New York Almanack

History, Natural History & the Arts

Union College

Excavations To Begin At Albany’s Lock One

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Len F. Tantillo's "The Weighlock, Albany, NY, 1880," oil on canvas, 32 x 48 inches, 2024.The NYS Department of Transportation (DOT) has granted a permit for an archeological excavation to confirm the location of historic Lock One of the Erie Canal in Albany’s downtown Warehouse District.

This according to a recent message to supporters of The Albany Waterway’s project to uncover the old lock, buried for a century, and transform the site. The lock was once connected to a boat basin, an associated weigh lock, and the Hudson River. [Read more…] about Excavations To Begin At Albany’s Lock One

Remains of Woman Said Killed in Schenectady Massacre Being Re-interred

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A partial human skull believed to belong to a victim of the Schenectady Massacre (courtesy Union College)On the frigid, snowy night of February 8, 1690, a band of French marauders and their Native American allies stormed the stockaded frontier village at what is now Schenectady, NY. Sixty people were slaughtered during the raid, including 10 women and 12 children, and 11 Black enslaved people, and dozens of others captured. About 60 residents were spared, including 20 Mohawk people. The raiders set fire to most of the homes and barns in the community, leaving the settlement in ruins.

What came to be known as the Schenectady Massacre was one of the first skirmishes of King William’s War (1689-1697), an attempt to conquer New York during the first clash between England and France for control of North America. [Read more…] about Remains of Woman Said Killed in Schenectady Massacre Being Re-interred

Carl George: Scientist, Adirondack Advocate & Poet

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Carl George holds court on the invasive garlic mustard in June 2008 (courtesy David Gibson)Carl George, Professor Emeritus at the Biology Department of Union College, died in December at age 95, leaving his wife Christine, and legions of friends at Union College, and around the world. [Read more…] about Carl George: Scientist, Adirondack Advocate & Poet

The Ballston Brief: The Law School That Time Misplaced

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Sans Souci Hotel built 1803, Law school 1849-1851Long before Saratoga County’s Ballston Spa was incorporated in 1807, a grand vision rose from its mineral-rich soil: the Sans Souci Hotel. Built in 1803 by Nicholas Low — one of the village’s earliest developers and most influential landowners — the hotel was a marvel of its time.

Towering three stories high and capable of hosting 250 guests, it briefly held the title of the largest resort in the United States. With its elegant proximity to the famed mineral springs and a nightly rate of $8 (a luxury in its day), Sans Souci attracted a glittering clientele of politicians, economists, and literary figures. [Read more…] about The Ballston Brief: The Law School That Time Misplaced

Records Reveal Jimmy Carter’s Legacy, Time In Schenectady

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Jimmy Carter waving from Air Force One in 1977Following his death Sunday, the legacy of the United States’ longest-lived president, Jimmy Carter, will be the topic of much discussion.

For historians and journalists, there are plenty of records available. [Read more…] about Records Reveal Jimmy Carter’s Legacy, Time In Schenectady

Dick Lawton: Warren County’s Early Radio Writer

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The logo from a 1953 Sentinel Radio Corporation stock certificate signed by Richard A. Lawton as SecretaryGlens Falls High School graduating senior Richard B. “Dick” Lawton in 1922 wanted to make a mark on the world. “What can I do to be forever known, and make the age to come my own?” was his favorite saying.

His fame would not be forever but, at least in Glens Falls, in Warren County, NY, he would claim the new emerging radio age as his own. Lawton, in 1923, was the first Post-Star radio editor, a new specialized beat. [Read more…] about Dick Lawton: Warren County’s Early Radio Writer

Speaker Heck: A Republican’s Long NYS Assembly Tenure

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Oswald D Heck opening the New York State Legislature in 1957Oswald D. “Ozzie” Heck was Speaker of the New York State Assembly for 22 years, longer than anyone else.

