One of the plants was digitalis which, Fanny Brigham said, spread so that the woods were full of it in later years. So if there is any foxglove growing wild near Brigham Road it was made in Fredonia by Grandma Brigham.

               There was not much beautiful writing going on back then, but there was publishing. The Chautauqua Gazette started in 1817, and Mr. Hull published the Minutes of the Holland Purchase Baptist Assoc. in June 1818. That seems to be the first book printed in the County. The Censor started in 1821. In 1823 there was a spelling book published by Burton & Spafford, which had been printed at the Fredonia Censor office on paper made at Burnham’s Mill near Shumla. A copy was given to the Barker Library in 1896. Frisbee also published A Contrast Between Christianity and Calvinism from the Censor office in 1824.

               In another category, we have Henry Bosworth, who fixed watches, who was also a gold and silversmith. He made silver spoons from coins. 6 silver 1/2 dollars made six tea spoons. In the 1840s he was on East Main Street. Nearby was Joshua Turner who made saddles and  harnesses. Benjamin Douglass had a tannery where he made boots and shoes, that was back in 1818 and Leverett Barker had the same, although he stayed in business longer. Earlier than either one, Charles Burritt made shoes at 2 West Main Street from 1808. Then he moved to 59 West Main,  and later on he decided he was a druggist. P. H. Stevens had a hat factory on East Main and across the street was Obed Bissell’s carriage works. Our friend Amos Wight was a carriage maker as well in the 1840s and may have honed his painting skills decorating his work.

               William Hamilton built a stone bridge replacing Risley’s original 1809 bridge on West Main in 1830. Hamilton also manufactured gravestones with Joseph Damon who was hung for murder in 1835. His brother Martin Damon was a stone cutter and tombstone maker as well. Pioneer Cemetery has many of his creations. Damon was in the Cascade Hamlet -- that huge three-story U-shaped building at 100 West Main from 1818 to 1832. William Norcutt, blacksmith was there. As were E. Shepard & R. Buck carriage makers, Martin Damon, R. Coffman Windsor chairs, Myron Chapin who made spinning machines and paper cutters, Uriah Wentworth the cooper who made barrels of all kinds, N. Randell who was a tanner and shoemaker, S. Willson tin and coppersmith, making pots and pans, lanterns, trays, weathervanes, etc., Sala Todd wheelwright, making the wheels for all those carriages.

               Some important cabinet makers were Nathaniel and Pearson Crosby. Pearson is the one who invented the “Portable Prairie Saw-Mill” in 1838 and after the circular saw was invented by the Shakers, in 1851 he had an improved Sawing Machine described in detail in Scientific American. When the Crosbys gave up their mill it was taken over by Jason and Pliny Smith who built the catamaran for Dr. William Park. Still later it became a churn factory, and at one point there was a comb factory there or in the vicinity.

               That catamaran reminds me of earlier boat building. William Risley said that one of the first boats on Lake Erie was built here in 1810 -- an open boat about 40 feet long.  In 1827 after the opening of the Erie Canal, an association of farmers bankrolled  the building of a canal boat by Zattu Cushing. He built the Enterprise on the flat ground below Fort Hill and had it towed by 100 yoke of oxen to the Lake. Captained by Mr. Tuttle it was towed to Buffalo by a steamer and then worked the canal for a few trips before giving out. This was a very significant occurrence because it signaled the beginning of the end of commercial isolation for Fredonia and a drastic change -- over time -- in what would be Made in Fredonia.

               We wax nostalgic about  whatever old stuff we can find that was actually made here in the good old days. As far as Fredonians of the time were concerned, they used what was made here because that was what available or affordable. After a season or two, enough land was cleared to raise enough to sell to newcomers who were the only people who might have some cash. No one did locally. It was the only way to get money because, Wm. Risley explained, “there was not any article sent off to have money returned for.”

