Annual Report for 2012

Below is a slightly edited version of the annual report that I am required to submit each year to the town board and to the New York State Historian's Office.

Overview

In last year’s report, I had several goals noted down, and managed to carry out most of them.  A major accomplishment this year was getting the Bovina World War II Honor Roll reinstalled at the Bovina Community Hall.  I continued pursuing leads concerning the 1945 plane crash in Bovina and  researched and wrote on Bovina and the Civil War on my blog. Though Bovina did not yet exist when the War of 1812 started, I did identify some Bovina veterans of the conflict to commemorate the Bicentennial of that conflict.  Work continued to identify old farm foundations to ensure they are documented.

Research Themes/Topics

I’ve started identifying old house and barn foundations around Bovina.  In April, Marie Burns and Colleen Heavey took me up to the old house and barn foundation above Marie’s farm.  This likely was the original site of the house and barn, but at some point before the 20th century, new buildings were constructed closer to the road going up to Marie’s and the original buildings demolished.  In December, I explored a farm foundation, including a house, barn and root cellar, about 300 yards from Scutt Mountain Road.  It was the old Dean Farm.  In 2011, I had identified old farm foundations off Coulter Brook Road and off Cape Horn.  I’ve had several suggestions of other foundations to visit. 

I continued each month to present biographies of Bovina’s Civil War soldiers on my blog.  The series will conclude in March 2013.

Two more expeditions on Moon Mountain have yet to turn up evidence of the plane that crashed in the Bramley Mountain area in April 1945, but help from Ray Kearns, whose grandfather owned the farm near the crash site, gives me hope that we may yet find something. 

In April, the 1940 Federal Census came out.  I did an extensive review of the Bovina pages and did a blog entry about some of the information I found.

Bovina Cemeteries

Ed and Dick Davidson continue their work to document all the burials in the Town of Bovina.  During their September visit, they photographed and marked the position of all the stones in the Reformed Presbyterian Church cemetery.  And they have uploaded all the gravestone photographs they have taken onto the Find-a-Grave website.  Late in the year I was able to purchase on sale a gravestone cleaning solution recommended by the Association for Gravestone Studies and used by such organizations as Arlington National Cemetery.  The solution is biodegradable and, more importantly, will not cause damage to the stones.  I expect to start using it in the spring to clean stones that are particularly difficult to read.

Bovina Honor Roll

I achieved a major goal this year in having the World War II Bovina Honor Roll reinstalled in the Community Hall.  The honor roll had been stored for many years in the basement of the Bovina Museum.  The Bovina Historical Society, custodians of the roll, agreed to have it moved and the Bovina Town Board agreed to have it put up in the community hall.  Jim and Tom Hoy very generously covered the costs of having it reinstalled.  Dick Brannen took on the project and on November 3, an unveiling ceremony was held at the community hall, with two of the surviving veterans from the roll, Stanley ‘Stub’ Hewitt and Gordon Rabeler doing the honors.  The Daily Star (Oneonta) covered the event in its ‘Brighter Side’ feature.  It also was covered by the Delaware County Times.  The publicity has helped me to find out the status of more of the veterans on the roll, including the fact that three more are still alive, bringing the total as of this writing to six. 

Bovina History Blog-http://bovinanyhistory.blogspot.com/

The blog continues to be one of easiest ways for me to share the history of our town.  A printed set will be created for the Bovina Public Library (one for reference and one that can be loaned out) and another set at Russell’s Store.  A set also will go to the Delaware County Historical Association.

Articles

I did two articles for the community newsletter, put out by the Bovina United Presbyterian Church.  I also wrote a short article for the New York Archives Magazine about a possible murder that took place in the Cabin Hill area and involved some Bovina people as witnesses. 

Bovina History Calendar

After being in hiatus for several years, I was able to work with the Bovina Historical Society to produce a history calendar for 2013, proceeds going to the society.  There was a glitch with the printing, delaying its release until early December.  As well as some mail order requests, the calendar is being sold at Russell's, Two Old Tarts and the Bovina Public Library. 

