Before the day of rapid transit the arrival of the stage coach was one of the important events of the day. Up the long street rumbled the old thorough-brace, with its four-in-hand, the horn blowing and the whip cracking, and as it rolled up in front of the Chenango House, the driver threw his reins to the hostler, dismounted, and was the first man into the house and up to the bar, where he took four fingers of whiskey straight without blinking an eye. In the meantime, Uri WHITTENHALL had opened the coach door and was escorting the some thirteen guests into the hotel, where they rested during change of horses and mail, and the numerous trunks strapped on behind the coach for ballast were checked for security.
The stage driver was a very important person and felt the responsibility of a sea captain. My greatest boyish ambition was to be one and handle a four-in-hand.
Uri WHITTENHALL was a typical, old time, courteous landlord, always appearing in a blue broadcloth swallow-tail coat, highly respected among his contemporaries. He was always called upon to direct funerals of prominent people, before the undertaker had assumed the role of funeral director.
The Chenango House was popular with travelling public and villagers alike. Its lounging room on the corner with its great open Franklin stove radiating a cheerful glow from its wood fire made it an attractive place for men to gather to discuss politics and civic matters, and partake of a hot toddy. The ballroom on the third floor was the only place in the village where public entertainments could be held, such as the Firemen's Ball, the great social function of the year.
Myron COWLES, the landlord of the old hotel which stood on the canal bank where the Greene High School is located (On North Canal Street), was a sturdy, quiet man, mild spoken, but with nerve and muscle sufficient to maintain order when native whiskey created a fighting spirit on Election days.
The village was incorporated in 1842 and was a thriving, prosperous place. The canal, completed in 1837, created a shipping point which attracted produce from both neighboring valleys and Greene became the warehouse for goods shipped from New York to merchants in Afton, Coventry, Bainbridge, Sidney, Harpursville, and other places on the east side and from the Tioghnioga valley on the west from Whitney Point to Cortland, including Willet, Cincinnatus, etc.
There was no ready made clothing sold in Green at that time and no tailor who carried goods in stock. Men bought their goods and trimmings for a suit at the general stores and had their clothes made by a tailor. Every man who could afford it had a black broadcloth suit which was kept for Sunday and special occasions and in which he expected to be buried. Francis DINNIN, a tailor on Chenango Street, had the first sewing machine. Men were quite particular about their dress. It was the day of swallow-tail coats, fine calf boots and watch fobs. Jeremiah TILLOTSON, a gentleman farmer, always came to town wearing a white beaver stove-pipe hat, a blue swallow-tail coat with brass buttons , and a large watch fob. The Civil War made changes in customers, habits and styles. After the war the long leg fine boot and the swallow-tail for every day wear were gone forever, just as the late war has banished the stiff bosom shirt. As leather went up in price, the boot leg came down, until finally there was no book left and soon shoes were being universally worn. Patent leather boots, boot jacks and women's cloth gaiters are things of the past.
At the beginning of the Civil War there was but one New York daily paper taken in Greene, and that was received by the Chenango American office. The eager demand for daily news was supplied by Frank FISHER (one of the proprietors of that paper) who read aloud to a crowd who gathered on the hotel porch. Later in the year I secured a supply of New York dailies, which were brought by the afternoon stage, and sold them on the street, thereby becoming Greene's first newsboy.
Then I first saw light whale oil lamps were being used, I remember the introduction of kerosene oil and with what uncertainty it was received. But it soon outshone the whale oil and stylish but dangerous camphine lamps, as they in turn had taken the place of the tallow dip and the oil soaked rag.
In the old Fire Department of my day there were two small non-suction machines - the Alert and the Hero - neither having extension hose, just a short section carrying the pipe and attached to the top of the machine top. the brakes would possibly accommodate ten to twelve men. The bucket brigade required many men when the water supply was remote from the fire. With the engine as near the fire as possible, the brigade formed a line and passed buckets from hand to hand to keep up the water supply as fast as it was pumped out. Fighting fires was strenuous work.
I usually had a cow to drive for a neighbor, and thereby earned six cents per week, walking a total of fourteen miles. This assured me admission to the circus, fireworks for July 4th, and a few delicacies. Parents in those days were not lavish with pocket money for boys. If they wanted money they must earn it.
One of the interesting people in Greene was old "Grandpa GALLUP", a Revolutionary veteran. His funeral was of sufficient importance to dismiss the school so that the scholars might join in paying tribute to the grand old soldier.
I attended school in the old white schoolhouse on Chenango Street opposite the Baptist Church. There were three rooms, two on the upper floor for the youngest children, presided over by a lady teacher, and one large room on the first floor. Here the schoolmaster presided. It was a bare, cheerless room, its begrimed walls dingy with smoke. IT was heated in winter (but never warm) by two large open-front Franklin stoves. From the cellar, piled full of wood, a boy was detailed each day to carry armfuls and keep up a roaring fire. Each mid-morning and afternoon a boy was sent to a neighboring well for a pail of water and all the scholars drank from the same cup.
My first teacher was Miss Melvina PENDELTON, in the infant room, who taught me my ABC's. When I graduated from the second floor down into the large room, Benjamin SHOVE was the teacher. He was expert in the use of the rod. Later he became a Methodist minister. Next came M. SPRING and then S. Dewitt BEALS, who lived on a farm on the east hill. When the new School on Monell Street was built in 1859 a more intelligent system of education was introduced, the rod was abolished and new interests added to relive school hours of irksomeness.
