OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK;/ EMBRACING A COMPREHENSIVE VIEW OF THE GEOGRAPHY, GEOLOGY, AND GENERAL HISTORY OF THE STATE, AND A COMPLETE HISTORY AND DESCRIPTION OF Every County, City, Town, Village, and Locality. WITH FULL TABLES OF STATISTICS. BY J. H. FRENCH, MEMBER OF THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE; CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE NEW YORK Illustrated by Original Steel Engravings, AND ACCOMPANIED BY A NEW MAP OF THE STATE FROM ACCURATE SURVEYS. SIXTH EDITION. SYRACUSE, N. Y.: PUBLISHED BY R. PEARSALL SMITH. 1860. LIST OF PERSONS EMPLOYED UPON THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE STATE MAP AND THE PREPARATION OF THE GAZETTEER. This list includes the names of those only who have been employed for considerable lengths of time. in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Northern District of New York. STEREOTYPED BY L. JOHNSON & CO. COLLINS, PRINTER. PERRY, BINDER. PREFACE. THE map of Westchester County which was commenced about ten years since, and soon after published by Robert Pearsall Smith, was probably the first map of any county in the State of New York published from actual survey of roads and boundaries. This was followed by maps of other counties on a similar plan; and, about eight years since, Mr. Smith conceived the idea of publishing a series of maps from actual survey, embracing all the counties in the State, and, from these, of producing a State Map that should be more full, complete, and reliable than any ever before published. But, about four years since, upon careful trial, in reducing a large number of these county maps to a uniform scale, so many omissions and discrepancies were found in them, that a new survey of the State was deemed necessary to the construction of an accurate map of the State, An arrangement was accordingly made with the author to take the general superintendence of the new survey; the general plan for the works to be prepared was fixed upon; and the re-survey of the State and the collection of statistics were begun. At the commencement of the re-survey, maps of fifty-one counties had been completed and published; six counties had been surveyed, but the maps were not yet published; and three counties were still unsurveyed. Of the fifty-one published maps, twelve were found to be so deficient in matters essential to the completion of the State Map according to the plan fixed upon, as to render entire new surveys of these counties necessary. Surveyors were sent into the remaining counties, with copies of the published or manuscript maps in hand, with instructions to visit every town, to correct every error that should be found upon the maps, to make additions of new roads, note changes in boundaries, and, in short, to return the maps properly revised and corrected for use in the preparation of the State Map. In many instances new surveys of parts of towns, town lines, roads, and streams were found necessary, and also countless changes in the location of boundary lines, roads, streams and bodies of water, and in the representation of the topographical features of the country. The surveyors were instructed to obtain copies of manuscript and other local maps, as far as practicable, as these were generally found to contain metes and bounds, and, being plotted to large scales, were of value in laying down boundary lines. Draftsmen were also sent to the several private Land Offices in the State, and to Albany, and all maps of any value in the offices of the State Engineer and Surveyor and the Secretary of State were copied, to be laid under contribution in the preparation of the State Map. The Superintendent of the United States Coast Survey and the Secretary of the Interior also furnished copies of all the maps in their Departments pertaining to the State. The number and variety of maps and plots, printed and manuscript, that have thus been collected is very great, and probably embraces more valuable matter than any similar collection in the State. Not the least difficult part of the labor of constructing a map of a large extent of country is “making the projection." In surveys of small areas this difficulty does not occur, as the proportion of the curvature of the earth's surface to that part of its area contained in a rectangle of thirty to fifty miles, is so small that, when reduced to the scale of even an inch to the mile, it is scarcely perceptible. But in projecting a map of territory of as great extent as the State of New York, the curvature of the surface from a plane is so great as to make the departure of the lines of latitude and longitude from right lines plainly visible upon a map even when plotted to a scale of less than one-fourth of an inch to a mile. The Flamstead Improved Projection, being the one best adapted to the correct representation of a large extent of country, was adopted for the State Map. The maps of the State heretofore published embrace a large part of the New England States, Pennsylvania, and Canada. The space thus usually occupied is appropriated to plans of the cities, and to smaller maps illustrating particular features of the State. These marginal