THE BEGINNINGS.

I. Indian Occupancy.

When white men came to America, New York State east of the Genesee River was inhabited by the Iroquois, a confederation of the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga and Seneca nations. They were given the name, Iroquois, by the French. According to tradition, Hia­watha, a member of the Onondaga nation, founded the confederation. The seat of government was near the present city of Syracuse in the territory of the Onondagas, the central nation. There the council fire was kept constantly burning. The Iroquois were strong and warlike and subjugated the tribes on all sides beyond their boundaries.

The Cayuga nation occupied the territory bounded on the east by Lake Owasco, on the west by Lake Seneca, on the north by Lake On­tario, and on the south by Pennsylvania. There were a few Seneca villages on the east shore of Lake Seneca and the Cayugas and Sen­ecas shared fishing privileges in Lake Seneca outlet, but the Senecas lived chiefly north, south and west of the lake bearing their name. The Cayugas, the least warlike of the Iroquois, had many villages and ex­tensive farms and orchards. Their principal village was Goioguen, four miles north of Aurora. It was later called Cayuga Castle.

Probably by 1600 or earlier, there was a Cayuga village on the site of Aurora. The original name of this village was Deawendote, or Village of Constant Dawn. Later, however, because of the large peach orchards at this village, it was nicknamed Chonodote or Peachtown. Both the original name, Deawendote, and the present name, Aurora, almost certainly were chosen because of the fact that an eastern ridge obscures the rising sun causing the vicinity of the village to have a longer dawn than usual.

In accordance with a treaty between the Iroquois and the French, missionaries were sent to the Iroquois. In August, 1656, Father Menard came to the Cayugas and they built a chapel for him near Goioguen. Although these missionaries remained with the Iroquois many years, they never accomplished their main political purpose, to win over the Iroquois as allies of the French. On the contrary, in all the wars between Great Britain and France, the Iroquois were allies of the British. Also during the Revolution, the Iroquois, with the ex­ception of a part of the Mohawks and Oneidas, were on the side of the British and made many bloody raids on the border settlements. Final­ly in the autumn of 1779, General Washington sent Generals Clinton and Sullivan with armies to break the power of the Iroquois. This

they did thoroughly. From Pennsylvania General Sullivan marched north into New York between Cayuga and Seneca lakes and then westward, sending a detachment of five hundred men under Colonel Zebulon Butler along the eastern shore of Lake Cayuga. There was little fighting as practically all of the Indians had fled. Their houses, crops and orchards met with almost total destruction. At Chonodote (now Aurora) the fourteen long houses were burned, the crops de­stroyed and most of the fifteen hundred peach trees chopped down. The Cayugas fled to the protection of the British near Buffalo and most of them never came back to their native land.

II. Military Tract.

In 1782 the New York Legislature set aside a portion of the mid­western part of the State, called the Military Tract, to be given to the soldiers who had served in the Revolution. The Military Tract in­cluded all of the four counties, Cayuga, Cortland, Onondaga, Seneca, parts of Oswego, Schuyler, Tompkins, Wayne, and contained more than one and one half million acres.

When the Military Tract was erected the Cayugas and Onon­dagas still owned the land contained in it. On September 12, 1788 by a treaty made with the Onondagas at Fort Schuyler and on February 25, 1789 with the Cayugas at Albany, the State of New York pur­chased all of their lands with the exception of certain small reserva­tions. In particular, the Cayuga Reservation consisted of a strip of land about three miles wide on each side of the northern end of Lake Cayuga. Its southern boundary was near the middle of the present road from Aurora to Sherwood. Thus the north part of the village of Aurora was in the Cayuga Reservation. Almost all of this Reserva­tion was sold to the State in 1795 and the remainder a few years later. The Cayugas own none of their ancestral lands.

The Military Tract when erected was in Tryon County the name of which was changed two years later to Montgomery County. Next, the Military Tract was part of Herkimer County erected in 1791 and, finally, on March 6, 1794, the Military Tract itself became Onondaga County.

The town of Scipio was erected January 27, 1789 as a township of Montgomery County. It became one of the eleven original town­ships of the Military Tract and included the present towns of Led-yard, Moravia, Niles, Scipio, Sempronius, Venice, and parts of Springport and Marcellus.

III. Early Settlers.

Roswell Franklin and several other settlers of Wyoming County, Peunsylvaria, organized The Little Lessee Company, a land company, in 1788. This company arranged with the Indians for the perpetual lease of the land lying between lakes Cayuga and Owasco for which

rent was to be paid annually. In the summer of 1788 Roswell Frank­lin, Elisha Durkee and others surveyed these lands for the company, dividing them into lots of 160 acres each.

The first settlement in the territory that became Cayuga County, a decade later, was made in April 1789 by Roswell Franklin in that part of the town of Scipio which is now the village of Aurora. He had selected this location the previous summer. In March 1789, Franklin, his son-in-law and some neighbors left Wysox, Pennsylvania, with their families, traveling in sleighs to the head of Lake Seneca. They rowed down the lake in boats left there ten years before by Sullivan's army. On arriving at the foot of Lake Seneca, the women and children walked over to the foot of Lake Cayuga while the men brought the boats down the rapids of Seneca River into that lake. They finally landed in what is now the north part of the village of Aurora. Their cattle and hogs were driven overland along the east side of Lake Cayuga by other members of the party.

In September 1789, the men of this party and those camping within a radius of about fifty miles built a log house for the home of Roswell Franklin. In addition to Franklin and his two sons and son-in-law, Ebenezer White, the following fifteen men worked on this house: Hulbert Atwell, Levi Atwell, Joseph Atwell, Jonathan Brown-elI, Daniel Guthrie, Ebenezer Guthrie, John Harris, ---- Harris, Thomas Manchester, Edward Paine, Seth Phelps, Job Pixley, John Richardson, H. Spaulding, John White. The master builder was John Harris who kept a ferry across Lake Cayuga at Cayuga. The house, sixteen feet square, was completed in two days. This was the first house built by white men in the western three fifths of the Military Tract, the part that became Cayuga County ten years later. Houses were also built for the other families that came with Roswell Frank­lin. Elisha Durkee built his log cabin, burned with thirteen others by the Sheriff in 1791, just north of Aurora. The first white child born in the original town of Scipio was his daughter Betsy, born here December 5, 1790.

During the next two years several more settlers came. Edward Paine brought his family from Connecticut and built a log house south of Aurora on the creek that bears his name. Most of the settlers were members of The Little Lessee Company and built their homes north of Franklin's on the land they had leased from the Indians. The new settlement prospered. The virgin soil yielded bountiful harvests, fish and game could be caught or purchased from the friendly Indians and the partially destroyed orchards of Chonodote furnished fruit. But an unexpected disaster awaited them.

On February 25, 1789, the State of New York by a treaty with the Cayugas, purchased all of their lands with the exception of the Cayuga Reservation previously described. This treaty abrogated the lease The Little Lessee Company had with the Indians. When the state surveyors came to lay out the boundary according to the treaty, it was found that Franklin's home and those of thirteen other settlers were

on the Cayuga Reservation. In the late summer of 1791, on complaint of the Cayugas, Governor George Clinton sent Colonel William Col­braith, Sheriff of Herkimer County, with fifty men to put the white settlers off the Reservation. Colbraith burned thirteen of their four­teen houses. The only house spared was that of Roswell Franklin which was nearest the Reservation line. The Indians liked Franklin and were willing for him to continue to live there. Of those whose houses were burned, Ebenezer White moved to Ledyard, Elisha Dur­kee to Scipioville and the three Atwells to the western part of the state.

Seth Phelps, who had helped Franklin build his house, brought his family in 1791 from Groton, Connecticut. Franklin shared his home with the Phelps family until a house could be built for them. Franklin had planned to purchase some land south of the Reservation line which he had cleared. This land was part of lot 84 which con­tained most of the present village of Aurora. Lot 84 extended from the south line of the Reservation to an easterly line just south of Wells Road and was more than two miles in depth. Seth Phelps, on learning that this lot had been assigned to Lieutenant Peter Van Benscoten, secured the money from his nephew-in-law, John Wal­worth, and purchased the lot jointly with him on March 14, 1792, for $600.

Roswell Franklin had endured a long succession of misfortunes and hardships. In his early manhood he had served for several years with the British army. Following his marriage in Connecticut he moved to Wyoming, Pennsylvania, where he fought in the Pennamite border wars. He was a captain in the Revolution. The Indians burned his home while he was absent, carried off his entire family and killed his wife. Most of his children were later recaptured and reunited with him. He later married Mrs. Lester who with her small child had been captured in the Indian raid in which her husband and Franklin's oldest son, Joseph, had been killed. A year later she escaped with her child from the Indians and returned to Pennsylvania with Sullivan's army. Twice Franklin had lost all of his property in floods. He had come to this new country after securing a lease from the Indians ex­pecting at last to have a home, only to find that his lease had been annulled and that he could own none of the land he had improved. Broken in health and believing that the man he had befriended had wronged him by purchasing the land he wanted, he became deranged and shot himself.

In 1794 John Walworth moved to Aurora. He and Phelps divided lot 34 by an east-west line that passed just south of the present Masonic Temple, Phelps taking the north part and Walworth the south.

Seth Phelps was First Judge of Onondaga County from 1794 to 1799. When Cayuga County was erected in 1799, he became First Judge of that county, serving until 1810. He was a State Senator 1798-1801 and again 1810-1813. His second residence which he built in Aurora about 1800 is now the Doughty house on the corner of Main

Street and Cherry Avenue.

Early in 1795 the State purchased all of the Reservation from the Cayugas except two small areas north of Levanna. Roswell Frank­lin, Jr. then purchased from the State the land in the former Reserva­tion which his father had improved. Later in the same year he built a tavern on the west side of Main Street a short distance southeast of his log house. It was known for more than a decade as The Frank­lin Tavern and later became a dwelling. It was moved across Main Street in 1881 and is now The Grange. In the early 1800's, Roswell Franklin, Jr. sold his land to Jonathan Richmond (who had come from Massachusetts in 1792) and moved to a farm near King Ferry where some of his descendants now live.

Dr. Silas Holbrook was the first physician to practice in Aurora, followed by Dr. Frederic Delano who came to Aurora from Orange County, New York, in 1792. Dr. Delano was also the first druggist in this village. In the same year Abiather Hull opened the first general store in a small log house that stood just south of the present Pres­byterian Church.

Aurora, the principal settlement in the Military Tract, became the first county seat of Onondaga County. It remained the county seat until Onondaga County was divided in 1799, when it became the first county seat of Cayuga County.

The original name of the settlement at Aurora was Scipio, after the township in which it was located. On April 1, 1795 the U. S. Post Office, Scipio, was established here. Judge Walter Wood, who had come to Aurora earlier that year, was the first postmaster. The first mail carrier was Edward Paine. He carried the mail on horseback be­tween Aurora and Cooperstown, making one round trip every two weeks, for which he received $175 annually. The gross receipts of the new post office during the first year totaled $39.28.

Benjamin Ledyard, Captain in the Revolution and later Brigadier General of New York Militia, came to Aurora in 1793 as the New York State agent for the apportionment of lands in the Military Tract. Soon after his arrival, he built a log office on lot 8 and in 1796 his residence on lot 26. The latter still stands, currently the home of Mr. and Mrs. Samuel H. Ayers. A copy of his commission as Brigadier General signed by Governor John Jay is now hanging in the front hall of his former home. He was also appointed clerk of Onondaga County in 1794.

