HISTORY: Chateaugay; Franklin co., NY

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HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF FRANKLIN COUNTY WITH MANY SHORT BIOGRAPHIES
BY
FREDERICK J. SEAVER
MALONE, NEW YORK

ALBANY: J. B. LYON COMPANY, PRINTERS 1918

CHAPTER XI CHATEAUGAY

   Chateaugay was erected as a town in Clinton county from Plattsburgh and
Champlain March 15, 1799, and at first included only four townships of the old
Military Tract. The name was spelled "Chateuaga" in the act of incorporation.
In 1801 the boundaries were extended by act of the Legislature to include all
of the territory now comprising Constable, Fort Covington and Bombay and the
northern parts of Malone, Bangor and Moira. In 1802 another change was made,
by which the town came to include all of what now comprises Franklin county
with the exception of the small tract annexed from St. Lawrence in 1913, and
including also the town of St. Armand in Essex county. In 1805 the erection of
Harison (now Malone) left Chateaugay to include only what is now itself, two
townships in Clinton county, and Burke, Bellmont, Franklin and St. Armand. In
1808 the townships in Clinton county were detached; in 1822 St. Armand was set
off from Franklin county and annexed to Essex; and by the erection of
Bellmont, Burke and Franklin, Chateaugay has been reduced to barely more than
half a township, so that in area it is one of the smallest towns in the
county.

  The etymology of the name used to be stated in all soberness as "chateau"
and "gay," said to signify "gay castle." There would seem at first thought to
be the same sense, or lack of sense, in this as in the jocular derivation of
the word horseradish from the Latin "mare" and "radix," since in each there is
a combination of an English word with a foreign. But if we assume the Canadian
statutory spelling of the word, viz., Chateaugai, as that which obtained in
France, the alleged signification may be justified. Even then, however, it
were far better to make the translation "hospitable house" or "cheerful house"
than "gay castle." Concerning the local origin of the name the truth was
brought out a few years ago by Miss Annie Jack, of Chateaugay Basin, Que., in
a letter to the Franklin County Historical Society. More than a century and a
quarter before any white person is known to have set foot in our town of
Chateaugay Charles LeMoyne, the founder of the most eminent family in Canada,
received a royal grant of land fronting two leagues on the St. Lawrence and
extending back three leagues from the river, and he named this seignory
Chateaugay from a place in France. Lying at the mouth of the river which now
bears the same name, the name apparently attached to the stream, and,
following it southward, came to be applied to the town when it was settled,
and then to the lakes also. As to the proper spelling of the name, .Miss Jack
notes that DeSalaberry, who was said to be an excellent French scholar, wrote
it "Chateaugua," while in the statutes of Canada it appears as "Chateaugai."
The popular spelling in Canada would seem now to be "Chateauguay," though Miss
Jack says that until half a century ago it was as we write it here. Formerly
the town was sometimes called Seventh Town, because it was township number
seven of the Old Military Tract.

  As the geographies used to phrase it, the surface of Chateaugay is
diversified. There are hills, ravines and streams, with broad reaches of
almost level lands. The Chateaugay river enters the town at a point midway
between its southeastern and southwestern corners, and, trending westwardly,
traverses almost the entire length of the town, affording many good water
powers along its course. For a good part of the way it flows between walls of
rock, rent apart by some convulsion of nature or cut through by the ceaseless
wear of water, towering in some places two hundred feet above the rivers bed.
A couple of miles above the village the waters fall almost perpendicularly
over a cliff something like fifty feet in height, and a couple of miles below
the village, until dammed for a power development, it flowed through a chasm
almost rivaling that at Ausable in depth and grandeur. At one time thirty-odd
years ago walks and stairways were built there, and a summer hotel erected,
which attracted many visitors and had many guests until the death of R. A.
Jackson, who had been the life of the enterprise, left it without a manager,
and it also died as a resort. Other streams are: The Marble river, flowing
northwestwardly through the town to a junction with the Chateaugay, a couple
of miles south of the Canadian border; the Board-man brook, having a large
spring in the town as its source, and emptying into the Marble river; the
Alder brook, the Bailey brook, the Collins brook and other smaller brooks in
various districts.

  There is an intermittent spring a short distance east of the village, just
north of the railroad. When in flow the discharge is considerable, but,
regardless either of the time of year or of the conditions of drouth or flood,
it has gone dry at intervals from time immemorial, stopping abruptly and
completely. Then, perhaps after a few months or perhaps after a year or two,
it resumes its flow, usually requiring some days to regain its natural volume.

  The Rutland Railroad traverses the central part of the town from east to
west. The construction of the line at this point presented a difficult and
expensive problem   a fill having to be made at the Chateaugay river which
required the handling of half a million cubic yards of earth and the building
of a tunnel three hundred feet long and twenty-five feet wide to carry the
river. This tunnel extends through solid rock, and has an arched roof of
masonry. The two pieces of work consumed five months in time and a hundred and
thirty thousand dollars in money.