Collecting and sharing images and records

I continue to seek out images to scan and share.  I did a second set of scans of photographs from the collection of Joan Archibald Townsend and her cousin Steve Archibald in May.  Later that same month, Stephen Pelletier sent me a set of negatives for photographs he took on November 25, 1978 at Russell’s Store for a photography class at Syracuse University.  These formed the basis of a blog entry in November. 

In my work at the Delaware County Historical Association, I have been able to find a number of images related to Bovina in the Bob Wyer collection.  Wyer was active in Delhi and the surrounding area from the late 1930s to 1979 and photographed some Bovina scenes and many people.  I have started a series on the blog called “Faces of Bovina” which will use passport and chauffeur license photos to highlight some of these people. 

For the Bovina Honor Roll project (see above), I sought out as many images of the veterans on the roll that I could find.  Several family members were helpful in finding images. 

Flickr is a photo sharing service that has allowed me to share Bovina images and records.  I added images over the course of the year to the Bovina NY History page: http://www.flickr.com/groups/1109140@N20/ .  There are now 604 images. I created four new sets of photos of houses and barns in Bovina:

-There were three sets of photos taken in the 80s and 90s of Bovina Center as part of the effort to get the hamlet put on the National Register of Historic Places:  Bovina Center mid 1980s (these are mostly from color slides); Bovina Center 1990; Bovina Center 1999

-In 1989, the Delaware County Historical Association started a survey of houses and barns in Delaware County.  For Bovina, they specifically excluded the hamlet because of the work being done for the National Register.  This set focused on structures outside of the hamlet.

I used Flickr to post 60 of the above mentioned images that Joan Archibald Townsend and her cousin Steven Archibald allowed me to scan.    

Since starting the Bovina History page on Flickr in 2009, there have been 63,195 views of the 605 images there.  People often respond with more information or questions.  Scott Desimon on Reagan Road was pleased to find a photograph of his farm in the 1980s.

Other activities

My thanks to Andy Woss, who took me on a tour of the old Gerry Estate, including visits to the family cemetery, the site of Angelica Gerry’s home Ancrum and to the Aknusti home. 

I managed one successful group hike to Indian Rocks in April.  I had hoped to do a hike up over where Reinertsen Hill Road used to run but that never got off the ground.  It’s on my to-do list for 2013.

Correspondence and research help

Genealogical inquiries
o    John Fitzpatrick from Long Island contacted me with questions about the Van Buren family.  I got him in touch with Gary Robson, whose mother Peg was a Van Buren.
o    An inquiry concerning the Stoddard/Stoddart family came from Leroy Stout.  Unfortunately, I was unable to find any information for the specific line he was seeking. 
o    Lauren Mallory from Pittsburgh contacted me about the family of Henry Wooden/Woodin. 
o    A question from Ann Lamb concerning the Glendenning family came through a blog entry from 2009.
o    The county historian Gabrielle Pierce had an inquiry about the Maynard family.

Building and property related inquiries
o    Holly Anderson had an inquiry in 2011about the barn on her property on New Road.  Unfortunately, I don’t have any information that dates when the barn was built but was able to provide her with photographs of the barn taken during a survey in the late 1980s by the Delaware County Historical Association. 
o    Nicholas Thompson on Russell Hill wants to verify when his barn was built.
o    Lynne Resch is interested in collecting more information about her property on Reinertsen Hill Road, the old Conklin place.  I was able to trace the deeds back to the first owner in 1804, John Thomson. 
o    Related to above, Gwen and John Deyensroth were interested in the history of the Barn on Lynn’s property.  I was able to provide information about how the main barn was built from the remains of the Bovina Methodist Church, demolished in 1926.
o    A number of inquiries concerning a stone structure at the start of Mountain Brook Road came from Diane Galusha and through Facebook.  The building was once used as a sap house as well as a residence and is on the old George Johnson farm.  It is now in an advanced state of decay – the roof had been damaged by a strong wind several years ago.