               The first and only articles sent to market for a number of years after the first settlement were pot and pearl ashes....Montreal was the market until the Erie Canal opened. That means from 1805 to 1825 nothing else could be exported for sale. H. C. Frisbee helped his father drive teams up Temple Street by way of the mouth of Canadaway Creek almost to lighthouse point in 1818. They hauled casks holding 400-500 pounds of the ash product.

               There was great excitement when Joseph and Ralph Plumb brought on a load of goods -- the first landed in Dunkirk. That was in 1816. Wooden horses were put out in the water and planks laid on them to reach the small boat. All of that helps explain the whiskey trade. Like potash, the only way to compress grain sufficiently to make it worth hauling to markets far away was in the form of whiskey.  At one point there were 11 distilleries operating here and one or two breweries. The first was in 1813 just west of the bridge. Later they were built up and down the Creek. What 11 distilleries meant was a need for implements to handle the grain, wagons, cribs, rakes, and thousands and thousands of  barrels.

               But you see all of that was a matter of necessity. There was an Old Settlers Reunion here in 1873. Huge turnout. Lots of exhibits lent by the old timers or their descendants. Do you know what they had lots of and showed with the greatest pride? Anything from before they settled here: A saddle then 130 years old (in 1873). A chair over 100 years old brought here in 1826, a pewter platter 100 years old, a foot warmer ditto, an Indian snow shoe 200 years old, a carpenter’s square of 1703, an axe made in 1575, and so on.

               The point is that much was made in Fredonia because they couldn’t get anything from outside until the Erie Canal, plank roads, steamships and finally the Railroad opened up affordable commerce. William Risley described a typical home with hand cards, spinning wheels for wool and flax, a loom in the corner, a dye tub in the corner near the fire. The colors were primarily blue butternut or madder red. (Does that account for our flag?) Women’s winter clothing was generally flannel. Linen for towels, table linens and lighter clothing. The tow carded from the flax was spun on the large wheel for men’s summer clothing. Wool also on the big wheel for stockings.

               Norton & Howard’s mill across from Colburn’s not only ground corn and rye, it also carded wool, and fulled and pressed cloth. Frisbee described our community in 1828 as having a woolen mill, a paper mill, an oil mill (linseed oil) a casting furnace for ploughs, a rifle factory, a powder factory, a pail factory, a nail factory and a bedstead factory. A busy, busy place. In finishing up, let’s add the manufacturing of cheese presses, Pettit’s Eye Salve and Canker remedies beginning in this period, and a machine for reeling silk. We must include the early seed companies before 1850: the Risley Brothers, Thomas Warren and Joel Parker. Plus the people making the paper packets, the small boxes, the shipping crates and the wagons themselves.

               Now, the very last item is one fundamental to our whole exhibit. In the summer of 1819, Levi Risley, then 15 got a job working at Mr. Turner’s brick works on Chestnut Street. He tended the oxen going round and round working the straw into the clay. He also shaped the bricks in the molds before they were fired.  They made 200,000 bricks that season of which Leverett Barker bought half, which were used in building his home, completed in May 1821. So as you walk around admiring the various artifacts on display, keep in mind that you are, at the same time, INSIDE one of those artifacts -- the Barker home, now our Museum, which is also very much “Made in Fredonia.”

    

General Lafayette in Fredonia

An account of the circumstances surrounding Lafayette's visit which appeared in the Censor of 3 July 1872.

By Douglas H. Shepard, 2000

 

In the body of his article, newspaper editor Frisbee commented that "I am not able to give the names of our principal citizens who bore a part in the ceremonies, owing to a favor I extended to some person in lending a file of the Censor [for 1825], being requited by his cutting out and purloining a whole half sheet of the paper that gave a full account of the reception." The Censor in 1825 had a small format. Each issue was made up of four pages, two leaves. In other words, a large sheet folded once. Half of that sheet, containing pages 1 and 2, was "purloined." The bound volume is now in the Barker Historical Museum containing only the 3rd and 4th pages of 9 June 1825.

