HOMES AND GOSSIP OF OTHER DAYS
Early in the century activities were renewed, just across the river from
Cooperstown, in the development of what was known as the Bowers Patent,
originally owned by John R. Myer of New York, whose daughter became the
wife of Henry Bowers. For some years after their marriage Mr. and Mrs.
Bowers lived at Brighton, near Boston, in a residence that was one of
the finest relics of Colonial days, commanding a fine view of Boston,
Cambridge, Charleston, and the bay, with its numerous islands. They
afterward removed to New York City, and Henry Bowers made journeys
thence to the Otsego region, where a settlement had been commenced in
Middlefield, then called Newtown Martin,[72] some years before the
founding of Cooperstown.
In 1791, Henry Bowers surveyed and laid out a proposed village of
"Bowerstown," across the river from Cooperstown. It was to extend from
the Susquehanna to the base of the hill on the east, and from the lake
to a point about 1,000 feet south. The projected village never became a
reality, although the name is perpetuated by the present hamlet of
Bowerstown, which still flourishes about a mile to the south, on a site
that was once included in the Bowers Patent, where a saw-mill was
erected on Red Creek in 1791, the first in this part of the country. A
modern saw-mill now occupies the same site.
[Illustration: THE HOUSE AT LAKELANDS, as originally built]
The residences across the river are all in the town of Middlefield, but
the village of Cooperstown has extended its corporate limits to include
some of them, and virtually claims them all.
[Illustration: MRS. WILSON]
After the death of Henry Bowers, his son, John Myer Bowers, married in
1802 Margaretta Stewart Wilson. Young Bowers was said to be the
handsomest and most fascinating man in New York, and had inherited a
fortune which in that day was regarded as princely. Shortly after the
marriage he decided to make his residence on the Bowers Patent in
Otsego, and came hither with his bride in 1803, occupying a part of the
Ernst house at the northwest corner of Main and River streets, while the
present house at Lakelands was under construction. The building was
erected during 1804, and Mr. and Mrs. Bowers took possession in 1805.
Mrs. Bowers's mother, Mrs. Wilson, made her home with them, and lived at
Lakelands for a half a century. These two ladies contributed much to the
life of the community, and the younger generation was fascinated by
their vivid memories of the leading spirits of the Revolutionary War.
Mrs. Wilson occupies a niche of fame in _The Women of the American
Revolution_, by Elizabeth F. Ellet, who said of her that "her
reminiscences would form a most valuable contribution to the domestic
history of the Revolution." She was in Philadelphia on the day of the
Declaration of Independence, and made one of a party entertained at a
brilliant fête, given in honor of the event, on board the frigate
Washington, at anchor in the Delaware, by Captain Reid, the commander.
The magnificent brocade which she wore on this occasion, with its hooped
petticoat, flowing train, laces, gimp, and flowers, remained in her
wardrobe unaltered for many years. Mrs. Wilson was Martha Stewart,
daughter of Col. Charles Stewart of New Jersey, who was a member of
Washington's staff. At the age of seventeen she married Robert Wilson,
also closely associated with Washington, and in the midst of the war she
was left a widow. During the Revolution Mrs. Wilson was more favorably
situated for observation and knowledge of significant movements and
events than any other lady of her native state. Her father, at the head
of an important department under the commander-in-chief, became
familiarly acquainted with the principal officers of the army; and,
headquarters being most of the time within twenty or thirty miles of
her residence, she not only had constant communication in person and by
letter with him, but frequently entertained at her house many of his
military friends. General Washington himself, with whom she had been on
terms of friendship since 1775, visited her at different times at her
home in Hackettstown. Mrs. Washington also was several times the guest
of Mrs. Wilson, both at her own house and at that of her father at
Landsdown. Such was the liberality of Mrs. Wilson's patriotism that her
gates on the public road bore in conspicuous characters the inscription,
"Hospitality within to all American officers, and refreshment for their
soldiers," an invitation which, on the regular route of communication
between the northern and southern posts of the army, was often accepted.
