History, Natural History & the Arts
The year 1886 in Washington County, New York, ended on an optimistic tone.
“But thou, the old year, has not been a very hard one, especially,” The Granville Sentinel reported on December 31st, 1886.
Extended periods of drought followed by weeks of unseasonal warm rain gave way in the final days of the year to seasonal weather. [Read more…] about The New Year in 1887, Granville, Washington County
Lake Champlain froze completely on January 8th, 1887, missing by just two days the seventy-year record for earliest freeze.
“Saturday morning (January 8th) was the coldest of the season, the mercury registering 26 below zero – in the shade,” The Granville Sentinel reported on January 14th. [Read more…] about The Joys of a January Freeze, 1887
This little piggy from Eagle Lake apparently did not want to go to market.
“Hebert Moore’s pig is still at large. Motorists are requested to drive with care in the vicinity,” the Ticonderoga Sentinel reported on July 15th, 1920. “A reward of $1 is offered by L. Lodge to anyone who will catch said pig single handed. Mr. Lodge must witness the catch. $3 if done after dark.” [Read more…] about An Anthology of Pig Tales from Northern New York
If there was one thing 19th century Granville Sentinel publisher Anna McArthur disliked more than Democrats, it was a competing newspaper attempting to siphon off Republican readership. [Read more…] about A Washington County Political Newspaper Brawl
The weather at Granville, in Washington County, in June 1877, was ideal for agriculture.
“This is the weather that makes farmers happy,” The Granville Sentinel reported.
Corn and flax crops looked promising, but “vigilance and perseverance is to be the price of potatoes.” [Read more…] about A Plague of Potato Bugs in 1877 Washington County
Presidential elections can strain neighborly relations, as reiterated in Washington County’s Granville Sentinel in 1876.
“The one pleasant thing about it, when the cruel suspense is over, they’ll be less lying in the newspapers and less personal defamation in the streets,” the Sentinel quipped on October 29th. [Read more…] about Local Newspaper Editor Ponders Election of 1876
A hog weighing in at 1,200 pounds raised in Greenwich, in Washington County, was spared the slaughter, at least temporarily, in order to be put on display as an oddity.
“G.V.P. Lansing, a resident of the town of Greenwich, has the unique distinction of having raised and marketed the largest hog ever grown in the world,” The Post-Star reported on March 12, 1919. “The hog was sold last week to Bennett Brothers of Albany, and shipped to that place.” [Read more…] about Big Hogs In The Paper: A Collection Of Pig Tales From Historic Newspapers
The Lake George Land Conservancy (LGLC) has protected 25 acres on County Route 6 in the Town of Dresden on the east side of Lake George in Washington County, NY.
The property includes 1,300 feet of Fairy Brook, a small tributary of Lake George which drains north into Lake Champlain at Ticonderoga and ultimately into the Richelieu and then St. Lawrence Rivers into the North Atlantic. [Read more…] about Portion of Lake George Tributary Protected
The Plattsburgh Daily Press in late 1894 fact-checked the boasts of M.W. Howard, age 32, of Alabama, and George M. Southwick, age 31, of Albany, who each claimed to be the youngest member of the incoming U.S. House of Representatives.
Actually, it was local Representative-elect Wallace T. Foote Jr., who would still be 30 when he took office, that would have the distinction. Foote represented New York’s 23rd District, which included Essex, Clinton, Franklin, Warren and Washington counties. [Read more…] about Wally Foote: ‘The Most Handsome Man in Congress’
The Post-Star of Glens Falls received first-hand accounts of the 1920 Republican National Convention from Washington County suffragist Betty Wakeman Mitchell, who had a choice seat in Section 70 of the Chicago Coliseum, where she could hear the nominating speeches.
Two years earlier Mitchell had run unsuccessfully in a Republican primary for the state Assembly seat representing Washington County (once the home of Susan B. Anthony). [Read more…] about Suffragist Betty Wakeman Mitchell of Washington Co