 Frisbee's 1872 account was answered by a letter from L[evi] R[isley] of Shady Brook, Iowa, commenting on some aspects of Lafayette's visit and the theft of the Censor article. Soon after Frisbee's article appeared, Miss Jane Osborne lent her copy of the report on Lafayette's visit to a rival newspaper, the Advertiser & Union, and it was published there during the week of 11 August 1872. Although no copy of that issue is now extant, the Censor ran a copy taken from the Advertiser, on 21 August 1872.

               The Censor also ran Frisbee's reaction, in which he said "I made some effort to ascertain what became of it [the stolen half sheet], but got no satisfaction from the quarter where I had good reason to look for it; but it seems my suspicions were well founded, as it has been brought forth from an old scrap book by a member of the family to which the files were loaned [the Osbornes]."

               This was followed on 28 August by a partial retraction. The Censor editor announced that he had examined "the copy furnished the Advertiser by Miss Osborne, and are satisfied that it was cut from some paper called the Chautauqua Advertiser," and that Mr. F. erred in his belief that it explained the fate of his lost article." The documents were shown to Frisbee who added: "After a more full examination of the 'mutilated parts' I am satisfied the account published in the Advertiser & Union from the 'scrap book' material was not the one abstracted from my files of the Censor, but from some other Chautauqua paper, so that the mystery as to what did become of it after the loaning remains unsolved. . . . I am satisfied the one alluded to as the 'fair perpetrator' is not the one who did the deed." The Censor editor's reference to the Chautauqua Advertiser as the source for Miss Osborne's scrap book clipping uses the later name of the Gazette. It was common practice for the Censor and the Gazette to run items borrowed from each other at that time.

               When Frisbee described the purloining of the half sheet from his volume of the Censor, he did not mention that some of the text towards the end of the account had continued on to page 3. When that lengthy fragment (some 120 lines) is compared to the scrap book version which ran in the Advertiser and was reprinted in the Censor in 1872, they are seen to be virtually identical. The minor differences can be attributed to a careless typesetter. The 1872 version corrects "Capt. Fowle" to "Towle," changes a "was" to "were," and omits the word "so" from the phrase "circumstances render it necessary that my stay with you should be so short."         

               It seems obvious that the scrap book version is a verbatim copy of what also appeared in the Censor of 9 June 1825. By comparing the number of column inches taken up by the page 3 copy with its equivalent in 1872, we can determine that the first part of the 1825 account must have taken up some three and a half columns on page 2. In 1825 the pages were normally five columns wide. Since the "purloiner" did not take page 3 with something over a column of text from the same article, it may be that he/she was after some other item on page 2.

               Because it appeared in a Fredonia paper, the original version began with Lafayette's early morning arrival in Fredonia, carried through to his departure from Dunkirk for Buffalo, and only then tacked on an account, provided to the Censor by an unnamed participant, of Lafayette's arrival first in Westfield and his progress on to Fredonia.

               In addition to this earliest account, written immediately after Lafayette left Dunkirk by ship for Buffalo, there is also a typed version of what is entitled "Copy of contemporary account of Lafayette's visit to Fredonia written by the Hon. John Crane." It is dated "1885, June 1st.," that is, the date on which A. Z. Madison, Secretary of the Fredonia Historical Association, copied Crane's original, which was found among the papers of Charles F. Matteson. The specific date when Crane wrote his account is not given. John Crane was a prominent citizen of Fredonia, 34 years old at the time of Lafayette's visit.

               Following Frisbee's article of 3 July, in the 10 July 1872 issue of the Censor,  J. E.  Baldwin added his "Recollections" of Lafayette's visit. Baldwin seems to have been a member of the local Militia at the time, since the focus of his article is on their part in the events. There is a Jesse E. Baldwin, born in 1796, who came here with his family in 1810. He would have been 29 in 1825.