For everyone but the very few who find the state legislature a topic of passing interest, though, he is best known as the eponym of the of the state-owned day-use island off Assembly Point on Lake George, which for most of its history was known as South Island. [Read more…] about Speaker Heck: A Republican’s Long NYS Assembly Tenure

The Seeley Family: Settlers, Patriots & Missionaries

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Augustus Horton SeeleyIn the spring of 1870, Rev. George Augustus Seeley boarded the steamship Colorado in New York harbor bound for Liverpool, England. When he stepped aboard that day, Rev. Seeley was beginning a journey of 8,000 miles to Farrukhabad, India, returning as a missionary to the place of his birth 23 years earlier.

This is a story of how the seeds planted by early settlers and patriots from Charlton, Saratoga County bore fruit as far away as the other side of the globe through the lives of George Augustus, and his ancestors. [Read more…] about The Seeley Family: Settlers, Patriots & Missionaries

“Locusts of the East”: The Yankee Invasion of New York

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Anthony Finley (1784 – 1836) 1827 Map of New YorkNew York by 1820 was becoming a “colony from New England” to use the phrase of President Timothy Dwight of Yale. The “Puritan Pope,” as he was some­ times called, estimated that 60 to 67 percent of the people of New York had originated in the “land of steady habits.”

The few thousand Puritans who had established a new Zion around Boston in the 1630s were a remarkably energetic, prolific, and self-assertive people. The thin soils on the hilly lands, the harsh winters, and the stern theology of John Calvin created a distinct community spirit and shaped a unique character. [Read more…] about “Locusts of the East”: The Yankee Invasion of New York

A Tornado in Schenectady, 1847

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Tornado at Schenectady from the Cohoes Advertiser August 31, 1847TORNADO AT SCHENECTADY. On Saturday last [August 28, 1847], about four o’clock in the afternoon, Schenectady was visited by a phenomenon unusual in these high latitudes. Gentlemen who witnessed its inception, relate that a heavy storm seemed gathering over the high grounds which bound the city on the East, when suddenly large clouds were seen to rush towards each other from opposite directions with amazing velocity. [Read more…] about A Tornado in Schenectady, 1847

Albany’s Squire Whipple: Father of the Iron Truss Bridge

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Squire WhippleSquire Whipple was born in Hartwick, Massachusetts on September 16th, 1804. His parents were James and Electa Whipple. Born and raised on a farm, he attended a small country school for three or four months a year. He moved to New York in 1817.

By the age of seventeen, he passed the required examination for common school teaching and taught part time to finance his education. In 1822-1828 he attended Hartwick College in Otsego County; Fairfield Academy in Herkimer County; and graduated from Union College, Schenectady in 1830. He spent the next few years working as a surveyor for the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad and married Anna Case. [Read more…] about Albany’s Squire Whipple: Father of the Iron Truss Bridge

Medical Practice in 19th Century Schenectady

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Joseph Lister calls for an antiseptic spray prior to surgeryVery little is documented about medicine in Schenectady County during the 19th century. There are few hospital records to review; Ellis Hospital was not founded until 1885; and the Schenectady County Medical Society did not meet between 1843 and 1869.

We can however, glean some insight into this period from old newspapers, a wonderful book on the 134th NY Volunteer Infantry, minutes of the Schenectady Common Council, and old stories from the Efner Center and the Schenectady County Historical Society library. [Read more…] about Medical Practice in 19th Century Schenectady

The 1832 Cholera Epidemic in the Capital District

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le petit journal Cholera can kill more people more quickly than any other disease. Thousands can die overnight. More people died from cholera in the 100-year period from 1817-1917 than from three centuries of Bubonic Plague (Black Death) during the Middle Ages.

