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A cenotaph, last words, and crowdfunding
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Rufus Wheeler Peckham (the first) was born in Rensselaerville (to Peleg “One G Short of a Pirate” Peckham and his wife, Desire) in 1809, and raised in Cooperstown. He graduated from Union College and then studied law, was admitted to the bar at 21, and eventually became district attorney of Albany County. Following that,…
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Albany, 1854
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In 1854, Lippincott, Grambo & Company of Philadelphia published “A New and Complete Gazetteer of the United States.” It being 1854, the title wound on: “Giving a Full and Comprehensive Review of the Present Condition, Industry, and Resources of the American Confederacy: Embracing, Also, Important Topographical, Statistical, and Historical Information from Recent and Original…
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Mother Johnson
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While we’re on a little bit of family history, here’s a bit more: my great great great grandmother was “Mother Johnson,” famed supplier of pancakes to the likes of Rev. W.H.H. Murray and Seneca Ray Stoddard. Along with husband Philander Johnson, she ran a lodge on the Raquette River at Raquette Falls starting in…
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Company C, 93rd NY Infantry, August 1863
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This is Company C of the 93rd New York Infantry in Bealeton, Virginia, in August 1863. The 93rd was also known as the Washington County regiment and the Morgan Rifles. According to Phisterer’s New York in the War of the Rebellion, the regiment was organized at Albany by Col. John S. Crocker on Feb.…
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Eagle Tavern: “The House of Lords”
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Yesterday we showed a handbill from the Eagle Tavern, sometime after 1845, promising that it had been regenerated to what it had once been. Turns out it had once been quite the place indeed. Cuyler Reynolds’s “Albany Chronicles” listed any number of notable events that had taken place at the Eagle. It said that…
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Eagle Tavern
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This undated image from the Library of Congress depicts the Eagle Tavern at the corner of Broadway and Hamilton Street in Albany: We have leased the Eagle Tavern for a Term of years, and have cleansed and regenerated it from top to bottom. No exertion on our part shall be wanting to make the…
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The Rail-Road Exchange
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The Library of Congress includes this flyer in its ephemera collection, with a possible date of 1847 and no more information than that. Apparently Abner A. Pond’s Rail-Road Exchange offered board and lodging (single meals 25 cents) on Broadway, with its entrance at 25 & 27 Maiden Lane. “This House adjoins the square used…
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The Brick Makers of Albany
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Just when brick manufacture began in New Netherlands has been the subject of considerable conjecture. It is often still taken as given that in the earliest days of settlement of the Hudson Valley, any brick that was used by the brick-loving Dutch settlers must have been imported, even though the cost to do so…
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What Lord Kelvin Saw in Schenectady
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Yesterday we tried to identify the many, many scientific, engineering and industrial luminaries pictured in this photograph, taken at the Schenectady General Electric Works. So, what were they all up to? In September of 1897, Lord and Lady Kelvin were the guests of Mr. and Mrs. Spencer Trask “at their country seat on Union…
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A Meeting of the Minds in Schenectady
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This picture of Schenectady’s industrial past, taken in 1897, pops up from time to time, usually vaguely captioned as “Lord Kelvin visits the General Electric works.” That Spencer Trask is in the picture is sometimes mentioned. (The New York Public Library has one decent source for the photograph.) That the captions rarely identify the…