               Andrew Young issued his History of Chautauqua County in 1875 after several years of work on the subject. The record of Lafayette's visit was significant enough for him to include a separate section early in the volume to tell the story. The seven-page account begins with a brief biographical sketch of Lafayette's life and then describes his 1825 visit here, beginning with his reception in Westfield, then Fredonia, Dunkirk, and his departure. Although Young gives no sources, the text seems to be taken directly from the 1872 Censor reprinting, including the use of "were" in place of "was." However, Young did replace the word "so" as in the original. The text has been edited down somewhat from the 1872 version, perhaps to fit the space he was willing to make available.

               In the 13 July 1892 issue of the Censor appeared an anecdote entitled "Alex and Lafayette" by Olive Risley Seward, the daughter of Hanson A. Risley. It is a thinly disguised version of the events as seen by "Alex" (Hanson Risley's middle name was Alexander) and no doubt told to his children. He died the year after this piece appeared. This account focuses on the preparation, particularly those the children were involved with, Lafayette's triumphant arrival, and the presentation of each citizen in line, including babes in arms. This account is the source of the story about the fine shawl handed on from one woman to another as she was to be received. In their 27 July 1892 issue, the Censor ran a letter from Miss Seward adding further comments. "I have heard the event [LaFayette's Reception], described all my life. . . . Father [Hanson Risley] was here [Washington DC] when I wrote the sketch and remembers every incident of the day distinctly. . . . The friend who went up the hill with Alex was his cousin Fidelie Brigham. Mr. D. J. Matteson, my cousin Kate Matteson's grandfather, was the master of ceremonies. . . . It was Mr. Matteson, the judge [Charles F. Matteson, D. J. Matteson's son, 9 years old in June 1825], who told me the story of my grandmother Crosby's plum-colored shawl and bonnet, and how he reflected on the strange vanity of women as one after another they came up in a copy of Mrs. Crosby's fashionable attire." 

               Hanson Risley must have been very impressed by the events of June 1825, since, later, when he was a student at the Fredonia Academy (1827-1835), he delivered a "Eulogy Upon General Lafayette" at an oral examination. It apparently was memorable enough for H. C. Frisbee to quote some parts of it in the account he wrote in the 3 July 1872 issue of the Censor, some 40 years later. (Lafayette in America in 1824 and 1825, the journal kept by Lafayette's secretary was translated into English and published in Philadelphia in November 1829. It is referred to in Hanson Risley's piece, which puts his "Eulogy" then as delivered somewhere between 1830 and 1835.)

               In the 11 April 1900 issue of the Censor was printed an article copied from the New York Journal, referring to Lafayette's 1825 journey. The editor added the comment that Devillo White, then 9, witnessed Lafayette's arrival and remembered that Gen. Leverett Barker had "illuminated his mansion [the Barker Historical Museum] with a number of candles at each window pane." One part of a sash was scorched and Barker never permitted it to be painted over. It was in 1900 that a brass marker was put by the scorched portion to commemorate that reminder of Lafayette's visit.

               Responding to that article, in the issue of 2 May, was Mrs. Lydia Bradish, who indicated that Leverett Barker had not been alone. She described how her mother put candles in every window of their home on West Main Street. Lydia D. Houghton was ten years old in 1825.  Years later, in the Buffalo Evening News of 5 May 1956, appeared a feature article entitled "When Fredonia Used Gas Jets to Honor Hero." Aside from erroneous statements about gaslight, it does add some details such as Mrs. David Brown lending her "boughten" carpet for the platform and that Sally Patrick Crosby, young wife of Dr. Orris Crosby, lent her "magnificent purple silk shawl" and a Tuscon [i.e., Tuscan] bonnet" with a white plume to other ladies in line. There is a reference to Lafayette commenting on the repeated appearance of the shawl and bonnet, but, since that is not mentioned in the original account of 1825, nor in his secretary's journal, it may be a later embellishment to the tale, like the story of the gas jets.

               In July 1995 a hitherto unavailable collection of Lafayette's papers, including many documents relating to his 1824-25 trip, began to be microfilmed by the Library of Congress. The complete set of microfilm is available in the Manuscript Reading Room of the Library and may well offer additional information about Lafayette's triumphal tour.

