Comstock's History Page Eleven

SOME OF THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF SCIPIO

CAYUGA COUNTY NEW YORK by Austin B. Comstock

I will be posting each page of this history separately. The index, posted on June 24, 2014 in 4 parts, provides the page numbers; you can also search the blog for a particular name appearing anywhere within it. 

The index is also published at  http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nycayuga/ and will eventually have a link back to this blog.

I hope you find something new!

Page Eleven

lived where Professor A. LaMar Lane now lives.

He was one of the most highly respected citizens in the community and a true Christian

gentleman. Much such a man as was “Uncle Tom” in Mrs. Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

Herman was unable to read and so he decided to attend school and learn to read his Bible.

 He went to school with his own children in the ‘50’s, he in the primer and they in the 3^rd and 4^th grade reader. His sons all joined the Union Army, and Herman said if they failed

he would go down and do his duty.

Samuel Phelps who bought the west half of Seth Sherwood’s land, built the north part of the house now known as the “Green” house. He sold several building lots and two large pieces of land, one to Enoch Honeywell who built a house and chair factory. This was on the property now owned by William Crowley. There were three lots between the Crowley farm and the Green place – one was the Guiles lot, the Boulster lot, and the house known as the Moses T. Fell house, now moved away (these were between the hospital and the cemetery).

Phelps also sold the north 50 acres of what is now owned by Herbert Robinson; he also sold 40 acres to Judge Spencer who built the house now occupied by John Cannon. The 50 acres was sold to Captain Calvin Tracy and Chester Tracy who built two houses on it in which they lived. Phelp’s widow afterward married Gilbert Honeywell, father of Enoch, and she received as her part of the land the Green house and 10 acres of land adjoining to the west. His son-in-law Joel Sherman and his son Ralph got the south half of the farm now owned by Herbert Robinson, whereon each of the built a house.

His sons Samuel and Erastus got the 4 acres now owned by William Crowley, and also the land on which the Hospital now stands. Orpha Hill was a daughter and the widow of Joshua Hill.

In 1814, Samuel Phelps built the hotel (now hospital) and leased it to John Swan who conducted it until 1819. Phelps then ran it two years. The Aaron Denniss hired the house and ran it until 1823 when he was succeeded by Christian Longnecker who gave the place to Henry Shoemaker in the spring of 1825, who stayed until 1831 when David Thomas came and kept a temperance house a part of a year and vacated in favor of John Seeley who ran the stage and kept the hotel until 1837. He gave place to David Milk who stayed two years and gave place to Amos Morgan, who tarried until 1841. Then John Riley came and stayed until 1844 when Stephen Fessenden took the place and ran it until 1849. Since that time it has been kept by many. I give their names in succession: Jason Boughton, William P. Smith, M. B. Kerr, James Allen,

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