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Roscoe Conkling Park, Utica, NY

Our trip to the Roscoe Conkling Park was brief, but it is a beautiful park and we hope to return. The park is perched atop Utica’s high hills, and overlooks the city and the Mohawk Valley with breathtaking views.

The park is named for Utica resident and mayor Roscoe Conkling. He was a popular mayor and national congressman, and also rubbed elbows with national political luminaries, such as Senator Thomas Pratt and President Chester Arthur. As a matter of fact, it was even speculated that Conkling has something to do with the assassination of President James Garfield so that Conkling’s pal (and Vice-President) Chester Arthur could become president. Conkling was influential in the nomination of Ulysses S. Grant as president.

When we wandered the park, we were alone, except for a few joggers. At the top of the hill are various monuments to local philanthropists.

We have visited the historic homes of the men noted here. See our visit to Fountain Elms in Utica to read about our great trip.

A curious tin chair rested in the ground. It looked out of place!

The best thing of all is the view of the valley. The Val Bialas ski lift begins up here. What a beautiful view! In the summer evenings, the city must look spectacular, all ablaze in a glittering symphony of fanciful Hinkley lighting.

Also down the hill is the Utica Zoo– we love the Zoo. Read about our wintertime exploits here. Roscoe Conkling Park is lovely– it must be a wonderful and peaceful repose from the hectic city living below.

Forest Hill Cemetery, Utica, NY

Last week, I took the opportunity to drive to nearby Utica, NY, to visit the Forest Hill Cemetery in the city. Utica is an amazingly historic town, and walking through Forest Hill Cemetery is like stepping back in time. Many of New York State’s most notable citizens are buried here. I won’t list them all! but I’ll show you a few of the sites we found. Behind Forest Hill Cemetery is the Roscoe Conkling Park. I’d never even known this place was there! What a beautiful park, and it sits perched on a high hill overlooking the city in the valley below. Breathtaking. I took photos– keep reading.

Forest Hill Cemetery was founded in 1850. It is a huge plot of land, established when people were becoming more aware of sanitation for urban areas. It’s a beautiful cemetery. The Gothic-style gate opens into several small park-like islands.

I found the old resting place of the Oneida Stone, that famed stone of the Oneida Indian Nation! It was taken from the Oneidas in 1849 and placed here during the cemetery’s opening ceremony. The stone has been returned to the Oneidas since 1974. According to Anthony Wonderley in his book, Oneida Iroquois Folklore, Myth, and History, the stone now sits at the Oneida Nation council house, on their historic land given to them after the American Revolution (on the old Honyoust tract).

I’ve done a variety of posts about the Oneida Indian Nation: The Skenandoah Boulder in Oneida, NY, The Turning Stone Casino, and The Shako:wi Oneida Indian Cultural Center.

The cemetery, like I’ve said, is filled with the buried remains of hundreds of luminaries from New York State history. New York State governor and Utica native Horatio Seymour is buried here.

Roscoe Conkling, a long-term Utica mayor and national figure, is buried here, too.

Also among those resting here are James Schoolcraft Sherman (vice-president under William Taft), John Adams’ granddaughter, John Jay’s personal secretary, Jedidiah Sanger (who founded New Hartford, NY), Moses Bagg (an influential merchant) and local philanthropists James Watson, Thomas Proctor, Alfred Munson, and Rachel and Maria Williams. I also found a few famous folks from the American Revolution, including Captain Benjamin Walker who was an aide of George Washington and Baron von Steuben (who is buried north of here and whose memorial site we have visited).

And we also saw the burial site of Amariah Brigham, that groundbreaking doctor who believed mentally ill patients could be treated, and began his practice at the very famous Utica Insane Asylum. The link will take you to my post about that, and this link is my post about our visit there.

One thing that caught our eye was a very peculiar memorial in the more “modern” section of the cemetery. I’d never seen anything like it.