Benjamin Ledyard came originally from Groton, Connecticut, as did many early settlers of Aurora and vicinity. He was a cousin of John Ledyard, "The Traveler." Both of their fathers were lost at sea and the two boys were raised by their grandfather, John Ledyard.

General Ledyard christened the village "Aurora" soon after his arrival. Attempts to change the name of the post office to Aurora, however, did not succeed until 1810. During those fifteen years the name, Aurora, was used for all purposes except the post office address.

Paulina Mosher Wood, wife of Judge Walter Wood, originally of Dartmouth, Massachusetts, was the first Friend (Quaker) to settle in Aurora. Others soon came, many of them also from Dartmouth.

Judge Seth Phelps, assisted by judges John Richardson, Silas Halsey and William Stevens, held the first Court of Common Pleas for Onondaga County in a corn crib in Aurora in 1794. The first Circuit Court was held in the home of Judge Pheips in Aurora on September 7, 1795. The next Circuit Court was held in Aurora on June 12, 1798, in what has been called "the first court house" in the Military Tract. This "court house," built of crotched posts set in the ground support­ing poles which were covered with brush, was used for several years. When Cayuga County was erected in 1799, the courts were held alter­nately at Cayuga Bridge and Aurora until 1804 after which all were held in Aurora.

Benjamin Howland's family came from Dartmouth, Massachu­setts, in 1798 in two sleighs, one drawn by horses containing the fam­ily, the other driven by Benjamin Wilbur, drawn by oxen containing the household goods. They drove twenty cattle and a number of sheep with them. Benjamin purchased 135 acres (three cleared containing a log house and a saw mill) from Walter Wood for $840. The "Mary Howland House" a two-story frame house which still stands about two miles east of Aurora on the Poplar Ridge Road, was built im­mediately, for Benjamin's wife, Mary, had come with the stipulation that her family would not live in a log house. In 1799 the first Friends meeting in Cayuga County was held in the front room of this new house. A year later, the first Friends Meeting House was built of logs nearby.

The bridge across the foot of Lake Cayuga was completed in 1800 after eighteen months work and at a cost of $150,000. Although the lake is very deep at Aurora, the north end is quite shallow. The bridge was supported by piles driven into the lake bottom. It was more than a mile long and was at that time the longest bridge in the Americas. Cayuga Bridge immediately became an important artery in east-west travel and continued as such for more than a half century. Some of the old piles may still be seen at low water.

In 1806 John Walworth moved to Cleveland with his family and lived in the first frame house erected in that city. Eighty-one years after John Walworth left Aurora, one of his great-granddaughters came back. She was the late Julia Walworth Severance Millikin (granddaughter of Juliana Walworth Long who was born in Aurora, September 19, 1794), a graduate in 1885, trustee for many years, and lifelong benefactor of Wells College.

Jean Margaret Lamb (Wells 1921) presented two maps of Au­rora to Wells College. One was the long-lost Seth Phelps map and the other was the equally important Benjamin Ledyard map. Leonard Searing, then Surrogate of Cayuga County, and President of the Cayuga County Historical Society deposited photographs of both maps in the offices of the Clerk and Surrogate of Cayuga County.

In Aurora, lot 34 of the Military Township of Scipio was 240 rods wide measured due south from the Cayuga Reservation to an east-west line near the south side of the present Dean's Cottage. It was irregular in shape with an area of about 1.2 square miles. Phelps and Walworth divided lot 34 by an east-west line a few feet south of the present Aurora Masonic Temple. Walworth received the south portion containing about 53% of the total area, and Phelps the north, containing only 47% of the lot, but about 60% of the part of Aurora included in the lot.

The Phelps map was drawn probably in 1794 shortly after the division of lot 34. It contains only the portion of Aurora originally belonging to Phelps which extends 142 rods south along Main Street beginning at the south boundary of Goulds Hill Road. Two unnamed parallel streets were laid out 18 rods apart and each four rods wide. These are now Main Street and Court Street. The bearing of each of these streets is South, 100 East. Main Street could not bear due south without running into the lake. The Phelps portion of Aurora was divided into 27 lots, averaging about 11/2 acres each and numbered 1-27, in three sections of nine lots each: west of Main Street, between Main and Court Streets, and east of Court Street.

Seth Phelps gave lot 1 and the strip of land between this lot and the Reservation to the widow of Roswell Franklin. Of the eighteen lots west of Court Street, sixteen bear the names of owners which will be given later. Phelps built his residence on lot 24 and reserved lot 13 (west of 24) "partially for public purposes." In 1795 a street, later Cherry Avenue, was cut through lot 13.

The other map shows the entire village and more. It extends from the original Rosweli Franklin house to a short distance south of Paine's Creek. It bears the legend: "Plot of Aurora on a scale of about 20 rods to an inch with a Sketch of a Winter View of it in February, 1795." The map has been mounted on cloth. The following inscription on the back, however, shows through on the front: "Map. View of the Village of Aurora taken by B. Ledyard in Feby. 1795."

At the time this map was drawn, Benjamin Ledyard was Clerk of Onondaga County, and Aurora, the County Seat. The Ledyard map proves that our village was given the name of "Aurora" on or before February 1795. Indeed, it is possible that this map is, itself, the christening document - that Ledyard proposed the name "Aurora" by writing it upon his map of the village. On the map he also sug­gested names for the streets, but these names were not adopted. Evi­dently they did not catch the popular fancy as did "Aurora."

There was no postoffice here at that time. The postoffice, "Scipio," was established at Aurora, April 1, 1795, less than two months after this map was made. In view of the fact that it required fifteen years of unremitting effort by the residents to get the name of their postoffice changed from "Scipio" to "Aurora," it is interesting to have this proof that the village had been given the name, "Aurora," before its postoffice came into being.

Twenty dwellings, fifteen log and five frame, and several log barns are on the Ledyard map. The Patrick Tavern is the only one of these buildings still standing. North of the present Wells Road, all of the buildings west of Main Street are log and all five dwellings east of Main Street are frame.

The names on both maps are the same except for lot 7. The lot numbers and their owners in the Phelps portion are:

1. Mrs. Roswell Franklin, Sr. Log dwelling. (On Ledyard map, north of lot

1, is shown the original Franklin home built in 1789).

2. Samuel Branch, Deputy Sheriff of Onondaga Co. Two log dwellings.

8. Barber. Log dwelling. (Probably Deacon William Barber; later, Barbers Corners).

4. Judge John Richardson. Three log buildings. Also owns lot 15.

8. Benjamin Ledyard. Log dwelling and Clerk's Office. Also owned lots 11, 26. Three lots each 18 rods wide. In 1796, built Ledyard House on lot 26. This house is still standing

9. Abiather Hull. Log dwelling and store. Also owned lot 10.

24. Seth Phelps. Contains two-story dwelling, only frame house in Pheips portion.

No names on remaining lots - evidently not sold before February 1795.

John Walworth also laid out his portion of Aurora in lots, but did not number them. On the west side of Main Street, north to south, these lots were owned by: Richardson (log dwelling); Avery, farmer (log dwelling); Mumford; Walworth; Mumford. On the east side of Main Street: Joshua Patrick (frame tavern; east portion of lot owned by Lawyer Daniel Shepard); Avery (frame dwelling); Law­yer Thomas Mumford (frame dwelling containing office); John Wal-worth (large frame dwelling on lot 18 rods square); Mumford. The eastern lots were owned by Patrick, Walworth, and Mumford.

Farther south in Scipio lot 43 and east of Main Street were three log dwellings belonging to Dr. Silas Holbrook, James Richardson, and Kennedy. The petition for Scipio Lodge No.58, F. & A. M., dated December 1, 1795, is in Dr. Holbrook's handwriting. He moved to Venice in 1797. Still farther south in Scipio lot 54 at the mouth of Paine's Creek, the log dwelling (built in 1790), barn and still house of Major Edward Paine are shown.

On the Ledyard map, "Front St." and "Second St." are now Main Street and Court Street, respectively. Both streets are drawn beyond Paine's Creek. Here Court Street, never more than two blocks long, appears to be two miles long! Evidently this map was meant as a plan for a future larger Aurora as well as an accurate "view" of what had been laid out and built up to this time.

Surrogate Leonard Searing found the record of a deed dated April 15, 1795, from Seth Phelps to Walter Wood for lot 6 and three fourths of lot 13 (of which the south half of the north half was re­served by Phelps for a street between Main and Court Streets, now called Cherry Avenue). "Beginning at a certain stake" - The "cer­tain stake" stood at the southwest corner of Court Street and Cherry Avenue. This shows that the Seth Phelps house stood in the south half

of what is now Cherry Avenue, extending a few inches over the south boundary of that street, with its front about 108 feet east of Court Street. In this house on September 7, 1795, the first session of the Cir­cuit Court of Onondaga Co. was held. It was later occupied by Jona­than Swan and finally by Henry Wells and his family when they moved to Aurora in 1850. It burned in May 1851, while the Wells family were living in it.

Humphrey Howland came to Aurora with his parents in 1798 at the age of 18. Having had only three months schooling, he purchased books with money earned by trapping and educated himself. He was one of the surveyors of the Military Tract, working principally in Cayuga, Cortland and Seneca counties. Currently in the home of Mrs. John L. Zabriskie is a beautiful picture map with the principal build­ings of Aurora drawn in perspective. Here is found the only picture known of the first Cayuga Academy Building which burned a few months after the map was made. Though showing the correct location of all streets, houses and barns then in existence, it is also partly the surveyor's ideal of the future Aurora as the permanent county seat of Cayuga County. Just east of Court St. (named for the proposed county court house) and at the head of Front St. (now Lafayette St.) was the site reserved for the Cayuga County Court House, with the legend, "Proposed site for the Court House. A donation offered with $1500. by the villagers." Also Court St., which extends only a few yards south of Cherry Ave., is shown running parallel to Main St. for the entire length of the village.

IV. Formation of Cayuga County.

Cayuga County was formed March 8, 1799 from the western part of Onondaga County and contained about three-fifths of that county. Its northern and eastern boundaries were the same as today, but it was bounded on the south by a line from the southwest corner of Cortland County to the head of Lake Seneca and on the west by Lake Seneca and a meridian line from the foot of this lake to Lake Ontario. Thus the original Cayuga County contained almost all of the pre­Revolutionary territory of the Cayuga Indian Nation.

Aurora was near the geographical center of the new county and became the first county seat. Benjamin Ledyard, Clerk, and Seth Phelps, First Judge of Onondaga County, continued in these offices in Cayuga County. The first surrogate was Glen Cuyler who came from Albany and married Mary Ledyard, the oldest child of Benjamin Ledyard. General Ledyard died in November 1803, and Peter Hughes, who had been sheriff of Cayuga County for three years, became clerk.

Two men, several of whose descendants became prominent in the affairs of state and nation came to Aurora at about the same time, 1800, and from the same place, Groton, Connecticut. They also bore the same name but were only distantly related (third half-cousins). One was Christopher Morgan (1777-1834); the other, Jedediah Mor­gan (1774-1826). Both were influential leaders in politics, business and Masonry and contributed much to the development of Aurora.