The hospitality which Mrs. Wilson had the privilege of extending to
illustrious guests was returned by marked attentions to her daughter and
only child, on her entrance into society in Philadelphia during the
presidency of Washington. Mrs. Wilson was the object of much devotion on
her own account at the capital, where her appearance was thus described
by a lady of Philadelphia in a letter to a friend: "Mrs. Wilson looked
charmingly this evening in a Brunswick robe of striped muslin, trimmed
with spotted lawn; a beautiful handkerchief gracefully arranged at her
neck; her hair becomingly craped and thrown into curls under a very
elegant white bonnet, with green-leafed band, worn on one side." At the
same time the debutante daughter, Margaretta Wilson, became a favorite
with Mrs. Washington, who distinguished her with courtesies rarely shown
to persons of her age. A contemporary letter describes her appearance at
a drawing-room given by the President and Mrs. Washington: "Miss Wilson
looked beautifully last night. She was in full dress, yet in elegant
simplicity. She wore book muslin over white mantua, trimmed with broad
lace round the neck; half sleeves of the same, also trimmed with lace;
with white satin sash and slippers; her hair elegantly dressed in curls,
without flowers, feathers or jewelry. Mrs. Moylan told me she was the
handsomest person at the drawing room, and more admired than anyone
there."[73]
Such was the belle whom John Myer Bowers carried away as his bride to
the wilds of Otsego, where, shortly afterward, at Lakelands, her mother
also came to dwell. These two ladies, with their unusual experiences,
added a new flavor to the life of Cooperstown.
Eight children born to Mr. and Mrs. Bowers at Lakelands were girls. The
father's hopeful anticipations were so well known in the community that
when a son and heir, Henry J. Bowers, was born at last, in 1824, the
event was signalized by the ringing of the village church bells in
Cooperstown, the only birthday in the region that was ever honored by
such a demonstration.
John Myer Bowers, in his later years, was far from being the Beau
Brummel of his youthful days in New York, and came to be known in the
village as a distinct character, ruggedly determined not to yield to the
infirmities of old age. When his physical strength began to fail he kept
a horse constantly in harness and standing at the door of Lakelands that
he might ride to and from the village. This horse, known as "Old Chap,"
was a familiar figure on the road in those days, and faithful to his
master to the advanced age of thirty-seven years.
John M. Bowers died in the year 1846. His widow continued to occupy
Lakelands until her death in 1872, and a daughter, Martha S. Bowers,
continued the occupancy during her life. After the death of the latter
Lakelands was sold in making division of the Bowers estate. Henry J.
Bowers married in 1848 a daughter of William C. Crain, a prominent
citizen of the adjoining county of Herkimer. She was a woman of large
intellectual gifts and undaunted spirit, and personally undertook the
education of their eldest son, John Myer Bowers, who sat on the floor
before her, while the mother, book in hand, instilled into his mind the
importance of the three R's, with much stress upon the principles of
fidelity and loyalty as elements of success in business. At the age of
sixteen years she sent him to New York to study law under one of the
leading attorneys of that city. He became one of the foremost lawyers of
the State, and a few years after its sale repurchased Lakelands, with
its forty acres along lake and river, as his summer home. No native son
of Cooperstown has had a more successful career than John M. Bowers. In
1915 he won a verdict for Theodore Roosevelt in the celebrated trial at
Syracuse in which suit for libel was brought against the former
President of the United States by William Barnes, the proprietor of the
_Albany Evening Journal_.
[Illustration: _C. A. Schneider_
LAKELANDS]
A mansard roof was added to Lakelands at the period during which the
property was out of the possession of the Bowers family, but the
remainder of the house is of the original building, and the carved
wooden doors and mantel-pieces within testify to the skill of old-time
workmanship in Cooperstown. The wide stretches of lawn shaded by
venerable trees, and the long sweep of lake shore commanded by Lakelands
make it a charming country seat.
* * * * *
In 1801 George Pomeroy, a young man of twenty-two years, arrived from
Albany, and set up in business as the first druggist in the village and
county. His store stood on Main Street on the site of the present Clark
Gymnasium. Some of the hardships of the early settlers to which history
may only allude are suggested by a sign which hung in front of the drug
store of Dr. Pomeroy, as he was called. This sign depicted a hand
pointing to these words: "Itch cured for 2 cts. 4 cts. 6 cts. Unguentum.
Walk in."
Dr. Pomeroy had other talents beside his skill in chemistry, and soon
became a popular citizen of the village, displaying one accomplishment
that was perhaps not so rare then as now in being an expert in the
exposition of the Bible. Dr. Pomeroy was not so absorbed in his Bible as
to be indifferent to the heavenly qualities which radiated from the
person of Ann Cooper, the seventeen-year-old daughter of the founder of
the village, for it soon appeared that these two young people had formed
a romantic attachment. In aspiring to the hand of the heiress Dr.