I did some reading and this is a memorial to Justus Henry Rathbone of Utica. He founded the Knights of Pythias, and became extremely influential in politics and business. The Knights of Pythias sounded occultic to me (the oracles at Delphi in Greece worshiped the fortune-telling snake, Pythias)! I did some quick research and found that the Knights of Pythias is from the Greek myth Damon and Pythias. Huh. Wikipedia says this of Rathbone:

Justin H. Rathbone was the founder of the international fraternal order of the Knights of Pythias. He was born October 29, 1839 in New York. He graduated from Colgate University and attended Carlisle Seminary. He was a music composer and actor. In 1863 he moved to Washington D.C. as a government clerk in the Treasury Department, where he founded the Knights of Pythias on February 19, 1864. Rathbone wrote the ritual for the Knights of Pythias which is based on the mythological friendship of Damon and Pythias. He died in 1889.

It was a very interesting visit, and I don’t think I even scratched the surface of all the history to be discovered. I’ll have more about our visit to the Roscoe Conkling Park up the hill, and about the Oneida Stone, in future posts.

Nice Upstate Tourism Webpage

The Mohawk Valley (the area wedged between the Catskills and the Adirondacks in Central New York) has a nice new website. It’s a website created to promote the assets of living in Upstate New York. I noticed they have a terrific page for tourism in the Mohawk Valley. The only shortcoming is that my blog isn’t linked there.

There are some really great things to do around here (most of which I’ve seen and done). So feel free to pack your Rimowa and get going! Check it out, you might find something you like!

Fort Stanwix, Rome, NY: Summer 2007

Have I ever mentioned that we absolutely adore Fort Stanwix? We’ve been there many times over the years. This is one of the greatest parks and historic sites I have ever visited, and everyone who works there is so friendly and knowledgeable. Plus, they keep updating and adding new things.

For a more detailed history of the fort, see this earlier post I’d written about the fort and the Visitors Center.

We visited in summer 2007 (we visit almost every year). This visit was relaxing and exploratory. It began with a lovely walk around the park, from the Marinus Willet Visitor Center and all around to the entrance of the fort.

On the walkways, there are large, informative plaques.

I let the kids wander wherever they desired. We are quite familiar with the grounds. Here’s an aerial view of the fort. Forts were built this way in New York State. Some forts date back to the French and Indian War, before 1754!

I love the skyline from the top of the fort’s embankments.

The boys like the bombproof– a place under the berms where stores and ammunitions are kept. It also served as a hospital during times of siege.

The girls and I like learning about life back then. Therefore, the quarters and bunk rooms interested us.

All around the fort, the rooms in the long wooden dwellings are open for exploration. They are filled with genuine and replica articles that were common for this time period and for military barracks during the Revolutionary War.

There is always something neat to play with at the fort.

At the fort, we got to sit in the theatre this time, to watch a movie. The park service has, in the past several years, produced some excellent films about the fort. We’ve seen ones on the Battle of Oriskany and another about the Oneidas’ contribution to the war. Today was another great film about life at the fort during times when fighting ceased. It portrayed a soldiers’ experiences at the fort during times of monotony between battles. We recognized many of the actors in the movie– employees of the fort who have been so informative and friendly during our visits.

We also enjoyed a instructive presentation about popular music during the fort’s heyday. The instructor was a very talented fife player and made the presentation fun!

Although our visit was briefer than other visits, we still loved seeing Fort Stanwix again! And no doubt, we will see it again this summer! Since they keep adding new things, I’m sure it will not fail to interest us. Hopefully, we can make it to a re-enactment this year!

People of the Standing Stone: The Skenandoah Boulder in Oneida

We’ve been by it countless times. Every time we zip by it, we grab a fleeting glimpse and wonder aloud to each other what is etched on it, what is it’s significance, and why it is there. Today I finally got to get up very close and snap a photo of the words written on the plaque!

I’m talking about the Skenandoah Boulder, on Route 5 outside of Oneida Castle village limits. There is a stone resting on the side of the road, by a very busy four corners area, with an old historical marker punctured in the lawn next to it. “Skenandoah Boulder” is all the historical marker says.