Following the erection of Seneca County on March 27, 1804, which left Aurora on the western edge of Cayuga County, certain vil­lages, more centrally located, began an active campaign to secure the county seat. Aurora, on the other hand, attempted to keep it. An Aurora "argument" is revealed by the 1805 map of Aurora. On this map it is stated that the citizens of Aurora have donated a site for the county court house and raised $1500. for building it. The leader of the Aurora faction was Judge Walter Wood, "Scipio" Postmaster.

The five villages actively contending for the county seat were Aurora, Cayuga, Hardenbergh's Corners, Levanna, and Sherwood's Corners. The first legal move was a law, sponsored by a member from the vicinity of Sherwood and passed by the State Legislature in 1804 designating Sherwood's Corners as the new county seat and appoint­ing a committee to raise $1500. to build the court house in that village. This somewhat surreptitious action of the Legislature aroused a storm of criticism and soon practically everyone in the county had taken sides in the controversy. The next Legislature repealed the law and appointed three commissioners from other parts of the state to make a final decision. The claims of the five rival villages were considered and in June 1805, Hardenbergh's Corners was selected for the coun­ty seat.

A short time later, a meeting was held at Hardenbergh's Corners to choose a name for the village. The local physician, Dr. Crosset, sug­gested "Auburn." This suggestion was strenuously opposed by John Hardenbergh, the first settler of the village, and his friends who wanted merely to drop "Corners" from the original name. When the vote was taken, however, Auburn won by two votes. For several weeks thereafter the Hardenbergh faction carried petitions around with the argument that they did not want their village named for a "deserted village," but they could not obtain a majority.

The courts continued to be held in Aurora until the first court house at Auburn was partially completed in 1808. The county records were taken from Aurora to Auburn by Peter Hughes, Clerk, in 1807 and kept in his home.

Thus Aurora, after having been the county seat of Onondaga County (the Military Tract) for five years (1794-1799) and of Ca­yuga County for eight years (1799-1807), lost its position of local political importance largely because it was off the beaten path. Chiefly for this reason, also, it has always remained a small, residential vil­lage, but as the site of Cayuga Academy, as the home of some of the principal express organizers and other nationally known figures, and now as the seat of Wells College, it has had a role much greater in usefulness and wider in scope than during its early local eminence.

V. War of 1812.

In the War of 1812, the entire northern border of New York, in­cluding that of Cayuga County, was exposed to the enemy. Troops were needed for the defense of this area, chiefly near Buffalo. In ad­dition to the State Militia and volunteers, many young men were drafted for service.

Aurora, especially while it was the county seat of Onondaga and Cayuga counties, had become accustomed to martial events. Local companies of the State Militia met here (as in other villages of the State) on certain "muster days" for drill and instruction. On those days bouts between fighters longing to display their prowess often provided additional excitement which sometimes rose to such a pitch that many would join in a joyful and boisterous battle royal. On August 28, 1801, a general Court Martial was held in Aurora to try Captain Phineas Stevens for disobedience. Lieut. Col. Wilhemus Myn­derse, a charter trustee of Caynga Academy, presided. Stevens was captain of a company in Lieut. Col. John Tillotson's regiment which was a part of General Benjamin Ledyard's brigade. He was found guilty but appealed to the Commander in Chief, Governor George Clinton. On January 2, 1802, Governor Clinton annulled his sentence stating while evidently guilty as charged, he had not been given time to prepare his defense. In the War of 1812, John Tillotson, Master in 1798 of Scipio Lodge No. 58, Aurora, was promoted to Brigadier Gen­eral, commanding the Seventh New York Brigade of Infantry.

In addition to the young men who enlisted or were drafted, older men, exempt from service because of age, often formed companies. At least one such company was raised in Aurora and vicinity largely through the efforts of Jonathan Richmond, then in his 49th year. It received the following authorization from Governor Daniel D. Tomp­kins, Commander in Chief of New York State troops.

General Orders: Headquarters, Albany, Nov. 11th, 1812

Whereas a number of persons, inhabitants of the town of Scipio in the County of Cayuga, exempt from military duty, have associated themselves to­gether and formed a company, pursuant to the 35th section of the militia Law of this State; Now, therefore, the Commander in Chief, in pursuance of the authority vested in him by the said law, does hereby organize the said associa­tion as a company of Infantry and assigns and brevets one Captain, two Lieu­tenants, and one Ensign for said company, viz.: Jonathan Richmond for Cap­tain, Elisha Durkee [now more than fifty years old] for First Lieutenant, Nathan Webster for Second Lieutenant, and Worden Babcock for Ensign, and directs that they be obeyed and respected accordingly.

There was great excitement in Cayuga County following the burning of Buffalo by the British on January 1, 1814. Rumors often came that the British Army was marching eastward across the State. At one such time the rumor seemed so well founded that several com­panies of both infantry and cavalry crossed Cayuga Bridge and ad­vanced as far as Canandaigua before it became apparent that there had been no invasion.

The following, excerpted from a letter from Christopher Morgan

to his brother-in-law, Erastus T. Smith in Connecticut, tells of some happenings in Aurora during the war and portrays the feelings of a Federalist who had opposed the war and was distrustful of the gov­ernment of President Madison.

Aurora, 30th August, 1814.

Dear Sir,

Yours of the 13th Inst. we received last Saturdays mail . . . . I think it was rather hard that you should be called, immediately on your arrival home among your friends, from them on so unpleasant an occasion, but hope you conducted yourself with true American principles.

We have had a heavy draft of Militia from our County since you left here - twelve hundred and eighty exclusive of all the independent companies. The Covernor in his orders states that the remains of Genl. Brown's Army now in Fort Erie are placed in such a situation that they cannot retreat and in order to relieve them, has called out the Militia. They have generally manifested the Spirit of 76 on this occasion.

Major General Brown and suite have been in our Village for 8 days --left here yesterday for the Army at Fort Erie. His wound has healed com­pletely . . .

Aurora, 2 Sept., 1814.

The Mail went past before I finished my letter - nothing new since ex­cepting the news yesterday that the British had destroyed the Public Buildings in the City of Washington. Oh! God! deliver my Country from their enemy and also from the hands of such rulers who declared that when they came into office, they found the country in the full tide of successful experiments, at peace with the world, and an overflowing Treasury - Men who have had their choice of time to declare war and who declare it, and have not placed any one point in the United States in security.

Many new war taxes were levied by the national government. The tax collector for the 23rd New York Collection District (the original Cayuga County) beginning January 1, 1814 was Roswell Tousley of Aurora. He received six per cent of the amount collected as his fee. The total tax collected on liquor was more than that on everything else combined. Distillers paid 20 cents to 25 cents per gallon and the annual charge for a license to retail liquor was $15. Retailers of other goods normal­ly paid $10. Other taxes were: $2 per year on each carriage used; 8% on hats, bonnets and caps; 5% on leather goods; 3% on paper; 1% on nails; 6% on gold, silver and plated ware and on household furniture. Except for the carriage tax, the above taxes were paid by dealers in the articles named and were readily collected. Also there seems to have been no resistance to the carriage tax, but the final straw was reached when the government levied a tax on watch owners.

On page 304 of the larger collection book, Roswell Tousley listed by towns the names of the watch owners in his district in 1815. The names of 107 owners of silver (tax $1 each) and 5 of gold watches (tax $2 each) are given. Of the total $117 tax, nothing was collected. The collector had to give some reason for non-collection, so he wrote after all of the names either "not found" or more often, "absconded." It is scarcely possible that all watch owners went into hiding or left the country to avoid a one-dollar tax. A better reason is given in the following affidavit by Roswell Tousley dated July 26, 1817 and writ­ten on that same page: "I hereby certify that I have employed all reasonable means to collect the above duties without effect and that

it is my firm belief that they are not collectable." This is signed and sworn to before Eleazer Burnham, Justice of the Peace.

Roswell Tousley was succeeded on April 11, 1817, by Jonathan Richmond. Richmond resigued early in 1819, after his election to the House of Representatives, and was succeeded by Eleazer Burnham who was also Postmaster and Justice of the Peace. Evidently most of the war taxes were discontinued at about this time.

VI. Incorporation of the Village.

The Town of Ledyard was formed from the original Town of Scipio in 1823 and named for Benjamin Ledyard. Its eastern bound­ary was that of the Cayuga Reservation extended south to the Town of Genoa. The first town meeting was held at Aurora in April 1823, and the first supervisor was Jedediah Morgan.

Aurora became an incorporated village May 15, 1837. The chief reason for its incorporation at this time was "to secure the name and prevent its appropriation by Aurora in Erie County." One of the present townships near the center of Erie County is named "Aurora." Since Millard Fillmore was born in Summer Hill, Cayuga County, and began the study of law at Montville with Judge Walter Wood, a for­mer leading citizen of Aurora, Cayuga County, it has been stated by some, erroneously, that he began his law practice here. He began it, however, in the Town of Aurora, Erie County, as Fillmore, himself, states definitely in his autobiography, and he continued his practice there for seven Years until he moved permanently to Buffalo.

ORGANIZATIONS & BUSINESSES.

VII. The Steam Mill and Early Inventions.

Since the plow has always been a most valuable farm implement, these early inventions of plows made in or near Aurora were of prime importance. The first patent granted to a resident of Cayuga County was obtained on a plow by Roswell Tousley, January 11, 1812. Ros­well Tousley, a blacksmith, came to Aurora from Manlius about 1806. Plow patents were granted also to Mathew Patrick of the Town of Scipio, June, 1813; to Jonathan Swan, an Aurora merchant, July 5, 1814; to Jedediah Morgan, a farmer and later State Senator, and J. B. Harris, a blacksmith, October 11, 1814. No details of any of these patents have been preserved since the U. S. Patent Office burned in 1836. It is probable, however, that all were improvements of the "bull plow" then in general use, since, in 1816, Jonathan Swan and Roswell Tousley were granted a further patent on this type of plow. The bull plow had a wooden moldboard to which were attached strips of sheet iron with an edge and point of tempered wrought iron.

The most important plow invention of the nineteenth century also occurred near Aurora at this time. This was Jethro Wood's in­vention of an all iron moldboard and share which is still being used without substantial change except in the quality of the metal.

Jethro Wood (1774-1834) moved with his parents to Scipio in 1800. He lived in a farm house on the Poplar Ridge road about three miles east of Aurora. The first patent to Jethro Wood was granted July 1, 1814 and the final one, September 1, 1819. His plow had a cast iron moldboard shaped so that all parts of it would be subjected to equal pressures. He profited very little financially from his invention. William H. Seward said of him, "No man has benefited his country more and no man has been so inadequately rewarded." His plow was immediately copied by many manufacturers in this country and abroad. All attempts to enforce his patent rights failed. Finally after his death and just before the expiration of the patent, the courts de­cided that the improvements in the plow then in general use that ren­dered it so effective were due solely to Jethro Wood and that all manu­facturers must pay his heirs for the privilege of making it. This be­lated decision, however, was of little avail, as the patent soon expired despite attempts of the heirs to renew it.

Jethro Wood wanted to extend the usefulness of his invention as widely as possible, so he presented one of his plows to the Czar of Russia. At that time, Russia was the chief grain exporting country

of the world. This plow was of inestimable benefit to Russian agri­culture.

