Oneida Indian Settlement, Nichols Pond, in Smithfield

I’d been on a lengthy quest for the Oneida Stone, that sacred altar stone of the Iroquois Oneida Indians. My research and my travels had been going on for years. You can read more about it in my post about my visit to Forest Hill Cemetery in Utica, NY, and in a post about the People of the Standing Stone (the meaning of the name “Oneida”), and in another post of my efforts.

From what I have been able to ascertain, the Oneida Stone was something akin to the Ark of the Covenant for the Hebrews. The stone followed the Oneidas to their new settlements (all by itself without human intervention– some say the stone rested on a glacier, hm); when the stone was heaved into the crotch of a tree, the Oneidas were victorious in battle. They used the stone as a council landmark, too.

Now I am wondering if there were not several stones that the Oneidas called sacred– one in Smithfield here and another smaller one elsewhere. Or perhaps there was one small sacred stone and it rested on some larger stones that have been confused as being sacred? Here’s a lithograph drawn by historian Henry Rowe Schoolcraft in his book, “Notes on the Iroquois.” That looks too large to be able to fit in the crotch of a tree, and it much too large to have been placed on the memorial table at Forest Hill Cemetery, which I took a photo of, below:

Guess what, we found the stone depicted in the old lithograph.

The uniqueness of the stone (or stones??) is that it is not indigenous to the Mohawk Valley– the stone is apparently of syenite, found in the Adirondack region. The Oneidas first settlement was somewhere near Oneida Lake, but they eventually moved to the area now known as Smithfield, NY. It is a beautiful area that commands a beautiful view of the valleys of Madison County.

The first white settler of Smithfield was an American Revolution patriot who fought that first battle at Lexington and Concord in 1775. He was given this tract of land for his military services. Oddly enough, he is my direct ancestor; so there is a personal interest in these stories. When my ancestor settled these lands, the Oneidas had recently left the area to settle in what is now known as Oneida Castle, NY– I blogged about it when I stopped to see the Skenandoah Boulder, which rests by the side of the road right outside the town limits.

Back to Smithfield here, it is said that the Oneidas first settled in this area as far back as the 1400s. They built a large village here, with Nichols Pond at the back and a swampy moat surrounding their village to protect the people from enemies (notably, the nasty Huron Indians from Canada).

Click the photo for ALL SIZES and choose “Original” to see it close up. You can see the pond at the back of the village, the moat on either side, and a fire in the entrance.

You probably also see some men with guns shooting at the village. What’s up with that?

Well, I’m glad you asked! If it wasn’t for this battle, you just might be speaking in French today! This scene depicts the famous battle of 1615 here on this spot. Samuel de Champlain, founder of Quebec and buddy to those nasty Canadian Huron Indians we mentioned, decided to travel to this Oneida village and provoke a fight. The Hurons and the Oneidas had a long-standing animosity. The Hurons thought de Champlain and his French buddies (and their amazing “iron arrows”– AKA “guns”) could wipe out the Oneidas.

It was the first time the Oneidas had ever seen or heard the “iron arrows.” They were absolutely floored, but they fought back viciously. de Champlain was wounded in battle, and the French and Hurons took off for Canada, leaving the Oneidas intact but badly wounded.

The Oneidas (and their tribesmen, the Iroquois League of Nations) never forgot that battle. They made the French their bitterest enemies. When things grew heated between the English and the French over North American territory, the Iroquois allied themselves with the English to defeat the French. And that’s exactly what they did, in the French and Indian War of 1754.

The area is a park now. If we had brought our shovels, we may have tried to look for some arrowheads or artifacts. but instead we roamed the vast acreage and explored the wooded area. There are trails that lead all around the pond. There were– amazing to me– hardly any insects.

The forest was strange to me, I don’t know why. I’ve been in all sorts of forests and have never been jittery, but this was eerie and forbidding.

And it was as humid as anything. We didn’t follow the trail for very long, but we did walk to the wetland overlook of the swampy end of the pond. It’s a huge pond!

Finally, across the park was another historical marker where some archaeology had been ongoing.

The pits were net extremely large– they were perhaps the size and depth of a kiddie pool. I do wonder how they stored squash and corn in soft soil pits, especially in the forest during New York’s steamy summers and wet autumns. But that’s another investigation…

As for the Oneida Stone, I’m still looking. From what I have been able to gather, “the” syenite stone was taken from the Oneidas in 1849 and set in Forest Hill Cemetery. The Oneidas were almost completely eradicated as a people. But they have come back to their ancestral lands, and the stone was returned to them in the 1970s. It is said that the stone now rests outside the door of their official council house, somewhere south of Oneida, NY. I hope to find it when I go out that way, soon. So the quest continues!

UPDATE: Since the writing of this article, I found the Oneida stone! Read about my story.

Civil War Re-enactment Coming Up!

I love it when I hear about these re-enactment events BEFORE they occur. It seems that I always hear about them in the news after they have happened, and I miss out on all the fun! I’m really hoping to go to this one: the Annual Civil War Weekend in Peterboro, NY.