Cemeteries
o    Wayne McFarland inquired about ancestors buried in the Bovina Cemetery.
o    Sandra Barr requested a photograph of the gravestones of David Ballentine and his wife Anna Grant.  They are buried in the Bovina Reformed Presbyterian Church cemetery. 
o    Marianne Greenfield wanted to find the grave of Edward O’Connor to photograph it for Find-a-Grave (see the section below on Bovina Cemeteries concerning Find-a-Grave). 
Resorts and summer camps

Summer resorts
o    I received two inquiries this year from people who had stayed at the Elms Farm on Coulter Brook Road – Pat Zarcone and Christopher Hunt.  Ms. Zarcone was able to send me some photos of their time at Elms Farm in the 70s.
o    Joan Kaye Wishkoff contacted me concerning the camp at Tunis Lake.  Her parents owned it from the early 50s to the early 60s.  I expect to have further communication with her over the next few months as she shares more information about the camp. 

Image requsts
o    John Hilson is seeking a photograph of the Strangeway Home that used to stand on Route 28.  Other than a long distance aerial photo, I have yet to find any photos of the house.
o    I supplied to Mark Foster several old pictures of his house in the Bovina Center hamlet.

Other inquiries
•    Tom Sawyer from Clear Lake, Iowa, inquired into names on a Bovina store ledger from the 1830s now held by the county historian.  I have digital images of the pages and found a couple of references to names he was seeking.
•    Linnell Trimbell contacted me through the blog asking about Strangeway’s store.
•    Roger Heinemann contacted the Davidson brothers asking for information on Erma Hafele. 
•    Lori Glavin requested photographs of her farm on Pink Street.  She also has requested historical information about the property.  Across from the Glavins is Marty and Mary Ann Feinstein, who had similar questions about the property.  It was all part of the Barnhart farm at one time.
•    I provided for Chris Ingvordsen some information about Lulu Pauley, who used to own his house.  She was a poet – I have found one book of her poetry, Gateside Lyrics.  Miss Pauley died in 1950.
•    Shirley Houck from the County Clerk’s office is collecting information on the county’s Revolutionary War soldiers.  I had information on three buried in Bovina and may have identified a fourth soldier. 
•    Joe Doria was interested in the location of a house he used to visit up on Mountain Brook.  My Uncle George was able to help me track this down.

Plans for 2013

•    I will be continuing with the Bovina NY History blog and uploading photographs on the Bovina NY History Flickr page. 

•    The Historical Society and I are talking about a Bovina History Calendar for 2014. 

•    I will continue seeking out and documenting old farm foundations for the Foundations of Bovina project.  As well as photographing these, I need to measure these sites and note their location using a GPS.

•    I am hoping to prepare for publication a History of Bovina book that I’ve been working on for about a decade. 

•    I would like to start an Oral History project to collect recorded interviews from people in Bovina.  I need to scope out this project to figure out costs and logistics.  It would be a great project in which to involve local students. 

•    I want to make a push to identify Bovina related home movies to get them digitized – and maybe have a Bovina Film Festival.  I will continue to collect Bovina related images too. 

When Whiskey Was Good and Cheap and Other News Items from 100 Years Ago

The February 7, 1913 issue of the Catskill Mountain News reported on the delivery of new equipment to the Bovina Center Coop Creamery:

A new boiler for the Dry Milk Plant at Bovina Center was unloaded from Delaware and Northern at Andes on to a truck Tuesday and Wednesday was hauled to Bovina. The boiler weighed six tons and three teams were used. At the head of Delaware avenue [today's Route 28] the front axle of the truck broke but was fixed by the use of iron plates and the trip was made without further trouble.

A week later, the paper had this little tidbit on the front page of its February 14, 1913:

When Whiskey Was Good and Cheap.

Sixty and more years ago in the town of Bovina, practically every family kept liquor in the house to use when the new baby arrived or at the raising of a building frame, or other very special occasions. Drunkenness was by no means common although there were at one time three whiskey stills in town. A bushel of rye would buy two gallons of whiskey at the distillery. While this kind of beverage usually tends to pauperism, that class "was so scarce that when one did apply to the town for assistance it was the custom once to let the indigent person to whoever would bid tho least price for care and maintenance. At one town meeting it was voted to abolish the county poorhouse at Delhi.