I’d finally stopped a few months ago (in December) to get a photo of it, but the snow had been too high and too slushy for me to read what the plaque says. That photo is all I could get from my quick exploit.

The stone was tantalizingly near, but I couldn’t get closer than that!

The stone (about the size of a small couch, or loveseat) has an old copper plaque affixed on it (it’s now green). The print is small– too small for any passer-by to read even one word. Stopping the car on the side of this busy road is done at one’s own risk. I’ve always either been in a hurry or haven’t felt brave enough to stop the car and get a closer look.

Now that it is spring, I could park my car more safely, meander the very busy highway, and step onto the green grass.

This is what the plaque reads:

This marks the site of the last home of SKENANDOAH Chief of the Oneidas, “The White Man’s Friend.” Here he entertained Governor DeWitt Clinton 1810, and many other distinguished guests, and here he died in 1816 aged 110. He was carried on the shoulders of his faithful Indians to his burial in the cemetery of Hamilton College, Clinton, NY, and laid to rest beside his beloved friend and faithful teacher Rev. Samuel Kirkland.

“I am an aged hemlock; the winds of an hundred winters have whistled through my branches . I am dead at the top. The generation to which I belonged have run away and left me.” Skenandoah.

Erected 1912 by Skenandoah Chapter, N.S.D.A.R. Oneida, NY

We’d visited Rev. Kirkland’s and Skenandoah’s gravesite are Hamilton College; you can see photos and my post about it here.

I had done some research on this boulder and the Oneidas a few months ago. It only made the stone more intriguing. It is fitting to have a large boulder here, as it’s related to the Haudenosaunee and the meaning of their name: Oneida, People of the Standing Stone.

Oneida legend says that the Oneida were led to these lands by following a moving stone; where it stopped, they settled. There is another ice-age linkage here because glaciers move staggering amounts of loose stone and boulders (glaciers are made up of about one-third stone and two-thirds ice) and deposit these stones as erratics. Erratics are non-native stones and boulders which can be found all over New York. Syenite is one type of erratic and is frequently found in Oneida territories. The Skenandoah Boulder is perhaps the largest syenite erratic. It is named for a very famous Oneida Chief Skenandoah… As you pass through village of Oneida Castle, on NY 5, note that this was once the site of the principal Oneida village, known as Kanonwalohale.

We know about the great Oneida Chief Skenandoah– that close friend of Samuel Kirkland (founder of Hamilton College). Under Kirkland, Skenandoah became a Christian who influenced his tribesmen to join the Americans in the Revolutionary War.

His history– and the history of that stone– and his history in relation to that stone– is absorbing. This page taken from The History of Chenango and Madison Counties, 1880, by James H. Smith tells of the little-known history of the Oneidas and the first white settlers to the region.

Thus they were known as the people of the stone set in the fork of a tree. Tradition ascribes their origin to a stone, which, says Schoolcraft, “is a large, but not enormous, boulder of syenite, of the erratic block group, and consequently geologically foreign to the location,” there being “no rocks like this till we reach the Adirondacks.” “This stone,” says the same author, “became the national altar,” and “when it was necessary to light their pipes and assemble to discuss national matters, they had only to ascend the hill through its richly wooded groves to its extreme summit,” an eminence in the town of Stockbridge, where, he says, this stone, and the first castle of the Oneidas was located.

And who is “Schoolcraft”? I could find no reference to him on the website. Is this a reference to a relation of James Schoolcraft Sherman of Utica, vice-president during the Taft administration?

Another source I found says that this largest boulder of syenite rested at Forest Hill Cemetery in Utica, New York. Does it remain there, somewhere? Or was this stone removed to the four corners at Route 5, that same stone in the photo above? (Incidentally, Forest Hill in Utica is where James Schoolcraft Sherman is buried).

Before the door of an old chief, resting upright on the ground, stood the palladium of the clan, a stone of some size, declared by Mr. Kirkland to have been an object of idolatrous worship to many of the people. It was “a cylindrical stone of more than two hundred pounds weight, and unlike any other stone in that region.” From the earliest records, the Oneidas were spoken of as the “People of the Stone.” Onia is their word for a stone, and Oniota-aug means the people of the stone. The French called them Oneséionts; with the Dutch and English they were Oneidas.