The story of "The Ring and the Plow" was published in The New York Tribune a quarter of a century later. It reveals another instance in which Jethro Wood was deprived of his just rights.

During the year 1820, Jethro Wood sent one of his plows to Alexander I, Emperor of Russia, and the peculiar circumstances attending the gift and its reception formed a large part of the newspaper gossip of the day. Wood, though a man of cultivation intellectually as well as agriculturally, was not familiar with French, which was then as now the diplomatic language. So he requested his personal friend, Dr. Samuel Mitchel, President of the New York Society of Natural History and Sciences, to write a letter in French to accompany the gift.

The Autocrat of all the Russias received the plow and letter and sent back a diamond ring, which the newspapers declared to he worth from $7,000 to $15,000, in token of his appreciation. By some indirection, the ring was not delivered to the donor of the plow, but to the writer of the letter, and Dr. Mitchell instantly appropriated it to his own use. Wood appealed to the Rus­sian Minister at Washington for redress. The Minister sent to his Emperor and asked to whom the ring belonged and Alexander replied that it was in-tended for the inventor of the plow. Armed with this authority, Wood again demanded the ring of Mitchell. But there were no steamships or telegraphs in those days and Mitchel declared that in the long interval in which they had been waiting to hear from Russia, he had given it to the cause of the Greeks who were then rising to throw off the yoke of their Turkish oppressors. A newspaper of that time calls Mitchell's course "an ingenious mode of quarter­ing on the enemy," and the inventor's friends seem to have believed that the ring had been sold for his benefit. At all events, it never came to light again and Wood, a peaceful man and a Quaker by profession, did not push the matter further.

In addition to being the first patentee in this vicinity, Roswell Tousley built the old Steam Mill later purchased by Wells College. It is in the well known 1848 lithograph, "Aurora from the North Pop­lars," and occurs in all views of the Aurora lake front.

Roswell Tousley erected this three-story stone building in 1817 to house the first steam flour mill west of the Hudson River. Steam was a new source of power in 1817 - ten years after the first steam-boat and twelve years before the first steam locomotive. The pioneers had become accustomed to mills run by water power. Evidently while the mill was being built, many had expressed doubts that steam could do the job, so when the mill was completed, this advertisement ap­peared in a weekly paper, The Advocate of the People, published at Auburn, December 3, 1817.

The Steam Mill which I built at Aurora, that has excited so much anxiety, is now in motion, and goes and grinds to my satisfaction. All persons can view it for themselves, and are at liberty to publish its merits.

AURORA, NOV.27, 1817. Roswell Tousley.

A week later, this editorial was published in the same paper.*

The Steam Mill at Aurora recently built by Judge Roswell Tousley, is, we understand, in full operation with two runs of stone. The great expense at­tending the construction and building of this mill has been such that all per-sons who feel an interest in the welfare of their country, cannot but wish the enterprising and persevering proprietor that success which he is so eminently entitled to. Much credit is also due to the ingenious Mr. Curtis who is the inventor of the steam engine, and who has been the principal overseer of the building.

* The two Auburn Newspaper articles were given to the author by John J. Maloney, a former Aurora citizen now living in Auburn, who has preserved much valuable Aurora data.

In addition to his steam flour mill, Roswell Tousley had a black­smith shop, a shoe shop, a tannery, and a furnace. It is claimed that Jethro Wood cast his first iron plow in Tousley's furnace in Aurora.

It would be gratifying to be able to say that this early steam flour mill was a financial success. It was not, however. Evidently the building and machinery cost so much that they could not be paid for. The mill failed and with it the other Tousley enterprises. The machin­ery was sold and moved away and the Steam Mill became a ware-house, retaining only its name to indicate its origin. It was soon pur­chased by Christopher Morgan and his son, Edwin B. Morgan, and served them as a storehouse for grain and produce bought in the sur­rounding country and shipped to New York City via Lake Cayuga, the canals and the Hudson River. It continued to serve succeeding gener­ations, convenient to both lake and railroad. It was last owned by Sanford G. Lyon and heirs before its purchase by Wells College.

VIIl. Cayuga Academy and Brier Cliff School.

In 1798 the inhabitants of Aurora and vicinity decided to build a school. A committee was appointed to raise funds, select the site and secure the services of a builder. General Benjamin Ledyard gave the north half of his front lawn for the site. The first building of Cayuga Academy was begun in 1799 and completed the following year.

The first public meeting ever held in Cayuga Academy was a memorial service for George Washington on February 22, 1800, less than three months after his death. General Ledyard delivered the eulogy and the Reverend Seth Williston, the sermon. Seventeen young ladies represented the seventeen states.

In the autumn of 1800, Cayuga Academy opened "with a respect­able number" of students. A few months later, several of the inhabi­tants of Aurora applied to the Regents of the State of New York for a charter of incorporation of Cayuga Academy. The charter, signed by Governor John Jay was granted March 23, 1801. The Charter Trustees were: Seth Phelps, President, Benjamin Ledyard, Walter Wood, Seth Sherwood, John Tillotson, Thomas Hewitt, Benjamin Dey, Silas Hutchinson, Jonas Whitney, Silas Halsey, Wilhemus Mynderse, Thomas Mumford, John L. Hardenberg, Ezekiel Sales, and Elijah Price.

The original building burned in the autumn of 1805 while the Academy was in session. At that time, Glen Cuyler was surrogate of Cayuga County and his office was a small building near the Academy and was the former clerk's office built by General Ledyard. Mrs. Cuy-

ler "without hesitation threw open the doors of her own parlor, that apartment so choice in woman's estimation, into which she permitted the clerk's office to be removed." Thus the office building was made immediately available to the Academy and was used for instruction until a second Academy Building, also of wood, was erected the fol­lowing year.

In 1809 the Cayuga Boarding School was opened in Aurora "for the reception of young ladies in connection with the Cayuga Acad­emy." This was the first school for girls in Aurora. Its students were taught by the Cayuga Academy instructors. Thus Cayuga Academy became coeducational at an early date. A "Quarter Bill of Cayuga Academy for the quarter commencing 13 March and ending 17 June 1820 including 2 weeks vacation" contains the names of twenty-one boys and fourteen girls.

“The Post-Village of Aurora . . . has a flourishing academy, about fifty houses, a Post Office and a small library. The Cayuga Academy is an eligible situation for the education of such youth as are absorbed in the grosser pleasures of more populous Towns, and the price of board in respectable families is fixed at $1.25 to $1.75 cents per week.” Thus eulogized H. G. Spafford in his 1813 Gazetteer of the State of New York.

The first scholarship fund in Aurora was a legacy of $1,000 given Cayuga Academy by Judge Walter Wood in 1827. He directed that this money be invested and the return from it used to educate worthy boys at the Academy. The Walter Wood Fund is still part of the estate of Cayuga Lake Academy.

The early principals of Cayuga Academy were: John Ely, 1801-1811; Rev. Salmon P. Strong, 1812-1815 and 1820-1829; Rev. Medad Pomeroy, 1816-1819; Daniel D. Page, 1819-1820; Salem Town, 1829-1835.

Salem Town (1779-1864) was graduated at Middlebury College in 1805 and received the A.M. degree there in 1807. In 1829 at the age of fifty, he moved with his family to Aurora and became Principal of Cayuga Academy. Soon after his arrival he began writing textbooks, chiefly spelling books and readers. The book for which he was best known was his "Analysis of the English Language" which ran through more than thirty editions and was used in schools for fifty years, 1835-1885. It is estimated that more than one million of his books were used. In 1835, due to a long illness, Salem Town resigned as Principal, but remained in the Academy as "Teacher of Philology and Lecturer on Ancient and Modern History and the Origin and Progress of the Arts and Sciences." Although his chief interest was in English, he was evidently well qualified in science as shown by the fact that in 1863 at the age of 84 he gave a series of lectures on Astronomy at Indiana Asbury College (now Depauw University), Greencastle, Indiana. When he retired in 1850 he became President of the Board of Trustees of Cayuga Academy. At Ithaca, New York, in April 1843, Salem Town was the chief instructor at the first Teacher's Institute held in America.

Largely due to the reputation of Salem Town as a teacher, Cayuga Academy became well-known beyond its immediate neighbor­hood. Students came to it from states as far away as Illinois and Kentucky.

In 1836 the small wooden Academy building was moved to the north side of Sherwood Road and a much larger brick building was erected. The old building on Sherwood Road was the Methodist Church of Aurora for fifty years, after which it was moved to Levanna and is now the Levanna Chapel.

(PICTURE)

CAYUGA ACADEMY.

The 1841 catalog contains the names of ten teachers and 208 students of Cayuga Academy. There were also 44 in the primary department making a total of 252 students. Of the 208, 138 were "Gentlemen" and 70 "Ladies." The catalog contains the following statements: " The village of Aurora, although easy of access by railroad and steamboat, is retired and very justly celebrated for the morality and kindness of its inhabitants. No groceries, eating houses, or other improper places of resort are permitted to be kept." "Young men are fitted for any of the colleges." (In 1841 young women did not attend college). "Recitations commence at five o'clock in the morning and are continued one hour each." "Departments. There are a Pri-

mary, a Higher English, a Mathematical, and a Classical." "Tuition, from $3.00 to $5.00 per term." "Good board and lodging may be obtained at the Academy Boarding House at $1.50 per week." "Little or no pocket money is necessary as there are no places in which it may be spent for useless and injurious articles."

During the early forties, one of the students at Cayuga Academy was Ely Samuel Parker, a Seneca Indian, later a sachem. During the Civil War he became a Brigadier General on General Grant's staff. He copied the final draft of the surrender terms, delivered it to General Lee and brought back Lee's acceptance. In 1869 he was appointed U.S. Commissioner of Indian Affairs by President Grant. In 1845 the citizens of Cayuga County subscribed to a fund to send his sister, Caroline Parker, to Cayuga Academy. She became very active in the education of her people and was later known as "The Queen of the Senecas."

In 1856 a four story brick addition was built on the front of the older brick building. It contained class rooms, a library, a laboratory, and dormitory rooms. E. B. Morgan gave $5,000 to endow the library.

In 1860 the name of Cayuga Academy was changed to Cayuga Lake Academy. The attendance during the Civil War was temporarily reduced. Twenty-six Academy students volunteered as soldiers in the U.S. Army.

In the spring of 1882, the Trustees accepted the proposition of Colonel J. C. Wright, Principal of Peekskill Military Academy, to change Cayuga Lake Academy into a military school. Cayuga Lake Military Academy opened the following September. A year later a large wooden addition at the back was built. The military school pros­pered for a time but was discontinued shortly before 1900.

During several years prior to World War I, Albert Somes conducted a private school in the Academy building. In 1920 the building was remodeled for the public school of Aurora and vicinity. The local public school, now called Cayuga Lake Academy, continued to use the Academy building for twenty-five years until April 19, 1945, when it was destroyed by fire.