I remember the old Baptist Meeting House with its cold, solemn interior and the Sunday School room in the damp, musty basement. One of the early pastors of the Presbyterian Church was Reverend ORTON whose two sons established the first Daguerrian Gallery in Greene. Both became prominent men.
In the early days Linsey-Woolsey sold for 31 cents per yard. this was a home woven cloth for women's dresses, made in plaids and stripes, coarse but substantial, made from home raised wool and flax. Tow cloth, another home woven product, 25 cents per yard, was made from flax raised on the farm, very strong and when new, coarse and rough. As one old time has said "I recall wearing a pair of trowsers made from it which felt as if they were lined with curry combs.". The color was brownish gray, but after being worn by a generation it became white soft and comfortable. The original owner of the tow cloth suit never wore it out. Owing to shrinkage and durability it could be handed down from father to son. Another popular native product was sheep's gray, and all wool cloth for men's winter wear, made at Ephraim WHEELERS Carding Mill on Wheeler Brook, which sold for 70 cents per yard.
Black broadcloth with trimmings complete for a suit cost $13, and it cost $6 to get it made. A bombazine dress pattern with trimmings which consisted only of hooks and eyes, and skein of silk and bunch of braid cost $3.75. All thrifty housewives had something to use for linings. Dresses at that time carried no ornaments, severely plain was the style, and they were worn a long time without re-making. After a mother had worn a dress gray and shiny it was ripped up, dyed, turned and soon her eldest daughter appeared in a new frock.
I remember those squeaky ill fitting cowhide boots with wooden pegged soles which were made by shoemaker CLARK who kept the first toll gate on the plank road to Smithville. They were one of the greatest trials of my young life.
I recall the longing desire for books in my boyhood days. Entertaining and instructive books were scarce. In my father's house the reading matter was confined to the New York Weekly Tribune, Pilgrim's Progress and Fox's Book of Martyrs. None of these appealed to me. There was a school library consisting of badly worn, mutilated books which was located in Dr. WILLARDS office among his drugs and smelled so strong of asafetida and Jalap that they not only impregnated my hands but the whole house, with their sickening odor. However,r I did read all that were worth reading.
One cold winter day when 18 inches of snow covered the valley and there was no coasting on the hill, no skating on the river, no book to read, nothing for an active boy to do, I sauntered uptown on a Saturday afternoon looking for amusement. (There was only half a day holiday then from school). As I passed the vacant RATHBONE and THURBER store, I saw a man inside opening some large boxes which aroused my boyish curiosity, that soon deepened into great interest when I discovered that they contained books. I stood there looking in the window, wiping my nose on a yarn mitten, and stamping my feet to keep off chill blains until the man came to the door and asked me to come in and get warm. But he also wanted help in placing the books upon the shelves, a task which pleased me. It was a joy to handle the beautiful books. He said that he was to run a book auction five evenings during the coming week and wanted a boy to ring a bell and announce it on the streets, the pay to be 25 cents and the best book in the store. I did the job conscientiously and when the last sale was made he paid me and told me to choose my book. I knew little about titles but knew what kind of a book I wanted, one full of love, thunder, and action to read and re-read and exchange with the other boys. For a moment I was speechless then asked him to make the selection. He gave me the nearest book on the shelf and I rushed home to tear off the wrapper, and found "Advice to Young Men". My disappointment was so great that I threw the book across the room. IT is still in my possession and still unread.
Extract from a letter from Frank A. ROOT (Son of Abel B. ROOT) from Gunnison, Colorado, May 4, 1884, about his life in Coventry:
"Not one house in five had a stove in it. Everything was cooked over a fireplace. Kettles and pots were hung on a crane over the fire, and bread, Pies, and cakes, et. were baked in the utensils directly in front of the fireplace.
Up until 1843 I had never seen a match. Everyone banked his fire at night with ashes. If it went out one went to a neighbor's to get a firebrand. I remember once carrying this on a run between 2 sticks. Matches were unknown in the country. A box of matches would last a thrifty family six months. On frequent occasions, before matches, it would be necessary to take a little tow and strike fire from a flint. Punk was also occasionally used. No well regulated family of that early day was without a flint to use in case of emergency. (The first matches are said to have appeared in 1832. Punk was obtained from beech trees.)
Envelopes were not invented until 1851. It took two weeks to get a letter from the interior of Connecticut. Postage was 10-12 Cents.
Everyone turned out when the militia, preceded by a band of martial music, would march in their handsome military suits of blue coats with brass buttons, hats and caps trimmed with red and white feathers.
Nearly every farmhouse had two spinning wheels, a large one for spinning wool rools into yarn, and a small one for spinning flax into thread. (May 15, 1884).
Reminiscences of 1845:
During the winters when we attended school in the old schoolhouse opposite the Baptist Church there were many more farmers who had business at the Chenango Valley Mills than now. There was hardly a recess that we had that we did not see a great procession of farmer's slights with grists aboard, going to and from these mills, and they afforded excellent targets for young snowballers. some took it goodnaturedly, others did not. One time we thought it smart to knock the hat off one innocent looking old farmer. But the snowball hadn't been out of our hand three seconds when out he came from his sleigh, armed with a blacksnake whip and my! didn't he give me an awful warming. Some of the big boys came to the rescue and literally rained the hardest kind of snowballs upon him, and he was glad to beat a hasty retreat. After he landed in his sleigh a nicely directed ball hit him squarely in his left ear which pleased me so much that my audible grief over the warming ceased in mid-air and turned into hilarious laughter: (G.C. ROBERTS - Feb 28, 1895)
Contributed by Lynda & B.J. Ozinga - 2002.
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