Pomeroy could not promise to endow her with great riches, but he had a
good name in being a grandson of General Seth Pomeroy who fought at
Bunker Hill.
It was as a wedding gift to his daughter, on her marriage to George
Pomeroy in 1804, that Judge Cooper built the old stone house which
stands at the corner of Main and River streets. It was the first stone
house constructed in the village, and the peculiar herring-bone style in
which the stone is laid lends to this old residence a quaint and unusual
charm. Under the eastern gable of the house is wrought in stone a spread
eagle, with the date of the building, and the initials of the young
couple who began housekeeping there. The involved order of the
initials--G. A. P. C.--the master-mason, Jamie Allen,[74] explained by
saying that the lives, like the initials, of the bride and groom, should
be so entwined as to make their union permanent. And so it proved, for
they lived in peace and harmony to a great age. The house was for many
years called "Deacon Place," Dr. Pomeroy being widely known as a deacon
of the Presbyterian church, but in later times it was named "Pomeroy
Place."
Ten children were born to the first occupants of the old stone house,
and it became one of the liveliest centres of hospitality to old and
young in Cooperstown. Years afterward there were those whose mouths
watered at the recollection of the dining-room in the southwest quarter
of the house, where many a merry feast was held, with particularly fond
memories of delicious light buckwheat cakes that came hot from the
griddle through a sliding window connected with the kitchen.
As years went on Mrs. Pomeroy became famous as a pattern of good works.
In days when trained nurses were unknown, in almost every family when
sickness came the first call was for "Aunt Pomeroy," who was by many
considered wiser than the physicians. In the course of time the
surviving children born to Mr. and Mrs. Pomeroy had homes and families
of their own, and the old couple were left once more alone in the old
stone house. Aunt Pomeroy's favorite place for receiving her friends was
in the northeast corner room of the lower floor. There she was
accustomed to sit in her rocking-chair, with her book, ordinarily a
volume of sermons, or her knitting, usually a shawl to be sold for the
benefit of missions to the heathen. She was fond of a game of whist, and
her great-grandchildren once attempted to teach her to play euchre. She
was getting on very well with the new game, until an opponent took her
king in the trump suit with the right bower. She threw down her cards,
exclaiming, "No more of a game where a jack takes a king!" She was
always ready to receive visitors, of whom there were many, except at one
hour of the day, which was sacred to an ancient pact between her husband
and herself. Between the hours of five and six Aunt Pomeroy withdrew to
her chamber, while Deacon Pomeroy, at his store, refused himself to
customers, and retired to his private office, so that each devoted the
same space of time to a secluded reading of the Bible.
The old couple were not permitted to end their days in the house which
had been made a kind of symbol of their married happiness, and which
they had occupied for nearly half a century. Late in life, owing to
financial losses, Mrs. Pomeroy was compelled to sell the property. The
aged pair closed the wooden shutters at the windows, fastened the door
behind them, and descended the steps of the old stone house, never to
return.
[Illustration: _J. Patzig_
POMEROY PLACE]
Mrs. Pomeroy passed her later years at Edgewater, the home of her
grandson. Her death was typical of her life of piety. On a certain
afternoon seventy-five women were assembled for Lenten sewing. After
greeting them all in the drawing-room Aunt Pomeroy ascended the stairs
to her room, stretched herself upon the bed, and quietly drew her last
breath. In accordance with the old custom the clock in the death-chamber
was stopped, and a sheet was drawn over the mirror. Down stairs the
rector of the parish read a prayer, and the women filed out of the house
in silence.
Pomeroy Place was not permanently lost to the family for which it was
originally built. When the centennial of the building was celebrated in
1904, the house had already returned to its first estate, having been
purchased by the granddaughter of the original owners, Mrs. George Stone
Benedict, who with her daughter, Clare Benedict, came to occupy it as
their American home between journeys abroad.
Mrs. Benedict's sister, Constance Fenimore Woolson, who made many summer
visits in Cooperstown, may be said to have drawn her original literary
inspiration from this region, for Otsego appears in her first work, "The
Haunted Lake," published in December, 1871, in _Harper's Magazine_,
while Pomeroy Place itself is commemorated in one of her earliest
productions, "The Old Stone House." From this period till her death in
1893 the sketches, poems, and novels that came from Miss Woolson's pen
reached such a level of literary art that Edmund Clarence Stedman called
her one of the leading women in the American literature of the century.