The proposed site of the Cayuga County Court House east of Court and facing Front (now Lafayette) Street is shown on the 1805 Humphrey Howland map of Aurora. This structure was built by Wal­ter Wood in his effort to keep the county seat at Aurora. It was an inn until 1815 when it became a Friends school for girls, conducted by Asa and Ruth Potter. The school accepted girls from both Quaker and non-Quaker families. Judge Elijah Miller of Auburn sent his two daughters, Lisette (afterward Mrs. Alvah Worden) and Frances Adelaide (afterward Mrs. William H. Seward) to this school. In his auto­biography, William H. Seward wrote that his wife received part of her early training "in an excellent school in her own county conducted under the care of the Society of Friends."

Susanna Marriott, an English Friend, came in 1820 to take charge of this school. Miss Marriott, an orphan, came to America in 1793 at the age of 17. She first lived in the home of her brother near Philadelphia and cared for his motherless children. Later she became a teacher. She was an ardent abolitionist and would use none of the products of slave labor. She once told Miss Emily Howland that she erred only in the use of paper which was a necessity in her vocation. Paper in those days was made from discarded cotton cloth. Miss Marriott partially eased her conscience by adopting this point of view, "Paper, being made of cotton that has done one work, costs no in­crease of unrequited toil."

The school, now known as Brier Cliff, prospered under Miss Marriott's able management and girls came to it from many parts of central New York. Many girls without means to pay for an education were received at Brier Cliff and given board and tuition in return for whatever assistance they could render.

This was the "female School" to whose students Walter Wood bequeathed the use of his pew. He disposed of the Brier Cliff building as follows: "Also I give and devise to my Daughter Matilda (Mrs. Eleazer Burnham) the house and lot and all the buildings thereupon in the village of Aurora, now occupied by Susannah Marriott and which lays East of the highway leading northerly from Jonathan Swans."

When Susanna Marriott left Aurora about 1835, Brier Cliff was taken over by Rebecca Bunker. The school was discontinued three or four years later.

During the forties, the building was used for an entirely different purpose. It was a gambling house, an Aurora casino, known as "The Castle," which drew patrons from almost as wide an area as had the school. Still later, it was a home for unemployed Irish immigrants. Shortly after 1870 it was torn down and replaced by a residence for Henry Morgan's gardener.

IX. The Aurora Gazette.

In the spring of 1805, two English newspaper men, Henry and James Pace, came to Aurora. They brought their well-worn type with them and began publishing The Aurora Gazette, a weekly newspaper, on Wednesday, June 19, 1805. This was the third newspaper in Cayuga County, the first having been The Levanna Gazette and Onon­daga Advertiser, printed in 1798 at Levanna; the second, the Western Luminary, Watkins Settlement (Scipioville) 1801.

No copy of the first issue of The Aurora Gazette is known to ex­ist. Fortunately, however, William H. Bogart, builder of Wavebank

house, author of several books and many newspaper articles, and a charter trustee of Wells College, preserved a clipping from the first issue in one of his many valuable scrapbooks, and in his policy state­ment Pace decried the actions of those printers "who make news in their own closets!" He promises to faithfully and impartially record, but states that he is compelled to produce the "earliest account" and has "no time to reflect upon the improbability of the information, or to compare it with other accounts, or dates. Besides, this precious news is generally fabricated to answer political purposes, and it must find admission, at all events."

Two dollars per Annum was the price for his Wednesday weekly issue, in quarterly payments.

The oldest known copy of The Aurora Gazette is Vol.1, no.35, dated February 12, 1806 and the latest, Vol.3, no.146, June 17, 1808. Both of these are in the Wells College Library. The Aurora Gazette was published for a period of more than three years.

While Aurora was still the county seat, the legal advertisements appeared in this paper:

November 20, 1807

By virtue of a writ of testatum fieri facias residium, issued out of the Supreme Court of Judicature of the state of New York, to me directed and delivered, against the goods and chattels, lands and tenements of Henry Blateur, I have seized on and taken all the real property of the said Henry, in my baillwic, which I shall expose to sale, as the law directs, on Saturday the second day of January, next, and nine o'clock in the forenoon of said day, at the house of Daniel Avery, innholder, in the village of Aurora.

JACOB T. C. DE WITT, Sheriff.

Advertisements, most of which were local, filled almost half of each issue. Some examples of these follow.

BLACKSMITH WANTED

SOME Person who understands making Scythes, Axes, Hoes, and most kinds of country work, will meet with good encouragement, by settling and laboring at the trade in this Village, and may rely upon an extensive run of custom and good pay. If a young Man, well recommended as to his moral con­duct, inured to industry, should apply, he may be assisted with the means of carrying on the business to advantage.

Aurora, March 10, 1806 WALTER WOOD.

WANTED IMMEDIATELY

Two Journeyman Shoe and Boot-makers, Also a smart LAD, Fourteen or Fifteen Years of Age to learn the Art of TANNING and SHOE-MAKING.

Aurora, Sept.23, 1807 GAYLORD & SWEET.

WHEREAS, my Wife LYDIA, has this day eloped from my bed and board, without any lust cause or provocation; These are, therefore, to forbid any person or persons harboring or trusting her on my account, as I am de­termined not to pay any debts for her contracting after this date.

Milton, 81st October, 1807 JACOMIAH SMITH.

The printer used other means to eke out a living, as witness:

For Sale at the Aurora Printing Office, Doctor Solomons' Jaundice Bitters

---effectual in removing those sleepy, dull sensations so common in the spring season. Price fifty cents per box.

When the county seat was moved to Auburn, the Pace brothers soon followed and on June7 1809 they began publishing The Western Federalist, Auburn's first newspaper. Their paper became unpopular during the War of 1812 largely because they were English. In 1817, two other papers having appeared The Western Federalist suspended publication. One of its successful rivals was The Auburn Gazette.

X. The Masons: Scipio Lodge 110.

On December 1 1795 thirteen settlers of this vicinity petitioned the New York Grand Lodge for a Masonic lodge at Aurora. In response to this petition which is still preserved in the Grand Lodge archives, Scipio Lodge No 58 was chartered March 22, 1797. This was the first Masonic Lodge established in the Military Tract. The three highest charter officers Seth Sherwood (for whom the village of Sherwood was named) , Comfort Tyler and John Tillotson, had all been officers in the Revolution. Scipio Lodge No.110 in Aurora now operates under the original charter of 1797 signed by Grand Master Robert R. Livingston, a member of the committee that wrote the Declaration of Independence.

Scipio Lod ge No. 58, F.&A. M., had its first lodge room in the original Cayuga Academy building which burned inOctober 1805. Immediately following the fire, Scipio Lodge appointed a committee “to look out a suitable place in the village of Aurora and procure the same and thereon to erect a building twenty feet by twenty-eight feet, two stories high, . . . all to be done in a plain but workmanlike manner and finished as soon as circumstances will permit.” The chairman of this committee was Dr. Frederic Delano and the "suitable place" procured was the southwest corner of the lot on which his dwelling and drug store stood. Within a year after the fire, the Masonic Hall was completed. The first meeting of Scipio Lodge was held in it on October 27 1806. Christopher Morgan wrote the minutes of this meeting which was attended by forty members. This building is now the front two-story part of the "Chimney Corner." It is the oldest existing building erected by a Masonic Lodge in the State of New York.

Jonathan Richmond and his two personal friends, Christopher Morgan and Jedediah Morgan were leaders in politics, business, and Masonry in Aurora Christopher Morgan had the Morgan Store, the business center of the community. Jedediah Morgan lived on his farm three miles south of Aurora until 1822 when he moved to the village.

These three friends were the leaders in the organization of Au­rora Chapter No 64 Royal Arch Masons, chartered February 3, 1819. They became the three highest officers in the new chapter and con­tinued in these same offices for seven years. Although Scipio Lodge

No.58, F. & A. M., had erected in 1806 a Masonic Hall the members of the Chapter decided to build a separate hall for themselves. On July 3, 1819, Jedediah Morgan, Christopher Morgan, and Jonathan Rich­mond signed a contract (in the handwriting of Christopher Morgan) with Jacops Hovey, an architect of Pheips, New York, and a member of Aurora Chapter No.64, to build a Chapter Hall. The contract states that the building is to be erected "according to the understanding of the said Jacops and the contracting party who have that confidence in Jacops Hovey as a Mason and as a mechanic as to believe that he will not slite or turn off any necessary work that ought to be done to render the building reasonably ornamental or useful."

The cornerstone was laid by DeWitt Clinton August 18, 1819, before a large assemblage. At that time, DeWitt Clinton was Governor of New York, Grand Master of Masons in the State of New York and General Grand High Priest of the General Grand Chapter of the United States. The land was not formally purchased until after the building was begun. The deed dated October 6, 1819, to Jedediah Mor­gan, Christopher Morgan, and Jonathan Richmond, acting for the Chapter, is for "the land on which the Aurora Chapter Hall is now being built."

The building was completed in March 1820. Long before this it had become evident that the cost would far exceed the original esti­mate, so the Chapter invited Scipio Lodge No.58 to share the building and also the expense of its erection. Even so, the final cost must have been startling. In the contract it had been agreed to pay Jacops Hovey $200 as architect and builder and $750 for all building expenses. Hovey turned in an itemized bill for materials and labor (in addition to his $200 fee) totaling $1,748.26, one thousand dollars more than the original estimate. As much of that as possible was raised by sub­scription. For the remainder, two notes were given jointly by the Lodge and Chapter, one to Jacops Hovey for $205.60 and one to Jede­diah Morgan, Christopher Morgan and Jonathan Richmond for $486.79. The final payment on the first note was made in 1823 and on the second two years later. The building was never mortgaged and was fully paid for five years after its completion.

This building, now the Aurora Masonic Temple, is the oldest ex­isting building in the State erected by a Royal Arch Chapter. The lodge room, decorated with Masonic emblems, is a "room within a room." A set of detailed drawings and photographs of both the in­terior and exterior was published in The Architectural Review, vol.5 (1917). A description of it also has been placed in the Library of Congress by the Historic Buildings Survey. The design of the Masonic Temple is a harmonious combination of delicate quaintness and charm with more sturdy characteristics, affording as a whole a unique and beautiful pattern of early American architecture. Professor W. S. Rusk has called it "Aurora's chief claim to architectural fame."

XI. The Churches.

THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

In The History of Western New York, written in 1848 by the Rev. James H. Hotchkin, himself a pioneer minister in this region, the origins of the early churches in Central New York are described. One of these was the church which later became the Presbyterian Church of Aurora.

The Reverend Seth Williston, a Congregational minister sent to the area by the General Association of Connecticut, in 1800 assisted in organizing a Congregational Church in the Town of Scipio which later became the first Presbyterian Church of Scipio and finally, the Presbyterian Church of Aurora. There was no church building at first. The original congregation was small and services were held usually at the homes of members.

In January 1804, certain Congregational churches in the Military Tract organized “The Middle Association of the Military Tract and its Vicinity.” The record book has been lost, but the organizing churches probably were those of Aurelius, Skaneateles, Pompey, Hom­er, Genoa and Scipio. The Association existed until 1811, when it merged with the Cayuga and Onondaga Presbyteries. The change from Congregational to the Presbyterian denomination was occa­sioned by the gradual relatively greater increase of Presbyterians over Congregationalists. This change was one of mutual agreement among the members and leaders of the two denominations. About 1803, the Rev. Hezekiah North Woodruff became pastor of the Scipio Church and continued as pastor until he moved to Auburn ten years later. He resided in Aurora and the services of the Scipio Church were held alternately in Aurora and on "The Ridge." This church was re­ceived into the Cayuga Presbytery early in 1811 as the First Presby­terian Church of Scipio.