Tradition declared that wherever the tribe moved, this cylindrical stone of mystery followed them. A strong man could carry it forty or fifty rods without resting; in this way, as the missionary says, it may certainly have followed them in their wanderings. It would seem to have been an essential of this ancient stone of the Oneidas that it could be lifted by the sinews of their warriors into “the crotch of a tree.” and when placed in that position, it rendered their braves invincible. Such is the tradition given by Mr. Kirkland, who was thoroughly familiar with the language and habits of the Oneidas.

There was another stone of much greater size, in the Oneida country, about which mysterious traditions hover. It was of considerable size and weight, and lay on the summits of a commanding height, overlooking the country on the Oneida Creek, as far as the lake, which on a bright day can be seen in the distance.

At one period the principal Oneida village lay near a fine spring in a valley beneath the height. There are vague rumors connected with this boulder of syenite, shadows of the uncertain past, which claim for it the dignity of a tribal altar. Of this larger stone Mr. Kirkland makes no mention.

It was removed in 1850, from the height on which it lay, to Forest Hill Cemetery in Utica. It is said that there is no stone of the same geological character nearer than the Adirondack Mountains. Its weight has been variously stated at from one to three tons.

We’ve been to the Munnsville Museum in the Stockbridge/Munnsville area. I was researching genealogy information on my ancestor Nathan Edson (a survivor of the Battle of Lexington) and learned that he had been granted the area of Stockbridge for his war services. The Indians of that area had moved to Oneida Castle, NY, in 1784. I am surprised and mystified about all the historical connections, and now there is a personal connection. If I ever had to explain why history is such a fascinating subject, then this is why!

A Drive to Hinckley Reservoir

Early last week, we had a dentist appointment north of where we live, and decided to take a little car trip further to the lovely foothills of the Adirondacks. Spring is just coming to the area, and the tree lines are a mixture of still-scraggly limbs and little green buds. The air was fresh and invigorating. I like to think that the Adirondacks are the epitome of Upstate New York life: austere and slightly acidic, but independent and noble. The Adirondacks is no place for soft living!

I really didn’t have any particular place to go. I just drove for the pleasure of driving. I enjoy the view on Route 365, so we followed it, north. We stopped at a parking area along the West Canada Creek. The view of the creek is lovely.

Further down the creek we could see two majestic loons swimming and diving for fish. Every once in a while, one of the loons would stretch open its wings and expose its enormous wingspan. They were too far away for my zoom-less camera, unfortunately.

North of us, we could see the peaks of the Adirondacks. How they beckoned us to come see them!

We had to resist them. We did putter up north >>> Read more of ‘A Drive to Hinckley Reservoir’

Bagg’s Square and Old Fort Schuyler, Utica, NY

Bagg’s Square is an inconspicuous spot in the northern section of Utica, NY. It is named for Moses Baggs, a blacksmith and tavern keeper who kept a thriving business here.

Before there was Utica, there was Fort Schuyler, built in this area by the British in 1758. It was a critical spot for the new American settlers. Fort Schuyler was “a chain of forts built to protect the northern frontier from the French and their Indian allies, and to guard the great ford across the Mohawk Valley.” Fort Schuyler was named for Colonel Peter Schuyler, the uncle of the famous Phillip Schuyler (who later became Alexander Hamilton’s father-in-law). There’s a bit of confusion about the naming of the forts. During the American Revolution, Fort Stanwix in Rome (another British-built fort and was named for a British officer during the French and Indian War of the 1750s) was renamed Fort Schuyler, after Philip Schuyler. This Fort Schuyler here near Bagg’s Tavern was renamed “Old Fort Schuyler.” After the Revolutionary War, both Fort Stanwix/Fort Schuyler and Old Fort Schuyler were dismantled. When Fort Stanwix/Fort Schuyler was resurrected in the 1970s as a memorial, it was given it’s original name Fort Stanwix. Got that? There’ll be a test tomorrow… whew!