Miss Woolson spent the latter years of her life in Europe, changing her
residence frequently. Gracefully impulsive and independent, she had a
gypsy instinct for the roving life of liberty out-of-doors; yet in
character and demeanor she was so serenely poised, so self-contained,
with such inviolable reserve and dignity, that she was, as Stedman put
it, "like old lace."
* * * * *
One of the most remarkable men of early times in Cooperstown was Elihu
Phinney, publisher of the _Otsego Herald_, who had brought his presses
and type here in the winter of 1795, breaking a track through the snow
of the wilderness with six teams of horses. The first number of the
_Otsego Herald, or Western Advertiser_, a weekly journal, appeared on
the third day of April. This was the second newspaper published in the
State, west of Albany, and its title shows that Cooperstown was then
regarded as belonging to the far west of civilization. Like all
newspapers of that period, the early files of the _Otsego Herald_ appear
to the modern reader to be singularly lacking in local news, and only
the rarest mention of what was going on in Cooperstown is to be found in
its faded pages. There is much of the news of Europe, and the political
news of America admits the printing in full of long speeches delivered
in Congress, but the happenings in Cooperstown seem to have been left to
the tongues of village gossips, and the advertising columns stand almost
alone in reflecting the daily life of the place.
Elihu Phinney was a great favorite in the village, being a man of
delightful social qualities, and distinguished for his remarkable wit
and satire. His bookstore in Cooperstown furnished a large section of
the country with an elemental literature, and with many historical
works. A year after his arrival he was made associate judge of the
county. It was in the printing office of Judge Phinney that Fenimore
Cooper, when a boy, was in the habit of setting type "for fun," which
experience he afterward stated was very useful to him in the oversight
of the typographical production of his writings. On the overthrow of
John Adams's administration Judge Phinney changed the political policy
of his newspaper, _The Otsego Herald_, and became a supporter of Thomas
Jefferson, in opposition to the views of his patron, Judge Cooper, who
remained a Federalist. It was this breach of political friendship which
brought to Cooperstown Col. John H. Prentiss, who came from the office
of the _New York Evening Post_, in 1808, to conduct a newspaper in
opposition to _The Otsego Herald_. Thus came into being _The Impartial
Observer_, which shortly changed its name to _The Cooperstown
Federalist_, and in 1828 became _The Freeman's Journal_, under which
name it is still published.
Judge Phinney founded a bookselling and publishing business which,
through his sons and grandsons, was carried on in Cooperstown for the
better part of a century after its establishment. His place of business
was on the east side of Pioneer Street, next south of the building that
stands at the corner of Main Street, and the present building on the
original site of their enterprise was erected by the Phinneys in 1849.
The Phinney establishment became famous for original methods of
conducting business. Large wagons were ingeniously constructed to serve
as locomotive bookstores. They had movable tops and counters, and their
shelves were stocked with hundreds of varieties of books. Traveling
agents drove these wagons to many villages where books were scarcely
attainable otherwise. The Erie Canal opened even more remote fields of
enterprise. The Phinneys had a canal boat fitted up as a floating
bookstore, which carried a variety beyond that found in the ordinary
village, anchoring in winter at one of the largest towns on the Erie
Canal. Up to the year 1849, when the publishing department was moved to
Buffalo, and only a bookstore remained of the Phinney enterprise in
Cooperstown, their efforts had built up in this village a large
publishing business, while they stocked and maintained the largest
bookstores in towns as far away as Utica, Buffalo, and Detroit. As early
as 1820 their stereotype foundry in Cooperstown had cast a set of plates
for a quarto family Bible, one of the first ever made in the United
States, and of which some 200,000 copies were printed. Later they
published Fenimore Cooper's _Naval History_, Col. Stone's _Life of
Brant_, several volumes by Rev. Jacob and John S. C. Abbott which were
household favorites for a generation afterward, not to mention many
school text-books and histories.
The occasion which caused the removal of this publishing business from
the village arose out of the discontent of some workmen whose services
were dispensed with when new power presses were substituted for
hand-work in printing. The entire manufactory was burned at night by
incendiaries in the spring of 1849.
Elihu Phinney, the founder of the business, was the originator in 1796
of _Phinney's Calendar, or Western Almanac_, which was known in every
household of the region, for some three score years and ten. The weather
predictions in this calendar were always gravely consulted. In one year
it happened, through a typographical displacement, that snow was
predicted for the fourth of July. When the glorious Fourth arrived the
thermometer dropped below the freezing point, and snow actually fell, a
circumstance which greatly increased the already reverent regard for
Phinney's Almanac.