Members of the First Presbyterian Church of Scipio organized on August 21, 1818, the "First Presbyterial Society in the Village of Aurora." In Storke's History of Caynga County (1879), it is stated that this reorganization was chiefly a change in name from Scipio to Aurora, so that the Aurora Church was a continuation of the First Church of Scipio. The Aurora Church was received into the Cayuga Presbytery on September 22, 1818, at a meeting held in Aurora; at a second meeting on the next day, Rev. James G. Ogilvie was ordained and installed the first pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Aurora.

The erection of the church was begun immediately and the cor­nerstone was laid on December 28, 1818. A drawing of this church,, a beautiful wooden structure with a tall; slender steeple, hangs in the present church. The name of the architect has not been found, but it is possible that it was Jacops Hovey of Phelps, N. Y. He designed many churches in Central New York. A few years ago, Hovey's great-great nephew, while visiting the author, saw the drawing of the original church and said, "That certainly has the characteristics of a Hovey church." Jacops Hovey was the architect and builder of the Aurora Masonic Temple, which he began in the summer of 1819. It is possible, therefore, that he came to Aurora to build the original Pres­byterian Church and remained to build the Aurora Masonic Temple.

The following were pastors of the Presbyterian Church from 1823 to 1863: Asa K. Buel, E. N. Nichols, Henry R. Hoisingion,

Chauncey Cook, James Richards, Jr., Charles N. Mattoon, Richard Dickinson, Henry Webster Parker (Ordained in Aurora by the Cayuga Presbytery), William R. Chapman, P. P. Burnham, Daniel H. Temple.

From 1825-29, there was no regular pastor. Medad Pomeroy, Sal­mon P. Strong and George Allen were occasional preachers. The first two of these were principals of Cayuga Academy.

The original church was destroyed by fire, and the cornerstone for the present edifice was laid July 31, 1860 by Salem Town. The master builder, Samuel D. Mandell, received twenty shillings ($2.50) per day. Henry R. Menzie, an Aurora stone mason worked 1143/4 days at 18/ ($2.25) per day. The wages of the other workmen varied ac­cording to the type of work done.

The two round windows in the west end evidently were first filled with clear glass. The stained glass now in them was purchased from the Royal Glass Painting Establishment, Munich, Germany by Henry Morgan while abroad. In a letter from this firm to Henry Morgan occurs the statement, "I trust that these works will fully meet your expectations as they have been carefully executed in the style of very early Gothic and upon the principles of glass painting of that period for which this establishment is particularly noted." Henry Morgan wrote E. B. Morgan from Madrid, November 30, 1867: "I bought in Munich two round windows for the west end of our Church and they have been forwarded to the care of Mr. Garvin. I think they will look right and keep out the glare of the sun in the summer." The upper window was covered on the inside when the church was re-modeled in 1970.

Three years after the church was completed, the steeple was de­signed and erected by Samuel D. Mandell. It was completed December 22, 1864 at a cost of $4591.82. Miss Annie McGreevey told the author that on the day the steeple scaffolding was to be torn down, Samuel D. Mandell's 77 year-old father, Samuel Mandell, climbed to the top of the scaffold to get a view of the village from that height.

The clock was purchased from Alonzo Taylor, New York City, in May 1865. His bill to E. B. Morgan is for "One Tower Striking Clock, 3 wood dials, $550."

The church building complete with steeple cost about $28,800 of which about $22,000 was given by E. B. and Henry Morgan. While recognizing the fact that such a structure could not have been erected without the generous aid and vital interest of the two Morgan broth-

ers, the subscription list shows that many contributed substantial sums. A number of the contributors, moreover, were members of other denominations or not members of any church. Many others labored and planned whose names are not recorded. The Aurora Presbyterian Church has served the village through the years, accepting whole­heartedly into its congregation those of many faiths. Its stately edifice is a monument to all who helped to build it.

The first pipe organ, built by Samuel Hamill, Cambridge, Mass., was presented to the church about 1866 by Henry Morgan. In 1869 E. B. Morgan purchased a small pipe organ for the session house, also from Samuel Hamill. The session house was a brick building on the south side of the church with no connecting corridor. It was torn down in 1910 and replaced by the present chapel. A rose window from the session house was saved at the insistence of Mrs. Sewall. It is on the east wall and is visible from the outside, but not from the inside. With no light shining through it, its colors are lost.

The two marble medallions were modeled in Aurora by the well known sculptor, Erastus Dow Palmer. The Salem Town medallion, made in 1863, was placed in the church in 1870; the Samuel Mandell medallion was made in 1872. The bronze plate commemorating the Ledyard Civil War soldiers who gave their lives was erected in 1872 by E. B. Morgan. The W. W. Howard memorial tablet was also given by him in 1874.

One of the two memorial windows is inscribed to "Roswell Franklin, first settler in the village. Chosen elder in this Church, 1810." This was Roswell Franklin, Jr. (1768-1840?) son of the first settler, Roswell Franklin (1740 ?-1792) for whom the first house was built in 1789. The other window is inscribed, "To Rachel Dix Temple, the first missionary lady from this to the Holy Land, died 1827." Rachel Dix Temple was a sister of Governor John A. Dix, and the mother of Daniel H. Temple, pastor, 1856-63.

The pews still bear the original name plates. Henry Wells and family occupied the two in the southwest corner. Salem Town and Charles Campbell had the two center front pews. Behind Salem Town's pew was one reserved for the pastor's family. E. B. Morgan, Henry Morgan, Otis Howe, Thomas Gould, James Avery, Richard Morgan, Samuel Mandell, W. S. and W. W. Allen and W. H. Bogart had pews on the center aisle; Nancy Morgan, W. J. Morgan, and Patrick Sliney on the north aisle.

Wells College is mentioned for the first time in the church ac­count book as follows: "Dec.16, 1868, Wells Seminary, Eight seats per W. Howard, President. (half year) $76.00." The Lady Principal (later, the dean) accompanied the students to church. This custom was continued through Dean Piutti's administration. The students sat in the first five rows and Dean Piutti sat with the seniors in the Henry Wells pews.

In 1867-68, the Manse, (formerly Isaac Wood's residence

purchased for the church about 1840) was remodeled at a cost of $7,859.36 of which E. B. Morgan paid $5,239.57 and Henry Morgan, $2,619.79. Local tradition says that the Manse was made up of two old houses put together but whether this occurred in 1840 or 1867-8 cannot be proved.

In 1870, E. B. and Henry Morgan gave the church $14,500 and $5,500 respectively to provide a permanent endowment of $20,000. During the decade, 1860-70, the gifts of these two Morgan brothers to the Presbyterian Church of Aurora totaled more than $50,000.

Since 1863, the Presbyterian Church has had these pastors: William W. Howard, 1863-71; Thomas C. Strong, 1871-75; William Aikman, 1877-81; William A. Barr, 1881-83; S.T. Clarke, 1883-85; J.R. Wills, 1886-89; Henry Schlosser, 1891-98; Grenville P. Sewall, 1901-20; Robert S. Axtell, 1920-25; Charles H. Walker, 1926-34; Frederick H. Allen, Jr., 1935-39; Harris B. Stewart, 1939-57; Robert E. Herst, 1957-68; Richard F. Kuenkler, 1968- .

W.W. Howard was Principal of Erasmus Hall Academy, Flat-bush, Long Island, when he accepted the call to Aurora. The pastor salary at that time, $700, probably was less than Mr. Howard could afford to accept. E. B. Morgan, Henry Morgan, and Henry Wells each contributed $100 making his annual salary $1,000. In 1868 W. W. Howard became the first president of Wells College, but resigned at the end of the academic year. In September 1869, perhaps to make up for the loss of his salary as president, E. B. and Henry Morgan added $500 more to his salary as pastor. Mr. Howard died in July 1871. The next pastor, Thomas C. Strong, became the third president of Wells College in 1873, serving until he resigned from both positions in 1875.

G.P. Sewall holds the record for longest service, nineteen years, and Harris B. Stewart was a close second with eighteen.

Since January, 1969, the congregations of the Presbyterian Church and St. Paul's Episcopal Church have worshipped together as The United Ministry of Aurora.

ST. PATRICK'S ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH

In August 1656, Father Rene' Menard, a French Jesuit mission­ary, arrived at the Cayuga Indian village of Goiogouen, which was located on the north bank of Great Gully three miles east of the lake. A rough chapel of bark was built by the Indians and, in this struc­ture, Mass was first celebrated in the Aurora area. That temporary chapel, constructed in two days, was in sharp contrast to the brick building of Romanesque design that we know as St. Patrick's Church.

Several Jesuits toiled among the Cayugas during the time of French influence. The French and the English were at war intermit­tently during the 1700s, the two nations vying not only for possession of land but the allegiance of the native inhabitants. By the terms of a treaty concluded in Paris in 1763, France was vanquished and re­linquished all claim to the country of the Iroquois Nations. During the Revolutionary War the Cayugas sided with the English. Indian raids against the colonists along the frontiers of New York prompted the Sullivan Expedition in the summer of 1779, at which time the three Indian villages near Great Gully and the village of Chonodote, Peach Town, where Aurora is today, were destroyed. After the destruction of their homes and crops the Cayuga Indians were forced to flee, some seeking refuge with other nations, some going to Canada and eventu­ally to Wisconsin.

In the 1820s and 1830s a number of Catholic newcomers settled in Cayuga County The Erie Canal, in operation since 1825, and the New York Central Railroad which reached Auburn in 1835, opened the area to immigration. One of the first Catholic families in Aurora was that of Andrew and Ann McGordon. A son, James, was born in Aurora on October 4 1834 It is believed that the first Mass was celebrated in the village on January 26, 1841, at the McGordon home then located on the east side of Main Street across from the Aurora Inn. In the years before a priest came to Aurora, Catholics of the area traveled to Auburn or Seneca Falls to worship and were visited peri­odically by priests who were probably pastors of Holy Family Church in Auburn. The first pastor of Aurora was the Rev. William Quigley (1851-52). Mass continued to be celebrated in private homes until 1855, when Father Nicholas Byrne, the second pastor of Aurora, pur­chased, from Thomas Callan, a house and lot on Dublin Hill that be-came the St. Agnes' Church property. St. Michael's Church, Union Springs, was completed while Father Byrne was pastor. During the pastorate of Father John Touhy (1856-64) St. Agnes' Church was enlarged. The early priests of Aurora served the Catholics of a wide area, in the townships of Aurelius, Springport, Ledyard, Scipio, Ven­ice and Genoa with private homes in Cayuga, West Scipio, East Scipio, West Genoa and East Genoa designated as stations where Mass was celebrated.

In the fall of 1872 ground was broken for St. Patrick's Church. The Rev. Eugene Pagani (1871-77) was then pastor. Father Bernard McCool (1864-70) had purchased the land from Colonel Edwin B. Morgan in 1870 An additional lot to the south was acquired in early 1873 to provide for a church lawn. The Rt. Rev. Bernard J. McQuaid, Bishop of Rochester, presided at the laying of the cornerstone on July 6, 1873 and returned to Aurora on October 11, 1874 for the dedication. The structure, built of brick and trimmed with cut stone, cost $8,200.00 to complete. The stained glass windows were donated by

parishioners.