In 1794, Moses Baggs built a small but comfortable tavern near the fort, to house the many settlers and military men traveling from the eastern to western ends of New York State. George Washington and Marquis de LaFayette stayed at the tavern, as well as Henry Clay and General Ulysses Grant. It also became a stagecoach stop for mail delivery. In 1815, Moses Baggs’ tavern was torn down and replaced by a larger one made of brick. That, too, is gone. This newer stone building and park remain as a memorial to the important part Utica played as intermediary for travelers and ideals of revolution and reconstruction.

If I remember correctly, this area is where a huge revival was sparked in the 1820s, under the preaching of Charles Grandison Finney. Utica was one of the most affected cities. It was reported that all bars and houses of ill-repute were closed, because there was no business for such promiscuous living. Everyone was “getting religion” and didn’t want to sin anymore! This area was buzzing with revival that it became known as the “Burned-Over District.” Imagine, this happening in Utica, New York!

And then this plaque at the top of the tavern made us stop in our tracks. >>> Read more of ‘Bagg’s Square and Old Fort Schuyler, Utica, NY’

Photo Hunters #62: High

New York Traveler is joining the Photo Hunter ranks hosted by Daisy the Curly Cat. This week’s theme is high. I have a lot of “high” photos, but here are my favorites:

Here’s the view of my Manhattan apartment, when I lived on Lexington Street in the late 1980s. This is a view of “Little India.” Read more about my adventure.

Here we are, high on a hill in Cherry Valley, NY. That’s a view of the Cobleskill Valley below. Read about our visit to the Cherry Valley Gorge here.

Here we are, high at the top of Chittenango Falls. >>> Read more of ‘Photo Hunters #62: High’

Nero, NY: Sock City

I discovered a quirky, humorous website, Entering City of Nero. It’s done by Bob Cudmore, of The Bob Cudmore Radio Show of Amsterdam, NY. In the spirit of Prairie Home Companion, Cudmore has a million little tales about a little town on Upstate New York, Nero. It’s all imaginary and quite funny.

No one in Nero believes that anything good will ever happen again. Today, a declining upstate New York mill town, even Nero’s beginnings were not auspicious. When the community was founded by British textile interests in the 19th century, the good classical names - Utica, Attica, Troy, Syracuse - had already been claimed by other upstate cities.

Some people thought the name Nero had a good, ancient ring to it, and noted that Nero rhymes with “hero.” Nero also rhymes with “zero”and “Zero Nero” has become a common taunt aimed at the Nero High School basketball team when the Fiddlers run onto the court.

Nobody researched history when Nero was named and the connection with the infamous emperor Nero, who fiddled while Rome burned, wasn’t discovered until the city’s tenth anniversary. By then, the word Nero was lettered on the signs into town and had been carved in stone on a few public buildings. Residents decided to keep the name.

Sock-making was Nero’s principal industry and, for many years, Nero was known as Sock City and “the sock-making capital of the world.” In the 1960s, the sock mills abandoned Nero for cheaper labor down south and, ultimately, offshore. Nero has never recovered.

It’s been said that humor is humorous because there’s always a little truth mixed in. This proves true here, with Nero’s woes! You can delve into more stories about Nero, NY, here. Prepare to chortle.

Hat tip NYCO.

Griffiss Air Force Base Technology Park, Rome, NY

We took a short drive to Rome, NY, to visit Griffiss Air Force Base Technology Park. Planes, especially military planes, just don’t float my boat. Real snoozers. But I have two sons who are crazy about machinery. Aren’t all boys? So this is for them.

Griffiss was an AFB for decades before the Clinton Administration downsized it. The city of Rome developed it into a technology park, and, among other things, also hosted a debauched rerun of Woodstock in 1999 here. The AFB was named for the first U.S. airman killed in action during WWII, Townsend Griffiss.

For most of its operation, the base was equipped with B-52 stratofortresses. All are gone except the “Mohawk Valley.” >>> Read more of ‘Griffiss Air Force Base Technology Park, Rome, NY’