On the same front page was a report about the start of the delayed ice harvesting season.  "The ice harvest that a little more than two weeks ago seemed a remote possibility, is now in full swing and thousands of tons are being gathered all through this section."  The article went on to report a tragedy on Lake Delaware on the Gerry Estate.

Several horses went through the thin ice of the early week and men who were engaged in the ice harvest went through in thin places and got wet. Tuesday afternoon a pair of fine horses belonging to Commodore Elbridge T. Gerry of New York city, valued at several hundred dollars, were drowned in the Gerry lake. One of the men who cares for the estate escaped death by a narrow margin. It was thought the ice on the lake, was safe and so it was decided to cross. The team broke through, however, and before the animals could be rescued they succumbed.

Bovina in the Civil War - Soldier Biographies XIV

Daniel, John B., and Robert Tompkins were the nephews of Robert Post of Bovina.  In the 1865 census, they were enumerated with their uncle while in the service, though the Tompkins family was from Roxbury.  The three nephews likely were brothers, the sons of William and Lydia (Post) Tompkins.  Daniel and Robert enlisted the same day, August 19, 1861, Daniel in the 3rd NY Calvalry, Robert in the 20th New York Volunteers.  Robert joined his brother's outfit a year later.  Their younger brother John enlisted in August 1864 as a substitute for Charles E. Loomis.  He was wounded twice - in September 1864 then again in October 1864.  At some point he was absent without leave but he was mustered out in July in New York City.  The information on all three brothers after the war is somewhat confusing.  There is no definitive information for John's life after he mustered out.  It seems that Robert at some point moved to Pennsylvania and in 1915 was admitted to a National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers in Hampton, VA.  Daniel late in life also went to a home for disabled veterans, this one in Ohio.  He died in 1922 and his body was sent to Union Grove, NY for burial.

Robert Tuttle was Bovina's only Civil War veteran to serve in the Navy.  He was born on Cabin Hill in October 1833.  When he entered service in 1863 in the Navy it was as a 1st Assistant Surgeon.  He left service at the end of the war and settled in the Town of Rockland in Sullivan County, working as a physician.  In 1875, he married Emma Bush Parksville.  Dr. Tuttle died in 1910 and is buried in Roscoe.

Charles A. and James Warren were the sons of Horace and Clarissa Warren.  Charles was born in Ulster County in 1835.  He enlisted in August 1862, joining the 144th New York Volunteers as a private.  Discharged after one year because of a disability, he re-enlisted a year later.  During the Battle of Deveaux Neck in South Carolina he was wounded when a bullet struck him under the ear and came out near the eye.  He mustered out with his company in June 1865.  Settling in Fallsburgh, Sullivan County, NY, he died there in 1882.  His brother James, also known as DeWitt Warren, was born in Stamford in 1838.  Enlisting the same time and into the same regiment as his brother, he mustered out with his company on June 1865.  Married to Jane Aitken of Bovina, he lived in Bovina after the war, then moved to Kortright.  He spent the last 25 years of his life in Delhi, where he died in March 1917. 

Another Cathels Family Tragedy

In November 2011, I reported on the tragedy that descended on the family of James Cathels, Jr. in the fall of 1865.  James, four of his children and his mother in law died within about 10 days of each other.  James left behind a pregnant wife and four children. And he and his wife Nancy had lost two other children before 1865.

About a year and a half before this tragedy, the Cathels had another family death in somewhat unusual circumstances - unusual enough to trigger a coroner's inquest.  James father, James Cathels, Sr., was a widower and in February 1864 was living with Peter Dysart.  Dysart had a farm on Russell Hill (the former Lester McPherson farm).  At the age of 72, James Sr. was doing some farm work there, probably to cover his board.