Eighteen pastors have served the Catholic parish in Aurora. In 1877, the Rev. Thomas A. Hendrick was assigned to the parishes in Union Springs, Aurora and Cayuga. During his fourteen years as pas­tor he was successful in removing the debt incurred in building St. Patrick's Church. In 1883, land at the north edge of the village was purchased from Henry Morgan to be used as St. Patrick's cemetery. St. Agnes' Church building on Dublin Hill was sold to sons of Andrew

McGordon in 1889 and subsequently moved to the west side of Main Street, opposite the library, where it served as a hall until destroyed by fire around 1900. Horse sheds were built on the site of the old church. In 1903, while pastor of St. Bridget's Church in Rochester, Father Hendrick was named the first American Bishop of the diocese of Cebu, Philippine Islands. Death from cholera came to this well-respected man in 1909 while serving in Cebu.

Father John F. Nelligan came to the lakeside parishes in 1891. During a preceding appointment at Holy Family Church, Auburn, on September 14, 1884, Father Nelligan had the distinction of celebrating the first Mass in Auburn Prison. It was during Father Nelligan's pas­torate, in 1901, that the present rectory was purchased and the priest began residing in Aurora. Numerous improvements, including a new high altar, a church basement, and installation of electric lights and sidewalks, were made to the church property during Father Nelligan's nineteen years in Aurora.

Several priests have celebrated jubilees while pastors at Aurora. In June, 1974 the Rev. Henry C. Manley, Pastor Emeritus, celebrated the golden anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood. The pres­ent pastor of St. Patrick's Church and St. Michael's, Union Springs is Father John S. Hayes.

On October 11, 1974 St. Patrick's Church celebrated the 100th Anniversary of its dedication. During these years there have been many changes both in the Church and the community it serves.

ST. PAUL'S EPISCOPAL CHURCH

Episcopal services in Aurora were first held in private homes and in the second Cayuga Academy Building. The first mention of the establishment of a church occurs in the following document:

The Rev. Amos G. Baldwin of the Protestant Episcopal church, having performed several services in Aurora since the 16th of January 1885: and it being desirable to continue his services and to establish and organize a Prot­estant Episcopal Church in Aurora in the Town of Ledyard as soon as can be effected, We, the undersigned, agree to pay to the Vestry of such church or to said Rev’d Amos G. Baldwin, the sums set opposite to our respective names in quarterly instalments for his services for one year from this date (Jan.16, 1835) as such clergyman.

Thirty-six persons and two firms, E.B. & H. Morgan and Curtis & Marsh, pledged from $1.50 to $25, totaling $301.50.

At a meeting held February 1, 1835, in Cayuga Academy, the Rev. Amos G. Baldwin presiding, St. Paul's Parish was organized and the following officers elected: Church Wardens, Isaac Wood and John R. Travis; Vestrymen, Jonathan Richmond, Ephraim C. Marsh, Henry Post, John E. Williams, Coral C. White, Henry Morgan, David Wright and Alvah Worden.

In 1819, Aurora Chapter No.64, Royal Arch Masons, had built the present Aurora Masonic Temple. Jonathan Richmond was one of the leaders in this enterprise. The meeting room was on the second floor and, until 1835, the first floor, still unfinished, was Samuel Man­dell's carpenter shop. At a meeting of the Vestry of St. Paul's in the Aurora House, February 14, 1835, Jonathan Richmond, Henry Mor­gan and David Wright were appointed a committee "to obtain an esti­mate of the expense of fitting up the lower room in the Masonic Hall for a place of public worship." Samuel Mandell gave up the room and it was leased to St. Paul's Church.

This lease was signed by several members of the former Scipio Lodge No.58 and Aurora Chapter No.64, including Jonathan Rich­mond, E.C. Marsh, Isaac Wood and Charles E. Shepard. Since the Lodge and Chapter had disbanded in 1830 due to Anti-Masonic agita­tion and were not revived until 1846, the above conveyance was made by individual Masons. It was, however, considered binding by both Lodge and Chapter and continued in effect for twenty-five years after their revival.

The sale of slips and pews, priced from $10 to $26, brought in $549.50. The deed to a pew read like a land deed. For example:

KNOW YE that for and in consideration of the sum of Twenty Six Dol­lars by HENRY MORGAN of the Town of Ledyard... in hand paid to the Vestry of St. Paul's Church... the said Vestry have granted, demised and re-leased... unto the said Henry Morgan, Pew Number ONE in the Room of the Masonic Hall in Aurora... I, Joseph Shepard, Secretary of said Vestry ... have affixed their Common Seal at Aurora ... the Twenty third day of April in the year of our Lord, 1836.

On March 11, 1837, the Rev. Amos G. Baldwin sent the Vestry his resignation to take effect the first of May. His letter continues:

I beg leave to state that my receipts of every kind, subscriptions, donations, fees, etc., the first year was $346, and the second year $401. I take occasion to say that the salary of the Presbyterian minister of this place the last three years was $400, and a house and prerequisites, fees and donations, etc., yet he had to draw, it is affirmed, on his own resources to the amount of $250. But I need not have mentioned these facts to prove to gentlemen so well acquainted with the expense of living, how utterly inadequate has been my support the last two years and now on the third of my residence with you. Had the Mis­sionary Stipend been granted me from the beginning, as the Vestry had offi­cial encouragement it would, the whole would have supported me and no more. This was a misfortune, but blame attaches nowhere. I received only the last quarter's stipend of the second year, $31.25; $218.75 less than two years stipend. You will see how great a deficit this is from a small living.

For several years after Mr. Baldwin left, there was no resident rector. Services were held, sometimes regularly, by rectors from near­by communities. The next resident rector, the Rev. John Leech, began his nine-year ministry in 1854. During the first year he lived in Mor­avia. On March 8, 1855, Charles H. Richmond offered the Vestry his farm house (now The Grange) for one year beginning April 1, 1855. Evidently this residence and a salary of $500 brought the Rev. Mr. Leech to Aurora. He was a strong leader both in his church and the community. On August 8, 1855, E. W. Arms, William R. Grinnell, and Charles H. Richmond were appointed a committee "to ascertain if a convenient lot could be procured for a church." A month later, this committee reported that Dr. Thompson's lot on the west side of Main St. could be purchased for $900.

On March 7, 1856, at a meeting in the rectory, it was resolved unanimously

That the Wardens and Vestrymen of St. Paul's Church deem it expedient to erect a Church edifice upon the lot in Aurora owned by Dr. A. Thompson. The expense of said lot and building is estimated at $7200. And that a subscrip­tion list be circulated at home and abroad with the approbation of the Bishop to raise said amount.

Although five Aurora residents, including Dr. Thompson, subscribed $500 each, a sufficient amount was not obtained, so all building plans were temporarily tabled.

Dr. Alexander Thompson was a Charter Trustee of Wells College. He was an Aurora physician from 1834 to 1869 and president of the Medical Society of the State of New York in 1850. He is the only Cayuga County physician who has held this office during the 150 years existence of the State Society.

The Rev. Mr. Leech resigned as rector in 1863 and the Rev. E.D. Tompkins came for a year at a salary of $600. In 1865, St. Paul's Church and Calvary Church of Northville (now King Ferry) united in calling the Rev. George Perrine "to supply both churches for one year from this date for $700 and the Missionary Stipend of $125 and his livery bill not to exceed $50, half to be raised by each Society."

A.C. Boyer, E.W. Arms, and E.T. Brown were appointed in 1869 to confer with the vestries of Grace Church, Union Springs, and Calvary Church, Northville, in regard to obtaining a rector for all three churches. Grace and St. Paul's churches united to call the Rev. Alfred Brown at an annual salary of $700, the livery bill to be divided between them.

At a meeting of the vestry on January 6, 1870, the rector stated that the meeting had been called to make plans for building a church in Aurora. The rector and vestrymen were appointed a committee to circulate a subscription to raise funds. In the minutes of the next meeting, we find:

Whereas Mr. John E. Williams and Mrs. Lucy Williams have donated to the Wardens and Vestry of St. Paul's Church in Aurora a desirable lot, being in the southwest corner of the lot on which they reside, for the purpose of having a church edifice erected thereon, Resolved, unanimously, that the same be accepted for that purpose and that the thanks of said Wardens and Vestry-men and the Congregation they represent, be and they are hereby tendered to them for their noble, disinterested and very generous gift. ... Resolved that we proceed to adopt a plan and proceed with all due dispatch to erect a brick Edifice on said lot.

E. W. Arms led the subscription list with an offer of $3,000 "on condition that an equal amount be raised by others." W. H. Bogart, A. C. Boyer, E. T. Brown, Charlotte Irving Grinnell (niece of Wash­ington Irving), Henry Wells and Abram E. Williams subscribed $250 each and 23 others, $1200. Ten later gifts, including $577 from Dr. and Mrs. Alexander Thompson, brought the total to $6,713, including the $3,000 given by Arms.

The cornerstone of St. Paul's Church was laid June 24, 1870, Bishop F.D. Huntington officiating. There is no date on the corner­stone, but "A. D. 1870" is carved on the keystone of the arch over the entrance. This church was designed and constructed by the Aurora architect, Samuel D. Mandell, who built the first Wells College build­ing and the two other churches in Aurora. The solid walnut pews were made in Michigan from Mandell's designs. They cost $375 and were given by Erastus D. Corning of Albany.

The building cost of St. Paul's Church was $16,438.43 and the furnishings amounted to $1,305.17. Of the total, $17,743.60, Mr. Arms paid $13,642.53.

The first service in St. Paul's Church was on October 1, 1871, the Rev. Mr. Brown officiating. Mr. Brown resigned as rector, December 31, 1871, to return to his native Canada. In 1873, the Rev. William H. Casey of Trinity College, Cambridge, England, became rector. The church building was consecrated on September 29, 1874, by Bishop F.D. Huntington. E.W. Arms was elected treasurer of St. Paul's Church in 1859 and junior warden in 1863, and continued in both of these offices un­til his death, January 15, 1877.

At a meeting of the wardens and vestrymen of St. Paul's Church on January 20, 1877, it was unanimously resolved:

That we, the Rector, Wardens and Vestry here assembled, do solemnly declare that henceforth St. Paul's Protestant Episcopal Church in the village of Aurora is unto the glory of God a memorial of the Christian life and char­acter of Ebenezer White Arms and there be placed within this Church, either in brass plate or marble, an enduring record of this, our declaration.

The Albany sculptor Erastus Dow Palmer started to work on the Arms Memorial at once and it was placed in the church on the north side near the pulpit on February 27, 1878. The head of an angel sym­bolizes "Grief" and the inscription is in mosaic letters set in brass.

The Rev. W. H. Casey lived in Aurora for several years. His two daughters were born here and both graduated at Wells College, Mabel in 1895 and Norah in 1897. Mr. Casey moved to Union Springs in the early nineties, continuing as before to serve the Union Springs and Aurora churches.

