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surveying

The Old Trail: A Lyon Mountain History

November 19, 2022 by Lawrence P. Gooley Leave a Comment

Lyon Mountain Tower, 2008Many years ago, a new trail replaced the old trail on Lyon Mountain in the town of Dannemora in Clinton County, NY, which had degraded with sections ranging from grassy to rocky to bouldery to muddy to extremely steep, muddy, and slippery.

It was a mess compared to paths built by modern trail crews. In 2006, ADK’s Algonquin Chapter completed the plans for a new trail, which was built in the summer of 2008. [Read more…] about The Old Trail: A Lyon Mountain History

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Adirondacks, camping, Chazy Lake, Clinton County, Dannemora, Environmental History, Fire Towers, hiking, Lyon Mountain, surveying, Verplanck Colvin

Logging The Adirondacks: A Legal Logjam (1880-1900)

November 14, 2022 by Noel Sherry 4 Comments

Aaron Lloyd v. Moose River Lumber Co;An early 20th century Adirondack lawsuit pitted a small Big Moose Lake sportsman and landowner Aaron Lloyd against a team of powerful opponents, John Adams Dix and his Moose River Lumber Company with Dr. William Seward Webb and his Nehasane Park Association.

A second suit reversed the plaintiff and defendant, Webb vs. Lloyd, and appeared to be linked to the first complaint. Clearly this was a classic David versus Goliath clash. These cases would have been the fodder for conversations around the campfire in the Big Moose area for almost a decade.

On the surface, the complaints concerned the harvest of millions of board feet of virgin timber and flooding Big Moose Lake to get these logs to market, with Webb behind both actions. [Read more…] about Logging The Adirondacks: A Legal Logjam (1880-1900)

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Adirondacks, Big Moose, Big Moose Lake, Big Moose Tract, Environmental History, Forest Preserve, Hamilton County, Herkimer COunty, Industrial History, John A. Dix, Legal History, Logging, Mohawk & Malone Railroad, railroads, surveying, Totten Crossfield Tract, Town of Webb, Twitchell Lake, Verplanck Colvin, William Seward Webb

Logging The Adirondacks From The West (1800-1820)

May 2, 2022 by Noel Sherry 6 Comments

2a Eastern Lewis Co TownshipsIn the nineteenth century Lewis County settlements east of the Black River were just getting established; most of these included at least one saw mill. By 1820 these settlements were beginning to push their way up the rivers into the Adirondacks, and new mills were being built along their courses. A Copenhagen, NY farmer on Tug Hill, viewing the Adirondack panorama spread out to his east, wrote the following in a Journal & Republican article titled “North Woods Wonder:”

“All the wilderness is strewn with lakes as if some great mirror had been shattered by an Almighty hand, and scattered through the forests for Nature to make her toilet by … And how the rivers meander the woods as the veins of a human hand. There are Beaver, Moose, and Indian, Bog, Grass and Racket… And how rough and shaggy the wilderness is with mountains … Let them pass unnamed.”

One of these “shattered” gems was Twitchell Lake. [Read more…] about Logging The Adirondacks From The West (1800-1820)

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History, Nature, Western NY Tagged With: Adirondacks, Alexander Macomb, Beaver Falls, Beaver River, Black River, Boonville, Brown's Tract, conservation, Copenhagen, Croghan, Diana, Environmental History, Forestport, Greig, Herkimer COunty, Independence River, Independence River State Forest, Independence River Wild Forest, Indigenous History, Industrial History, Lewis County, Logging, Lowville, Moose River, New Bremen, Old Forge, Oneida County, Oswegatchie River, Otter Creek, Otter River, Raquette River, surveying, Totten Crossfield Tract, Twitchell Lake, Watson

Simeon DeWitt: America’s Surveyor General

April 25, 2022 by Peter Hess 2 Comments

The Roemer map of Albany 1698 showing fort orange and BeverwyckTjerck Claeszen DeWitt immigrated to New Amsterdam (now New York City) from Grootholt in Zunterlant in 1656. Grootholt means Great Wood and Zunterland was probably located on the southern border of East Friesland, a German territory on the North Sea only ten miles from the most northerly province of the Netherlands.

By 1657, Tjerck DeWitt married Barber (Barbara) Andrieszen (also Andriessen) in the New Amsterdam Dutch Church and moved to Beverwyck (now Albany). While in Beverwyck, he purchased a house. At this time Albany contained 342 houses and about 1,000 residents, about 600 of whom were members of the Dutch Church. [Read more…] about Simeon DeWitt: America’s Surveyor General

Filed Under: Capital-Saratoga, History, Hudson Valley - Catskills, Mohawk Valley, New York City, Western NY Tagged With: Albany, Albany County, Albany Rural Cemetery, American Revolution, Aurelius, Brutus, Camillus, Cato, Cayuga County, Cicero, Cincinnatus, Dryden, Fabius, Galen, Geography, George Washington, Greece, Hannibal, Hector, Homer, Ithaca, Junius, Kingston, Locke, Lysander, Manlius, Maps, Marcellus, Military History, Milton, New Amsterdam, New Netherland, New York City, Onondaga County, Ovid, Pompey, Rome, Romulus, Schenectady County, Scipio, Sempronius, Seneca County, Simeon DeWitt, Solon, Stirling, surveying, Syracuse, Thompkins County, Tully, Ulster County, Ulysses, Virgil, West Point, Yorktown

Jack Sheppard: Civil War Vet, Panther Hunter, Adirondack Guide & Steamboat Operator

November 7, 2021 by Roy Crego 7 Comments

Exhibit 1_Sheppard Portrait Jack Sheppard came to the Fulton Chain region of the Western Adirondacks after roaming the West as a youth and then served in the Union Army during the Civil War.