Peterboro invites everyone to visit and experience what life was like 150 years ago. After visiting the soldier’s camps, enjoy the music, drama, storytelling, and period craft demonstrations. Come for a day, wander through Confederate and Union camps and listen to the stories of the men and women. Watch them drill for the battle. Each afternoon, hear the sound of cannons booming and muskets cracking. The smoke of gun powder will rise as the north and south face off for a very realistic battle reenactment.

There’s a concert on Saturday, too.

This special concert program features the highly acclaimed 77th New York Regimental Balladeers and the Irish Volunteers. It will evoke the memory of those Irishmen who fought in the ranks of the Union and Confederate armies. The 77th is a nationally recognized Civil War string band, and have performed at Gettysburg, the U.S. Grant National Memorial and other historic sites around the country.

Admission is $7 for adults; $3 for ages 6-12, and free for children under 6. Parking is free, too. There’s a separate $5 admission charge for the Saturday 8 p.m. concert at the Community Center. This sounds like a blast! For more information: 315-684-9022.

Chittenango Falls State Park, Chittenango, NY

The Chittenango Falls State Park is another park slated for closure by New York State government, due to politicians’ mismanagement of taxpayers’ money lack of funds. It’s a lovely park, and I would hate to see it closed. We visited the park a few years ago. It is one of the crown jewels of Madison County. And Chittenango Falls is exquisite.

Chittenango Falls is about 170 feet high. The gorge, as you can see in the photo above, is enormous. There is no doubt that a whole lot of water once flowed down this creek.

The park is very woodsy. Admission for us (a minivan with four kids) was $6. There are no amusements at this park, and the trails are short (some were closed; I suspect it was because of the severe flooding we had before our visit that summer of 2006). But the “atmosphere” was right up our alley– thickly wooded forests, roaring water, lots of green space, benches, and beautiful stonework. The kids were enthralled with watching tufted titmouse birds dive and spin with vicious acrobatic moves over the water (we figured they were catching bugs). Chipmunks scurried everywhere, walnuts, dropping from trees, were just begging to be opened, and there were amazing fossils to be found in the large stone slab steps.

There were fossils in the stone stairs. The kids loved discovering them. According to Wikipedia, the Chittenango Falls park is home to the “endangered Chittenango Ovate Amber Snail (Novisuccinea chittenangoensis).”

Live specimens of the Chittenango snail cannot be found anywhere else on Earth.

I love that Latin word for Chittenango: chittenangoensis. We did not spot any snails.

We enjoyed terrific views of the falls at all levels: above, looking straight down, halfway down, below, and down the Chittenango Creek a bit. I liked the trails best of all. Walking down the trail to the gorge below was no easy feat. The trail was rocky and steep, and narrow at times. I guess that is part of what made it fun– it was adventurous!

The trail begins at the top of the falls. There are a lot of areas convenient to the view.

There were logs and other mangled debris snagged to the rocks. It can be safe to surmise that all this junk was a result from the Big Floods of June 2006 here in Upstate New York.

You can see the wooden footpath in the photo above. A steep trail takes you directly to it. Click the picture if you want a larger view, and then click “All Sizes” for a very large photo.

We made our way down to the gorge toward the creek. Read more

A Great Ski Deal in Madison County, NY

Believe it or not, I have NEVER been skiing, despite living in Upstate New York all my life. Oh, but I have shoveled my fair share above average amount of snow! If you have been pawing at the hooves, waiting for a good deal on a ski package, I have two pieces of good news for you:

ONE: New York State FINALLY has enough snow for skiing!

TWO: There’s a great deal going on for the Madison County ski mountain, Toggenburg, in Fabius, NY. I hear it’s a great trail for beginner and intermediate skiers and snowboarders– a great place to bring the family! If you stay at one of eight participating bed and breakfast resorts, you get your Toggenburg ski ticket for only $25! This is a great discount; regular tickets are priced $45. Since you have to stay somewhere, it may as well be at a beautiful inn and get a discount on your tickets at the same time. There is no limitation to the deal, either– you can have a party of one, or two, or twenty, or 200. If you all stay at one of the participating inns, everyone gets in to the Toggenburg Ski Area, all day, for $25. See the Madison County Stay and Ski website for more details on the deal.

On a personal note: I have passed by many of these bed and breakfast inns, and they are so beautiful and brimming with history. We have long admired the Brae Loch Inn in Cazenovia (I am, after all a Scot!). See the website for a peek into many of the exquisite bed and breakfast inns here in Upstate. Wow! You won’t be disappointed.

Photo Hunters: Garbage

Garbage is today’s theme. Boy oh boy. you could get REALLY creative with this one! I was tempted to snap a photo of a box full of the worst books in the world, or a photo of the current White House and Congress, or of my local school building… but I think it is wise to avoid politics today, lol. So I decided to go with *just* garbage. Although, as the saying goes, “One man’s junk is another man’s treasure.”

Here’s a photo of some garbage– er, treasure. I drove by a salvage barn on Route 20 in Madison, NY. It’s actually a cool place– they have some of the neatest things to be found there. If you are willing to dig past all the garbage.

Read more

Next Page »