FERRIS CORRESPONDENCE IN FILE OF 1838
"THE BIG WOODS HILL" OF SENECA. [Published again aug. 13, 1908]
The Landmark of the Town of Hector Locally Known as Satterly Hill.
Copyrighted by John Corbett.

The Gateway to the "Big Woods Hill” of the Town of Hector is shown in the illustration in this issue of the Chronicle. This notable work of masonry, is about one half mile north of the village of Burdett, where the Lehigh Valley Railway crosses the Tug Hollow Creek and the highway leading to the top of an elevation which although comparatively unvisited by the general public as as distinctive a feature of Seneca Lake, as is Bare Hill on Canandaigua Lake or ‘Bluff Point” on Lake Keuka. It is safe to say, that not one in five hundred of the inhabitants of Schuyler County have ever beheld this romantic spot or gazed upon the scenic beauties that are visible from the heights beyond.
The “Big Woods Hill” is the designation of this elevation known to the residents of the Town of Reading, from the fact that until the building of the Lehigh Valley Railroad in 1890, its entire western face for four hundred feet of its summit slope was covered with an unbroken forest growth. This condition arose from the circumstance that the property was a portion of the Ferris Estate which  had been bought as a military Lot of one mile square. bounded on the west by Seneca Lake, and on the east by the top of the east hill  slope. When the original owner of this tract died he willed the property in such a manner that it could not be disposed of by sale until his last child had passed away. He was a New York man who came on and built two residences of extensive  and similar construction, which are among the notable dwellings of the locality today. His last child lived to be a very aged woman dying  less than a score of years ago, and having been for the last twenty five years of her existence an inmate of an asylum for the insane
The “Satterly Hill” is the local name for this elevation, so- called from Charles Satterly, an old-time owner of land and dweller upon its summit. He was the son-in-law of Herman Canfield, who came from the Slate of Pennsylvania in about 1818, and settled upon the hill, taking up some one hundred and twenty five of its three-hundred acre area. His children were Sarah, who became Mrs. Satterly, Jonas Canfield, Nelson, James and Minard, Mary and Ann.  Herman Canfield built a great house for its day  upon the premises, it being some 30 by 40 feet in ground plan, with two stories and an attic. He died comparatively young, and Charles Satterly buying  out the heirs, occupied the homestead until about 1898 when he removed to Burdett where the remainder of his days were spent. The big house was then taken down and re-erected in Burdett, and the last of the farm barns was burned by lightning in the storm of July 7th of this year. A map of the “Satterly Hill’’ made in the 1850’s, shows the Canfield farm on the southern portion, now owned by Horatio Brown; the Satterly home near the center, now marked by a barn, and owned by George B. Paterson, and the premises of W. M. Weaver to the northwest now the property of Hon. O.H. Budd. Other owners of portions of the hill are Con. O. H Durland and Herman I. Keep. On the south slope which is much more graduated  than on the other sides, is the  farm of William Erway, now occupied by Horace W. Smith.
The ‘‘BigWoods Hill’’ at summit is 1,400 feet above sea level and 950 feet above the surface of Seneca Lake, which in round  numbers is 450 feet above tide. It is 400 feet above the site of Burdett, which is 1,000 feet above tide; 440 feet above the Tub Hollow Creek at the point shown  in the illustration, and  300 feet above  the stream valley along its eastward side. At the north end of the hill, the slope is quite abrupt for 200 feet, the general height of land beyond being 1,200  feet above the sea. The rocks then form the floor of the summit of this elevation are of the Chemung Group, the outcroppings of its sides belonging to the Portage formations, and the fine building stone have been quarried from just beneath the  thin surface soil. The facts as above set forth are gleaned from  a study of the topographic survey sheets of this section, and are ---ha given as a ground-work to convey an idea of the attractions of the ‘Big Woods Hill”, which is traversed by a highway from north to  south, and should be seen to be appreciated. From its summit on a clear morning, the entire length of Seneca Lake and the city of Geneva are in view, while the village of  Watkins and Montour FaIls and the Catharine Valley are at all times plainly visible   to the eastward are the farmstead slops of Hector far to the southward dimly  show the height of Pennsylvania, an westward the billowing hills appear even  beyond Lane Kenka. The home life has left the summit, for the “Big Woods Hill’’ perhaps forever, but it is an ideal location  for  a country resort to dwellers of the cities along the Lehigh Valley Lines and time may see it thus a pleasure ground .
 

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