These experiences equipped Sheppard with the knowledge, skills, and social network to become a successful guide and enabled him to shift his occupation from guide to innkeeper, to builder, to businessman. He never married or raised a family, but when he left the Adirondacks in 1892 he left behind a long list of devoted friends that reads like a virtual who’s who of Adirondack history. [Read more…] about Jack Sheppard: Civil War Vet, Panther Hunter, Adirondack Guide & Steamboat Operator

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: 117th NY Volunteers, Adirondack Guides, Adirondacks, Brown's Tract, Civil War, Environmental History, Fourth Lake, Genealogy, Hamilton County, Herkimer COunty, hunting, Moose River, Mountain Lions, Old Forge, Steamboating, surveying, Verplanck Colvin, wolves

Deep In The Adirondack Woods, A Colvin Survey Benchmark Revealed

September 15, 2021 by Noel Sherry 3 Comments

1. Picture of Frank Tweedy, courtesy of Special Collections, Schaffer Library, Union College, 1875 As a boy growing up in the Battle Hill section of White Plains, NY, I remember my excitement at reading a brass memorial telling me “George Washington slept here.” White Plains was the site of a battle during the American Revolution.

Now as an adult I have had the thrill of learning that Verplanck Colvin surveyed Twitchell Lake and took measurements on the shore where my log cabin stands in Big Moose, NY.  That realization launched me on a quest to find a benchmark placed by one of Colvin’s surveyors on an important boundary line nearby. [Read more…] about Deep In The Adirondack Woods, A Colvin Survey Benchmark Revealed

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Adirondacks, Big Moose, Big Moose Lake, Frank Tweedy, Hamilton County, John Brown Tract, Pigeon Lake Wilderness, surveying, Totten Crossfield Tract, Twitchell Lake, Verplanck Colvin

Naming the Lakes of the Eckford Chain

March 14, 2021 by Mike Prescott 3 Comments

Ebenezer-Emmons-1-216x300In the summer of 2017 I decided to paddle the Eckford Chain of Lakes in the Adirodnacks. We set out one fine August morning from Raquette Lake, crossed the lake, and proceeded up the Marion River, through the carry, putting back in at the Utowana dock, continuing through Utowana Lake into Eagle Lake, and then into Blue Mountain Lake before pulling our boats out at the Blue Mountain beach.

Our conversation (and questions) turned to the name Eckford Chain of Lakes. [Read more…] about Naming the Lakes of the Eckford Chain

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History Tagged With: Blue Mountain Lake, Eagle Lake, Eckford Chain of Lakes, Navy, paddling, Raquette Lake, Raquette River, surveying, Utowana Lake

An Adirondack Surveyor’s Unpublished Work Reflects On A “Wild and Woolly” Career

January 14, 2021 by Noel Sherry 4 Comments

Two Topo Maps by TweedyFrank Tweedy’s four-years of Adirondack surveying under Verplanck Colvin prepared him for a 43-year career as Topographical Engineer with the US Geological Survey (1884-1927).

After completing his survey of the Beaver River Basin and the Totten & Crossfield Purchase’s western line (1876-79), Frank served as Sanitary Engineer in Newport, R. I. (1880-81) before signing on with the Northern Transcontinental Survey based in Newport (1882-83). His contributions to mapping the Rocky Mountains stand as a big part of his legacy. [Read more…] about An Adirondack Surveyor’s Unpublished Work Reflects On A “Wild and Woolly” Career

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, Capital-Saratoga, History Tagged With: Adirondack Park, Beaver River, Big Moose, Frank Tweedy, nature, surveying, Twitchell Lake

An Adirondack Surveyor’s Basecamp At Twitchell Lake

January 7, 2021 by Noel Sherry Leave a Comment

The First Camp on Twitchell LakeAs Frank Tweedy approached the end of his four-year stint with forest surveyor Squire Snell on Verplanck Colvin’s Adirondack Survey, Southwest Division, he was no longer a tenderfoot, but a veteran surveyor and topographer, with many miles of survey work in the Beaver River basin and six expertly drawn maps to his credit.

His southern trek to finish the Totten and Crossfield Tract boundary line necessitated a new base camp well south of Beaver River. Twitchell Lake in Big Moose was the perfect location. [Read more…] about An Adirondack Surveyor’s Basecamp At Twitchell Lake

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History, Nature, Recreation Tagged With: Adirondack Park, Adirondacks, Beaver River, Big Moose, Frank Tweedy, Fulton Chain, Native Plants, surveying, Twitchell Lake

Rediscovering An Ancient Adirondack Survey Monument

December 29, 2020 by Noel Sherry 7 Comments

C1 Colvin's TwnShp 42-41 Corner MapRight out of college as a Civil Engineer, Frank Tweedy spent four seasons as part of Verplanck Colvin’s Southwest Division, producing six  topographically accurate maps of the Beaver River basin and the important Totten and Crossfield Tract border with Brown’s Tract.

His maps and field books received high marks from his boss, and they recorded several moments of exciting discovery on his part, first as he closed ranks with the Eastern Division crew, completing a survey Line from Lowville to Lake Champlain; and then with shouts of victory at finding “The Great Corner” of Totten & Crossfield’s million-acre land Purchase. [Read more…] about Rediscovering An Ancient Adirondack Survey Monument

Filed Under: Adirondacks & NNY, History, Nature, Recreation Tagged With: Adirondack Park, Adirondacks, Beaver River, Brown's Tract, Frank Tweedy, hiking, John Brown Tract, nature, surveying, Totten Crossfield Tract, Twitchell Lake, Verplanck Colvin, Wildlife

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