The disease is contracted by the ingestion of water and food with fecal contamination by Vibrio cholerae bacteria, resulting in acute diarrhea, dehydration, and death. Poor sanitation contributes to its spread. [Read more…] about The 1832 Cholera Epidemic in the Capital District

Ralph Waldo Emerson in the Capital District in 1852

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Ralph Waldo Emerson courtesy the Library of Congress Throughout the 1840s, members of the commercial and professional classes of New York’s Capital Region cities established “Young Men’s Associations,” loosely based upon the Young Men’s Christian Association recently founded in England. In Schenectady, ten prominent men formed their own Young Men’s Association in an attempt to bring culture to their growing city of 10,000. [Read more…] about Ralph Waldo Emerson in the Capital District in 1852

Chester A. Arthur, The Spoils System & Civil Service Reform

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Chester Alan Arthur by sculptor George Edwin BisselYates Street in Schenectady runs north and south from Union Street to Liberty Street, from the Friendship Baptist Church on Union Street to the Katbird Shop at the corner of Liberty and Yates.

In the late 1840s it was regularly traversed by the only former resident of Schenectady and the only graduate of Union College ever destined to occupy the office of President of the United States. [Read more…] about Chester A. Arthur, The Spoils System & Civil Service Reform

Schenectady and the Adirondacks: A Legacy of Conservation

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Upper Falls at the Plotter Kill Reserve courtesy Michael DianaSchenectady has a long history of its residents being active in conservation and outdoor recreation – in Schenectady County and in the wilderness of the North Country, alike.

Schenectadians’ interest in protecting and exploring wilderness has its roots in the mid 1800s with industrialization and westward expansion. The wilderness was at risk of disappearing, and influential nature lovers used their writings to convince Americans that preserving land and wildlife was vital. Many Americans, including people in Schenectady, could easily see the case for this. [Read more…] about Schenectady and the Adirondacks: A Legacy of Conservation

The Adirondack Raised Relief Map: Some History

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Paul Schaefer, back to camera, hosts an Adirondack discussion with, left to right, Joe Martens, Governor Mario Cuomo’s environmental secretary, standing in background with film camera Carl Schaefer, Paul’s brother, seated Dave Gibson with the Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks, Dan Luciano, deputy environmental secretary for the governor, and on the stool Tom Cobb, Trustee and later President of the Board of the Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks. Photo by Ken Rimany.The Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks had hired me the previous winter. It was now the spring of 1987. Windows and doors were again opening to the hope and then the reality of spring’s warmth. The director of the Schenectady Museum William (Bill) Verner had given me, practically rent free, a desk and telephone from which to begin work as the Association’s first Executive Director in over 60 years.

It helped that Bill was a member of my board of trustees, and that his knowledge and love for the Adirondacks and Adirondack history from a home base in Long Lake was long and deep. [Read more…] about The Adirondack Raised Relief Map: Some History

The Volunteers Behind the Adirondack Research Library

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Interior of the Adirondack Research Library in the Kelly Adirondack Center of Union College Photo by David GibsonMany organizations introduce their work with the words “were it not for the volunteers, we could not…” That can be justifiably said of the Adirondack Research Library (ARL), formerly part of the Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks (AfPA). [Read more…] about The Volunteers Behind the Adirondack Research Library

Radio Station WGY’s 100th Anniversary of Broadcasting

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WGY Radio Players performing a scene from William Vaughn Moody's The Great Divide in 1923Capital Region radio station WGY, New York State’s oldest broadcaster, will celebrate their 100th year with a live afternoon of broadcasting on Sunday, February 20th.

WGY’s original licensee was General Electric (GE), headquartered in Schenectady. In early 1915, the company was granted a Class 3-Experimental license with the call sign 2XI. That license was canceled in 1917 due to the First World War, but 2XI was re-licensed in 1920. [Read more…] about Radio Station WGY’s 100th Anniversary of Broadcasting

Adirondack Journal of Environmental Studies Call for Submissions

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Adirondack Journal Volume 24The Adirondack Journal of Environmental Studies (AJES) is now accepting submissions for Volume 25. Articles of a broad disciplinary scope will be accepted for review, including topics in natural and social sciences, arts and humanities related to the region or more general environmental issues. [Read more…] about Adirondack Journal of Environmental Studies Call for Submissions

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