The Joseph Damon Skeleton

By Douglas H. Shepard, 2012

 

Joseph Damon, the last man hung in this state, was buried in Pioneer Cemetery, disinterred, and disappeared. There have been numerous retellings of the events surrounding the Joseph Damon murder trial in 1834. His hanging was the last public execution in New York State. However, what happened to Damon after that is still unclear. Ed Kurtz, a Brocton historian, had questioned the matter for years, which is what has led to this admittedly incomplete account.

            Two basic sources offer some answers to our question. The first is a long article by Franklin Burritt in the Fredonia Censor of 2 February 1898; the second is a Xerox of a part of a clipping from an undated and unidentified newspaper. That copy is in one of the Barker Historical Museum's scrapbooks.

            Before we look at the two items, it would be best to give some background. Franklin Burritt was born in Fredonia in September 1827, the son of Charles and Orpha (Tucker) Burritt. Charles Burritt came to Fredonia in 1809, setting up as a cobbler in a small log house at the corner of today's Water and West Main streets. By 1812 he had married and transformed himself into a druggist, with his home and store on West Main just west of today's Forest Place.

Franklin Burritt's account explains that his father's "drug, grocery and general merchandise store" was "a sort of rendezvous for early settlers when they came to Fredonia [to shop] …. In that old store rude slab benches encircled a three-feet fireplace…. The incidents concerning the 'resurrection' of the body of Joseph Damon, which I propose, briefly to relate, I have often heard detailed in the light of a cheerful blaze of hickory wood in that capacious fireplace, by the actors in the weird drama themselves."

            Basically, then, this is the story as young Franklin Burritt heard it. Around 1830 "a freshly graduated young Dr. M, about 23 years old, came to Laona. He quickly became very popular and attracted a number of students. Dr. M. was open and "bluff," addressing his young disciples as "Hank and Pete and Joe and Sam and Sol." After Joseph Damon was executed in 1834, he was buried in what we today call Fredonia Pioneer Cemetery. Dr. M. and the three young men who were his students at the time, decided to exhume the body and secretly take it off to use for anatomy lessons. Somehow, Joseph's brother North Damon got wind of the scheme, so he took up residence at Watson's tavern, an inn at today's 35 East Main Street. Every two hours he would make a trip to the grave to make sure all was well. This went on for a few nights "when Dr. C. [possibly Dr. Orris Crosby or Dr. Charles Smith] persuaded him to go home."

             As soon as Dr. M. heard of North Damon's departure, he and his three co-conspirators chose a dark night to act. "Along the main road east of Fredonia for about a mile … stretched a thick forest. Our adventurers hid their horse and vehicle behind a thick clump of underbrush in that timber and were about to proceed to their work. It was a sultry night, about the middle of June, 1835. The sky was overcast with thick clouds and a storm threatened. Rain began to fall and they crept into the thicket."

Years later, Burritt says, he "heard Dr. H tell the story of that storm." A soon as they could, the four dug up the body, which was well preserved, although it "had been in the ground a month." They loaded it into their wagon and started for Arkwright. When they "got close by the Arkwright Center road, they heard, coming over the hill, singing at the top of his voice, a character, known to the early settlers as 'Glutfoot Thompson,' He was a big man, gifted with a voice like a fog horn, and equipped with a spacious throat for whisky. When drunk he was quarrelsome and offensively inquisitive." 

Therefore, Dr. M. had his students remove the corpse to hide it. "The boys boosted the body over onto his [Dr. M's] back and shoulders. In attempting to straighten up he stumbled over a rolling stone. What with the weight of the body and the libations he had indulged in, the luckless doctor tumbled to the ground full length and the dead man fell on top of him. The doctor had an impediment in his speech when excited, and he stammered out: 'T-t-t take him off me Lew.' That ever after became a catch-phrase among the doctor's students and intimate friends."