A quaint character who established himself in the village before the
coming of Elihu Phinney was Dr. Nathaniel Gott. He was a man of fiery
spirit. When Dr. Gott's patients, on being restored to health, seemed
inclined to forget their indebtedness to him, he threatened them with
chastisement, and published the following rhymed notice in the _Otsego
Herald_:
Says Dr. Gott,
I'll tell you what,
I'm called on hot,
All round the Ot-
-Segonian plot,
To pay my shot
For pill and pot.
If you don't trot
Up to the spot,
And ease my lot,
You'll smell it hot.
NATHANIEL GOTT.
Dr. Gott was an eccentric. He wore short breeches, with long stockings,
and always ate his meals from a wooden trencher. Among a company of
village men enjoying a convivial evening at the tavern a contest of wit
and satire arose between Dr. Gott and Elihu Phinney who had become warm
friends. Finally it was proposed that each should compose an impromptu
epitaph for the other. In the epitaph which he improvised for Judge
Phinney Dr. Gott, adapting the conceit of the schoolmen, made out Judge
Phinney's soul to be so small that thousands of such could dance on the
point of a cambric needle. Judge Phinney retorted with the following:
Beneath this turf doth stink and rot
The body of old Dr. Gott;
Now earth is eased and hell is pleased,
Since Satan hath his carcass seized.
Amid shouts of laughter from the onlookers, Dr. Gott, turning jest into
earnest, strode from the tavern, and his friendship for Judge Phinney
was ended.
The town pump stood on the north side of Main Street a few rods east of
Chestnut street. Its former position is now marked by a tablet set in
the sidewalk. On the corner west of the pump Daniel Olendorf kept a
tavern. He was a small man, and very lame from a stiff knee. The muscles
of the leg were contracted, making it considerably shorter than the
other. At one time he was leading a lame horse through the street, when
a little dog came following on behind, holding up one leg and limping
along on the other three. The sight caused no little merriment along the
street when the lame man, the lame horse, and the lame dog were seen
marching in procession. Olendorf, wondering at the cause of so much
amusement, looked back and saw the uninvited follower. He picked up a
stone, and flung it at the dog, exclaiming, "Get along home; there is
limping enough here without you, you little lame cuss, coming limping
after us!"
Young James Cooper, afterward the novelist, had left the village when a
young lad to be tutored by the rector of St. Peter's, Albany, and
thereafter spent little of his boyhood in Cooperstown. After his
uncompleted course at Yale, and a year's cruise at sea, he returned for
a time, in 1807, to his village home, being then a youth of eighteen
years. To this period belongs the incident of his participation in a
foot-race among some of his former companions in the village. The
racecourse agreed upon was around the central square, that is, beginning
at the intersection of Main and Pioneer streets, at the Red Lion Inn,
the runners were to go up Pioneer Street to Church Street, thence to
River Street, down River Street to Main, and so back to the place of
starting.
James Cooper was mentioned as one of the competitors, and his antagonist
was selected. The prize was a basket of fruit. Cooper accepted the
challenge, but not on even terms. It was not enough for the young sailor
to outrun the landsman; he would do more. Among many spectators Cooper
caught sight of a little girl. He caught her up in his arms, exclaiming,
"I'll carry her with me and beat you!" Thus the race began, the little
black-eyed girl clutching Cooper's shoulders. As the contestants rushed
up Pioneer Street, and turned the corner where the Universalist church
now stands, the amused and excited villagers saw with surprise that the
sailor with his burden was keeping pace with the other flying youth.
Around the square the runners turned the next two corners almost
abreast. After rounding the corner of the Old Stone House, as they came
up the main street toward the goal Cooper, bearing the little girl
aloft, gave a burst of speed, amid wild cheers, drew away from his
opponent, and won the race. The basket of fruit was his, which he
distributed among the spectators, and the little girl, afterward the
wife of Capt. William Wilson, long lived in the village to tell the
story of her ride upon James Cooper's shoulders.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 72: The _Otsego Herald_ of Jan. 14, 1796, contained a notice
of warning issued by Henry Bowers against persons who had been cutting
down trees "on my patent, in Newtown Martin."]
[Footnote 73: _The Women of the Revolution_, Elizabeth F. Ellet,
published in 1850, pp. 37-67.]
[Footnote 74: A skillful builder and noted character, commemorated by
Fenimore Cooper in _Wyandotte, or the Hutted Knoll_.]