He got up the morning of February 5, 1864 and commented to Peter that his boots pinched his feet.  While using a last to stretch his boots, James inquired of Peter about a caucus meeting held the previous evening in the hamlet.  The exact nature of the caucus meeting is not clear, but given that the town's annual meeting was February 9, this likely was some kind of caucus meeting to nominate candidates for town office.  Whatever it was about, Peter filled him in what had happened.  James then pulled on his boots and headed out to the barn.  Five minutes later, Dysart headed out to feed the animals.  As he started to throw hay down from the hayloft onto the feeding room floor below, he saw Cathels lying there, motionless. Dysart ran around the barn to get in at the lower level and unsuccessfully tried to rouse Cathels.  While he was pretty sure Cathels was dead, he ran over to his neighbor, Stephen Russell, to have him confirm this.   Russell concurred, noting that he could not get a pulse.  They contacted the coroner and sent word to James Jr. at his farm on Scutt Mountain Road about what had happened.

A jury was convened in the Dysart house that same day to examine the body and hear evidence.  The jury included James Douglas, Michael Miller, John Fife (Phyfe), Michael Dixon, Robert F. Scott, Roman Palmer, Robert C. Scott, James Gill, James Thompson, William Lull, Robert H. Sloan, and Richard Smith.  After examining Cathels' body and hearing the testimony of Peter Dysart and Stephen Russell, their verdict was that "James Cathels came to his death by falling on the feeding floor of the cow stable and striking his head on a pole in said stable dislocating one of the upper several vertebrae of the neck causing compression of the spinal morrow which would cause death."

Several of the people connected with this case were, to varying degrees, affected by the U.S. Civil War, completing its third year.   James Cathels, Jr. must have been a little uncomfortable to see James Gill on the jury.  James Jr. had gotten into a brawl with Gill at the Hamilton Hotel in Brushland in October 1862 over a comment Cathels made about Gill's son's Civil War enlistment (see the November 30, 2011 blog entry for more about this incident).  Also on the jury was Roman Palmer, who had only recently moved to Bovina to open a cooperage.  Palmer would enlist later that year and died in battle in December 1864.  Peter Dysart, the owner of the barn where this accident took place, had lost his son Robert in the war the previous October.  William Lull's son Andrew had enlisted in 1862 and would survive the war (as did Gill's son Alexander).  Michael Miller's two brothers, Gilbert and Berry S. Miller, enlisted around the same time as Roman Palmer.  Unlike Palmer, the brothers would survive the war.   

So even while a Civil War was raging, the routines of life - and death - went on back home.  

Stories from Bovina's Cemeteries - The Müller Family

One hundred years ago this month, on January 15, 1913, Swiss native, Alouisa Martha Marti Müller died at her home in Bovina.  Born in July 1829 in Schmerikon, Switzerland, she was married to Jost Urban Müller in 1854 in the same community.  They appear to have stayed in Schmerikon when they started their family, probably right up to the time they emigrated.

The Müller family came to the United States in the summer of 1870, arriving in New York City.  They did not linger long in the city but headed north to Bovina.  Why they chose Bovina we do not know, but they would stay there the rest of their lives. They purchased a home from Thomas Dennis in 1875.  The house was almost across from where Hugh and Pat Lee live (the house's last owner was Vera Hunter - it was demolished in the late 1990s - see photograph below, taken around 1990).  Urban Müller was a painter, though whether a house painter or an artist is not clear.  At the time of their arrival, the Müllers had four children, Louise, Werner, Emma, and Adolph.  Alouisa would have at least three more children in Bovina, Frederica, Kate and Jennie.  Alouisa and Urban were the parents of fifteen children in all, but eight of them died before Urban's death in 1897.  Likely some, if not all, of the eight died while the family was still in Switzerland.  When Urban died, his fairly brief obituary in the Delaware Republican noted that he was "a genial good citizen."

A decade after her husband’s death, Alouisa lost a ninth child with the death of her son Adolph in Texas.  In the 1910 census, Alouisa and her daughter, Frederica were living in the family house in Bovina, taking in laundry.  Three years later, Mrs. Müller died of pneumonia at the age of 83.  At her death, she was survived by six of her children.  Two of them were out west, Werner in Iowa and Emma (Roper) in Kansas.  Louise was in New York City, where she was a housekeeper in a hotel there.  Three of her daughters lived locally.  Jennie was Mrs. Otis McCumber and living in Andes.  Two other daughters were living with their mother at her death, Frederica and Kate. 