The body was quickly hidden in the roadside woods and "Dr. M., as noisy Elias came up, was busy at a put-up job of mending a broken harness. By the time they got rid of Thompson, dawn began to break. The next night they took the body to the house of a brother of one of the students, in Arkwright. It was a long, rambling, double house, and stood nearly opposite the present Horton cheese factory [at today’s Route 83 and Center Road]. It was a lonely spot, on a lonesome road. There the body was reduced."

            Burritt goes on to say "the bones were never articulated." Also, "the skull of Damon, a good many years ago, was loaned to a traveling lecturer on phrenology, one 'Old Grimes,' who held forth in Fredonia. 'Old Grimes' incontinently skipped, and carried off without leave or license the skull of poor Joe." 

             Dr. M. died young, age 32, in 1838 and was buried in Laona. "Sixty years after the death of Dr. M., an aged and venerable doctor, still living, who has practiced his profession toward sixty years, and who had enjoyed the patronage of a large clientele — a physician who, subsequent to the occurrences which I have related, was a student in the office of Dr. M., who sat by his bedside when he died, and into whose possession the skeleton of Joseph Damon then passed, presented the uncanny relics to me.

            "Gently nudging my consciousness, a sense of duty has suggested to me that the exhumed remnant of Joseph Damon's body should be reinterred." After a long discussion of the right of burial in general, Burritt's last paragraph reads "Thus have I made good my resolution. Its consummation has beguiled many a weary hour. If this sketch shall interest any and shall serve to perpetuate one historical incident, out of the many unwritten local events that are fast fading out of the memory of men, I shall be content."

Unfortunately, what he seems to be referring to by "resolution" is the beginning of his article. He had a visit in the fall of 1897 from Major Charles Kennedy, an old friend. They reminisced about many things, including the Damon episode, and "at the close of our interview" Burritt "resolved to sketch a brief history of the Damon crime and its expiation." That is what he was referring to. He has put this incident on record, not that he had buried the bones. So the question remains, as Ed Kurtz originally posed it, "where is Joseph Damon buried," if anywhere?

            Before we try to answer that question, we should look at another piece of evidence, the incomplete article in the Barker Museum scrapbook. "Clarence Buell, an employee of the Columbia hotel in Fredonia," the article begins, has "the skeleton of Joseph Damon." Buell had obtained it from "Fred Wilson, Fredonia's night watchman who had it in his collection of curios for ten years or more."

            After Damon's execution, "The body was brought to Fredonia and buried, but not long to remain so, for a couple of local doctors, a few nights later, stole the body from the grave and carried it to a lonely spot near Wheeler's gulf, and used it for experimental purposes. Many weird and sensational stories have been told of the theft of Damon's body but the truth of most of them is hard to substantiate.

            "The bones were eventually strung up in the form of a skeleton and have been about Fredonia ever since. For a long time they were in the old Academy, later in the office of Dr. Charles Smith, who, with Dr. Mann was said to have been involved in the theft. A few years ago Fred Wilson secured …, " and there the clipping breaks off.

            The newspaper article can be dated at least approximately. The Columbia Hotel burned on 26 January 1918. The 1917 city directory lists Clarence H.Buell as a clerk there; the 1915 State Census (dated in June) lists him as a "Hotel Clerk"; but the 1915 city directory, delivered to customers on 30 December 1914, lists him as a "Naval militiaman." In other words, Buell worked at the Columbia Hotel at some time between January 1915 and January 1918.

            That should mean that Fred Wilson owned the skeleton (by now "articulated" if headless) from around 1905/1908. Before that it hung in the office of Dr. Charles Smith, who was one of the original exhumers, and before that, in the old Academy "for a long time." However, the Fredonia Academy was in operation until 1867, after which the building itself continued to be used by the Village until it was replaced, in 1891, by today's Village Hall. If the skeleton was truly hanging anywhere by 1891, it cannot have been the skeleton that was "never articulated" as of 1898, when Burritt wrote his piece. Was it the newspaper reporter who misunderstood what he had been told? Perhaps.