maps, it is believed, add to the value of the work. By placing a map of Long Island by itself,at the same time showing its relative position to the rest of the State, by retaining a map of nearly one-third of the island in its proper place, the map of the entire State is constructed on a scale about twenty per cent. (linear scale) larger than can be done on a sheet of the same size with all of Long Island projecting eastward of New York City. This increased scale will be found to fully compensate for the change of place of the eastern portion of Long Island. The map of the State is plotted to the scale of 500.000, which is for a small fraction more than 4.7 miles to an inch; and the city plans to the scale of 50.000, which is §§ or a small fraction more than .78 of a mile to an inch. 625 The longitude of several points in the eastern and western portions of the State having been accurately determined by the Coast Survey and the Department of the Interior, and the latitude of many points on the north and south borders and within the State from numerous and repeated observations, the projection of the parallels and meridians was first made with accurately constructed scales, using the most recent tables of latitude and longitude measurements as adopted by the Coast Survey and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. The boundaries of the State were next projected, after which the lines of the counties were located on the map. The town lines were next laid out; and finally the roads, bodies of water, streams, topography, and all other details were filled in. This course could not fail to secure accuracy in all parts of the work; and, while the map does not agree, in many points, with previous maps of the State, the author feels confident that it will bear the closest scrutiny and criticism. A prominent and distinctive feature of the State Map is the representation of all the roads, railroads, canals, and routes of travel, every mile of each of which has been run and every angle measured. The city plans are all drawn to the same scale, thus presenting, at a glance, the comparative extent of the built-up portions of each. Albany, Brooklyn, and Buffalo have so great an extent of unoccupied or farm lands that it was not practicable to show the entire corporate limits of either on the city plans; but no built-up part of either city has been omitted. The plans of the other cities embrace their entire area. In the construction of the Geological and Land Patent Map, the geology of the State according to the New York System has been followed; but the different strata or formations are represented by a system of shading in the engraving,—instead of by color, as is usually done in geological maps. This plan was adopted, as it was desirable to present two distinct features in the one map; and the engraved shading for the geology permits the use of colors for the land patents. The size of the map would not admit of the representation of tracts of land smaller than a township; but a complete list of all the grants will be found in this work. In the year 1825 the Regents of the University established meteorological stations in various parts of the State, and reports were required to be made from these stations annually to the Board of Regents. At the expiration of twenty-five years the Regents caused these reports to be digested; and the mean averages of the summaries thus deduced-so far as relates to temperature, fall of rain, and direction of wind-are embraced in the Meteorological Map. On this map the several stations (including three established at military posts, and not subject to the direction of the Board of Regents) are at the centers of the small circles. In each of these circles are either two or three numbers: when two, the upper number is the mean annual temperature in degrees Fahrenheit, and the lower number is the mean annual fall of rain in inches; and when three, the upper and lower numbers indicate, respectively, temperature and rain, and the middle one the elevation of the station above tide, in feet. The diagram at the right represents the mean annual direction of wind at the several stations, the index in any case denoting the point of compass, and its length the number of days,— one inch in length of radius representing five days. Thus, taking the index for Canandaigua, the direction is S. 63° 37′ W., and the length of the radius is 3.4 inches. This indicates that the mean annual direction of the wind at this station was from the w. s. w. for 17 days in the year more than from all other directions. For the isothermal lines, or lines of equal temperature, and the shading representing the different depths of rain, we are indebted to LORIN BLODGET, author of American Climatology. The Time Indicator has been prepared from minute calculations, and will be found correct in every case. The diagram showing the capacity of the church edifices is constructed to a scale, and correctly represents the proportion of each to the whole. An examination of the various Gazetteers heretofore published cannot fail to satisfy any one that a great part of the material from which they were compiled was furnished by corre |