The payment of pew rents by Wells College students to the Au­rora churches was discontinued in 1923. The last such payment of $122.50 for pew rent in St. Paul's Church the second semester of 1922-23 was the first amount credited to the fund for a new pipe organ which was installed in 1930. The peal of bells was presented in 1922 by Wallcourt alumnae and students in memory of Mrs. Anna Goldsmith Taylor, founder and principal of the Wallcourt School. Mrs. Taylor, herself, had begun accumulating a fund to purchase the bells in 1920, the year before she died.

The Rev. Edwin G. White became rector in 1915 and served for eight years, followed by the Rev. George D. Barr in 1923-24. The Rev. Louis Jabine became rector in 1925. He and his family were the first to occupy the present rectory behind the church. Mr. Jabine resigned

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Insert map of Aurora Page 38-39

in 1929 and moved to Baltimore where he died in 1933. He is buried in Oak Glen Cemetery, Auroa.

The Rev. Thomas J. Collar became rector of St. Paul's Church in 1930. He resigned in 1949, but continued to live in Aurora. In addition to his long and devoted service as rector, Mr. Collar was a skillful printer and has been of great assistance to many local organizations in this capacity. He was also a church historian, having written an excellent history of St. Paul's Parish, and printed it as well. He was chaplain of Scipio Lodge No.110, F. & A. M. from 1933-1972. He cele­brated his 101st birthday, October 29, 1975.

The late Miss Edith P. Morgan ranks high among those faithful members who have given greatly in time, interest and devoted service to St. Paul's Church, and no one has done so much financially for it.

In 1949, the Rev. Robert J. Page became rector and was suc­ceeded in 1952 by the Rev. Robert W. Beggs. The Rev. Edward R. McCracken succeeded the Rev. Mr. Beggs in 1959 and remained until December 31, 1968. In the 60's there was a strong ecumenical move­ment at the national level of seven Protestant churches including the Presbyterian, Episcopal, and Methodist. The Protestant churches in Union Springs, Aurora, and Scipioville were reorganized. Congrega­tions combined and the Rev. Richard F. Kuenkler came to Aurora to serve a joint congregation of Episcopalians and Presbyterians as The United Ministry of Aurora, with regular services being held in the Presbyterian Church, beginning in January 1969.

THE METHODIST CHURCH OF AURORA

The Aurora Methodist Church was organized about 1835. One of its principal founders was Stephen Gifford, in whose home the first meetings were held. The Gifford residence still stands on the north-east corner of Court St. and Sherwood Road. Later, Stephen Gifford's son, George W. Gifford, grandfather of Estelle and Floyd Gifford, be­came the leading member of this church.

The second Cayuga Academy building, erected of wood in 1806, was replaced by a brick structure in 1836. The 1806 Academy build­ing was purchased by the trustees of the Methodist Church and moved to a lot north of Sherwood Road and opposite the end of Court St. The front of the church faced Sherwood Road. The deed for the church lot, size 60 x 70 feet, dated October 6, 1841, was given by Jona­than Richmond to Isaac Dwight and other trustees of the Methodist Church.

The first pastors were S. C. Phinney and Sylvester Minier in 1839. About 1845, the Aurora Church became part of a circuit includ­ing the Methodist churches in Union Springs, Fleming and Bolts Cor­ners. Aaron Cross and Benoni Ives were the first pastors for this circuit. In 1879 Wesley Mason was pastor and the membership of the Aurora Church was about twenty-five.

The trustees of the church in 1881 purchased an additional strip of land twenty feet wide on the east side of the church lot from Henry

A. Morgan. On this addition, stables were built for the protection of horses and vehicles of those attending the services.

The membership decreased until finally the church was discon­tinued about 1900. The church building was moved across the fields to

Levanna and is now its Community Church. The lot was sold for $200

by the church trustees to Edith P. Morgan on March 12, 1904.

XII. The Aurora Inn.

The principal business district of Aurora before 1829 was at the intersection of Farmer St. (now Dublin Hill Road) and Milton (now Main) St. The present business district contained no store before 1809. In that year, Jonathan Swan opened a store in a small building on the west side of Main St. opposite Cherry Ave., then unnamed and only one block long.

In 1827, Edwin B. Morgan purchased the Morgan Store from his father, Christopher Morgan. The store building, erected in 1810, was on the northwest corner of Farmer and Milton streets, just south of Morgan House.

At about this time, E. B. Morgan decided to move the business district to its present location, where, in about six years, he erected three buildings. The first was the Morgan Store completed in 1829.

The second building was the Aurora Inn. The first reference to it so far found is in the last sentence of the minutes of the April 1833 annual meeting of the inhabitants of the Town of Ledyard: "Ad-journed to Morgan's Brick Tavern in the Village of Aurora on the first Tuesday in April 1834." The original name of this building was the "Aurora House." It was completed in the spring of 1833.

The third building, also of brick, still stands on the east side of Main St. opposite the site of the Morgan Store. It was erected in 1834 as the Aurora office building, but has since been used for various purposes.

The first manager of the Aurora House was David M. Braman of Utica. The following editorial was published in the Auburn paper, The Journal, June 12, 1833.

During a short excursion a few days since, we had the good fortune to call at the Aurora House. we say, the good fortune, for it did our hearts good to witness the regularity, neatness, and order everywhere exhibited - as well as the thousand little attentions which are paid to the comfort and convenience of travellers. Of the Village of Aurora it is unnecessary for us to say a word: It is known to our readers as one of the most delightful little retreats to be found in this section of the country - affording scenery unrivalled for its beauty; and from its situation in the midst of a rich, healthy and flourishing territory, possessing almost every advantage that could be desired - and we doubt not - the travelling community will give their most hearty approval of the present most laudable enterprise by taking this lovely village in their route. This building is situated near the bank of the Cayuga Lake, and from its several balconies on the west, furnishes an uninterrupted view of water scenery of the most enchanting kind. It has but recently been opened by Mr. D. M. Braman from Utica, who has finished it and furnished it throughout in a style of neatness and elegance scarcely surpassed by the most expensive houses of our large towns.

In the early forties, William D. Eagles purchased the Aurora House and engaged his uncle, John Eagles, to manage it for him. John Eagles came about 1840, possibly before his nephew made the pur­chase. A former sea captain, John Eagles (1783-1855) had had charge of a hotel in Ovid where on June 9, 1835, he entertained a "menag­erie," consisting of 50 men, 70 horses, and 2 elephants. This was a forerunner of the traveling circus. W. D Eagles (1820-1854) married Nancy Richmond (1827-1917), a daughter of Jonathan Richmond. Mrs. W.D. Eagles told John Maloney that they never lived at the Aurora House, but left its management entirely to their uncle.

The author has found in an account book that the well known artist, Charles Loring Elliott (1812-1868), who was born in the Township of Scipio, was in Aurora several weeks in the autumn of 1842 painting portraits. He painted at least five portraits of the Morgans, two for E.B. Morgan, one for Henry Morgan, and two for Christo­pher Morgan. He received $40 for each portrait. This coincides with the statement of Miss Edith Morgan to the author that the two paint­ings in the Aurora Inn are portraits of John Eagles, with his spy­glass, and Mrs. Eagles, painted by Elliott while here painting por­traits of members of the Morgan family.

As an example of prices, in 1856 while E. B. Morgan, then a member of Congress, and his wife were in Washington, one of his sons lived at the Aurora House. The bill from Consider Carter for 171/2 weeks' board was $52.50, or $3 per week.

The Aurora House was owned by Henry Morgan when he died and was sold by his heirs, May 11, 1887, to Coral W. Smith for $2500.

When the first College building burned in 1888, the Aurora House was chartered by the Trustees and became the principal student dor­mitory until Main Building was completed in 1890. The students christened it, "The Wayside Inn," and that continued to be its name for many years. The addition at the back was built in 1904. Another addition (dining room and kitchen) was built in 1958.

When most of the business district, including the Morgan Store, burned in 1919, the south cornices of The Wayside Inn caught fire. Wells President K. D. Macmillan, while lying flat on the Inn roof, leaned out over the burning Morgan Store and put out the fire in the cornices with an extinguisher. At this time, the building was owned by N.L. Zabriskie. He bequeathed it to his son, R.L. Zabriskie, who deeded it to Wells College March 30, 1943. The name for several years was "The Inn," finally becoming the "Aurora Inn" in 1948.

13. The Morgan store.

The Morgan Store, founded by Christopher Morgan in 1801, con­tinued in his family for 118 years until it burned in 1919. It was kept successively by sons, a grandson, and a great grandson of the founder.

Christopher Morgan (1777-1834) came to Aurora from Groton, Connecticut, in April 1800, making the journey on a colt purchased with his earnings as a school teacher. After serving as clerk of the Manhattan Bridge Co. until the completion of the bridge over Lake Cayuga, he became the assistant of his maternal uncle, Benjamin Ledyard, Clerk of Cayuga County.

In June 1801, Christopher Morgan and Cornelius Cuyler opened a store on the south lawn of Mandell House. A year later they erected a large store building where the Catholic church now stands. In 1804, they dissolved partnership, Cuyler retaining the new store and Mor­gan returning to the first one. Except for this brief initial period, the Morgan Store was owned solely by Christopher Morgan and his descendants.

Nancy Barber, one of Christopher Morgan's former pupils, came to Aurora in July 1805 and on July 15, 1805, she and Christopher Morgan were married. Evidently they first lived near the store until his home, now Morgan House, was erected.

Christopher and Nancy Morgan had six children, all sons: Edwin Barber (1806-1881), Christopher (1808-1877), Henry (1810-1887), John (1812-1840), George (1815-1891), Richard (1818-1890).

The Morgan Store was a "general store," containing goods of all kinds liquid as well as dry, as shown by the following license.

We, the Commissioners of Excise for the Town of Scipio in the County of Cayuga, in pursuance of the Statute in that case made and provided, have per­mitted and by these presents do permit Christopher Morgan To Sell by Retail all kinds of Strong or Spiritous liquor under five gallons, provided the Same be not drank in any House, out House, Yeard, Garden of the Said Christopher Morgan from the date of these presents until the first Tuesday of May next, Given under our Hands and Seals at Scipio, the 6th May, 1807.

Elisha Durkee, Asa Harris, Barna. Smith.

In the latter part of 1810, a hogshead of "Jamaica Spirits," ship­ped to Christopher Morgan from New York, was tapped en route. On arrival, Daniel Avery, the Aurora gauger, found that the "wantage" was eleven gallons.

The following bill is for a peculiar combination of goods:

Albany, Feby. 20, 1810.

Mr. Christopher Morgan bet. of Barent G. Staats,

1 pipe, 4 qts., pro. Spanish Brandy, 127 glls. 9/10 62/8/10

1 piece Red Flannel 8/8/8

In 1810, Christopher Morgan employed Hezekiah Avery to build a

"Store... thirty feet by Twenty-two, the fraim to be of good white Oak tim­ber to be planked with 11/2 inch planks, to be sided with clabbeards and com­pletely enclosed with such sized windows and doors as the said Christopher shall direct, the inside to be finished off with shelves, counters, stairs, floors laid double, and sealed up to the first shelf, and the upper story to the plates; seller floor laid with ruff beards --- all work to be done in a workmanlike man­ner. The said Christopher is to find the planks and spikes and all the materials except the fraim; and beard the workmen while doing the work except while putting up the fraim and planking it - and to pay the said Hezekiah two hundred and twenty Dollars, one half cash, the other half out of the store in

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