            Dr. Charles Smith died on 7 September 1901, age 86. He had studied with Dr. Mann in Laona, according to his obituary. This must be the "aged and venerable doctor, still living," who gave the skeleton to Burritt. (In 1898 the doctor would have been 83.) It is possible the missing part of the clipping goes on to say that Wilson got the skeleton from Burritt, but what of the other participants?

             The Centennial History of Chautauqua County (Volume I, Page 177) describes a similar exhumation attempt — quoted from an account by Dr. Oscar Johnson — which took place in Laona in 1834. Dr. Thomas D. Mann and "his three students" again were involved. However, the effort was thwarted and one student was caught, George S. Harrison, later a local doctor for more than 50 years. "It is believed that the same trio of medical students prepared themselves for their duties by a close observation of the bones and muscles of Joseph Damon, the murderer." It must have been this notorious Laona escapade of 1834 that led North Damon to believe whatever warning he heard in June 1835.

            According to his obituary, Dr. George S. Harrison, who died age 70 in May 1881, had studied with Dr. Mann in Laona. His first wife, Mary Sprague, whom he married in December 1836, had also been from Laona. It would seem, then that Dr. Mann's trio consisted of George S. Harrison, Charles Smith, and a young man known familiarly as "Lew." On a stormy evening in June 1835 they had made their way toward Arkwright when they were temporarily side-tracked by Elias "Glutfoot" Thompson, a resident of Arkwright who died there on 4 February 1845.

The four were heading for the home of a brother of one of the students, the rambling double house opposite Horton's Cheese Factory. The factory lay on the east side of today's Center Road just below today's Route 83, with the double house across the way.

              There are a number of avenues that could be explored to clarify any questions that remain. It might be possible to determine who owned the large double house [possibly the large Horton house, later destroyed by fire] which would verify the family name of one of the students, unless the student's brother was renting. Another clue is the medical student known as "Lew." Was there a "Dr. Lewis ___________" who had lived in or near Laona in 1835? Burritt's reference to "Old Grimes" the phrenologist is to J. Stanley Grimes (1807-1903), a lawyer in Boston and New York who became interested in phrenology in 1832.

            Another question: Is it likely that Burritt gave the skeleton to Fred Wilson? Burritt, as we have seen, was a lifelong resident of Fredonia. Frederick N. Wilson and his wife came to Fredonia in 1871. At first he worked in a blacksmith shop, then as an ice dealer, then as a miller, living on West Main Street very near to where Franklin Burritt grew up. Burritt died here in September 1900, so he and Wilson both lived in the same small village for almost thirty years. It was indeed possible for Burritt to have known Wilson.

            Then what of Clarence Buell and Wilson? Julian J. Buell and his family came to Fredonia in 1891. Clarence was born here in 1893, his brother Julian, Jr., in 1894. They grew up in the family home at 217 Porter Avenue and both attended the Barker Street School, as did Fred Wilson's daughters, Ada, Mary and Ruth at the same time. Wilson was first appointed night watchman in March 1908, a position he held until March 1917. While Clarence Buell was a "naval militiaman" in 1915, his brother Julian was the day clerk at the Columbia Hotel, the position Clarence took over, and where he resided. Once again, there was ample opportunity for Clarence and Fred Wilson to have known each other.

             If the anonymous clipping is correct, the last person to own the Damon skeleton, with or without its skull, was Clarence Buell. Although Clarence did live at the Columbia while he worked there, he apparently had moved on by the time of the fire in January 1918. There is a very full account of the fire in The Fredonia Censor of 30 January 1918, including a list of all those who lost any property in the conflagration. Clarence Buell is not mentioned. If Damon's skeleton did not perish in the Columbia fire, what happened to it? We still do not know. At best we have brought Ed Kurtz's quest from 1834 down to 1918, but there we must leave it, waiting for one last chapter to be written.