Freda and Kate stayed in Bovina after Alouisa's death.  Their sister Louise joined them about a year later.  Louise had been a housekeeper for many years, starting with Reverend J.B. Lee in Bovina, then later for Judge Murray in Delhi.  After sixteen years working as a housekeeper in two New York City hotels, she developed health problems and had to retire.  Her last years in Bovina were spent mostly bedridden, cared for by her sisters until her death in 1917.  Their brother, Werner Müller moved to Iowa in the 1880s and probably lived in Des Moines up to his death, going by the name of Warner Miller.  He was still alive in the 1940 census, living with his daughter.  His sister Emma Müller was married to Samuel Roper in 1881 and settled in Kansas.  She was widowed before 1920 and still alive in 1940, living with one of her daughters.  Freda and Kate Müller continued to live in Bovina into the 1930s, occasionally going to Andes to help their sister Jennie run her boarding house.  Sometime in the 1940s both sisters moved permanently to Andes, renting out their Bovina house.  They sold it to Bill and Vera Storie in 1944.  Kate died in 1947 and Frederica in 1951.  Their older sister Jennie, the first child born to Urban and Aloisa in America, survived until 1961, dying a few months shy of her 90th birthday.  Urban and Aloisa are buried in Bovina, as are Louise, Kate, and Federica.

Note:  The Mueller family that lived off Route 28 is not related to this Mueller family. There's a great story to tell from this Mueller family that I hope will be a future blog entry.

Thefts in Bovina

A writer for the Delaware Republican in 1888 took advantage of several thefts in Bovina to make a plug for protective tariffs.  Basically, Republicans were for a such a tariff while Democrats saw it as a tax and demanded 'Free Trade.' In the October 20 issue, under the Bovina column was a paragraph about the thefts:

Certain parties in town believe in freed trade and they practice what they preach. Result has been mysterious disappearance of roosters and chickens from several hen roosts, some of our neighbors have been saved the trouble of gathering their apples, while E.C. Dean's flour barrel went down faster than wheat went up in Chicago, and A.D. Thomson was minus a half barrel of pork as a result of this Free Trade. Shot guns have been examined and the next time these Free Traders are found prowling around hen roosts, flour and pork barrels, they will carry home a charge of shot. Protection is the cry in Bovina.

The following week's paper had more on the issue: "... the great question of the hour - the midnight hour - am: 'How am we gwin' to protect our hen roosts.' That is why so many go to the hardware store, to buy powder, shot, padlocks and files - files to sharpen their dog's teeth. 'Shoot 'em on the rise, Edd, steady now.'"

A week later, there was yet another story on the thefts, tied again to the Free Trade issue:

Another hen roost heard from - S.G. Bramley minus twenty chickens, and still our democratic friends cry, 'The Tariff is a Tax.' When, Oh when, will they be convinced that protection is a necessity. Just wait till they wake up some morning and find their democratic rooster has been sacrificed at the altar of "Free Trade," and then they will whoop her up for protection.

It appears that at least some of these thefts were happening around Bramley Mountain.  Edward Carlyle Dean (1854-1926) and Stephen Girard Bramley (1838-1928) both had farms on Bramley Mountain.  Another theft took place at the Pink Street farm of Andrew Dixon (A.D.) Thomson (1845-1890).

Wintertime at Lake Delaware

In the interest of sharing Bovina pictures from other than just the hamlet of Bovina Center, I've found three images from the 1930s and 40s of the Lake Delaware area in the winter.  These images come from the Delaware County Historical Association. 

The first two images are from the Association's McMurdy collection and are believed to date form the 1930s.  They were taken from present day Route 28.  The photographer's main objective may have been to photograph the bridge over the Little Delaware, since it shows up in both photos.  You can see in the first photo the St. James Episcopal Church and the rectory.  The bottom photograph shows on the right the area known as "The Hook."  

And below is a Bob Wyer photo, dating from around 1940, showing the Earl Fisk house and barn at The Hook.

Don't forget, I'm always looking for other 'historic' pictures of the Town of Bovina.  I have a scanner and I do travel.  Thanks.