  One of the first roads into Franklin county was the old military turnpike
from Plattsburgh, which became the stage route to Ogdensburg, and which has
now been transformed into a State highway. At first it led northerly from a
point in the present village to Brayton Hollow, and later from near the old
Roberts tavern stand (now in the town of Clinton) past the Bennett place and
across the river at High Falls, and so on to a junction with the present road
about two miles west of the village. It was some years later that the bridge
was built at Douglass Hollow, and still later that the old covered bridge was
erected. Besides the main State highway, another is booked for building from
the village north to the international boundary, where it is to connect with
the Canadian system of improved roads, and a county highway runs from the
village south to Chateaugay lake.

  Though Chateaugay has but little deep, rich soil, its average fertility is
high, and the town is one of the very best agriculturally in the count}-. It
is our largest and best potato market, the potato crop alone bringing the
farmers a hundred thousand dollars in a good year, and it ranks well in
dairying and cattle shipping also. Because of these and other conditions,
including dairy returns, Chateaugay is, I think, as well circumstanced a town
as we have: and, if the county clerk's records were examined analytically, I
believe that they would show as few judgments and mortgages proportioned to
the population as any town in the county.

  Chateaugay is not only our oldest town as regards date of erection, but in
actual settlement as well. Township number seven of the Old Military Tract was
surveyed in part in 1795, and Benjamin Roberts, from Vermont, and Nathan
Beman, of Plattsburgh, having been favorably impressed by the country while
assisting in the survey, determined to locate the next year. A mere path had
been cut through the woods from Beekmantown, and following this Mr. Roberts
returned with one employee in February, 1796, to make sugar preparatory to
bringing in his family later. While on the survey he had erected a rude hut,
at a point between the present village and Marble river, to house the family
upon its arrival. Returning to Plattsburgh in April, he started with his wife
and children and Levi Trumbull, Joshua and Kincaid Chamberlain, Ethan Roberts
and Jared Munson, as employees for his new wilderness home. A yoke of oxen
drawing a sled and a pair of steers were to serve them for transportation, but
one of the oxen gave out at Beekmantown, and as much as possible of the
party's outfit was then loaded upon the odd ox and the steers, while each of
the men " backed " what he could, and, the father toting a child and the
mother carrying a babe in her arms, the journey was resumed on foot. The
distance remaining to be covered was twenty odd miles, and five and a half
days were spent in making it. At the destination only an unroofed hut offered
a shelter and a home. All of the furniture, even to the forks and plates, had
to be wrought out of wood by hand, and food itself, which was principally pork
and flour, could be had only from Plattsburgh except for the game that could
be taken from the streams and forest. There was neither money nor means of
transportation for bringing large supplies from Plattsburgh at any one time,
and thus the one remaining ox was kept on the road almost constantly through
the summer, an entire week being necessary for a round trip. Nathan Beman came
on and returned to Plattsburgh a number of times during the summer, but did
not bring his family until autumn. Mr. Roberts moved in 1806 or before over
into what is now the town of Clinton, where he kept a tavern for a number of
years. Mr. Beman had as a youth guided Ethan Allen in 1775 into Fort
Ticonderoga; and in a letter to the Palladium in 1835 he confirmed the popular
version of the phrasing (sometimes discredited) of Allen's demand of surrender
  "In the name of the Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress." Mr. Beman
was sold out under foreclosure in 1811, and died in Chateaugay in 1850.

  Within the three or four years following 1796 Lewis Ransom, Jacob Smith,
Silas Pomeroy, Peleg Douglas, Thomas Smith, Jonathan and Ralph Shepard, Jabez
Willey, Obed Rust, Justin Day, Amasa and Sebius Fairman, David Mallory, Aaron
Beman, Elisha Howard, Gates Hoit, Samuel Stoughton, William Bailey and others
arrived, so that in 1799 the population had become large enough, considering
the distance to the seat of town government in Champlain, to warrant the
erection of the locality into a separate town. In 1800 the inhabitants
numbered 443, with an increase in 1810 to 625 notwithstanding Malone,
Constable and Dickinson, with an aggregate population of 2,094, had been
detached either directly or indirectly between the two periods. The
fluctuations in the town's population have been remarkable   losses in five
years having run as high as thirty-five per cent., and gains in an equal
length of time having been ninety-one and once even one hundred and three per
cent. The greatest percentage of loss was between 1810 and 1814, and is
explicable only by removals on account of the war. In 1820 the fugitives must
have returned with reinforcements, as there was a gain for this period from
407 to 828 inhabitants. The population at some other periods has been: 2,016
in 1830; 2,824 in 1840; 1,952 in 1845, when Burke with 1,285 inhabitants had
been set off; 3,728 in 1850, when men at work on the then new railroad must
have been counted; 3,183 in 1860, followed by a loss of 310 during the civil
war. In 1865 and in 1910 the population stood at exactly the same figure,
viz., 2,840, though it had fluctuated between times a hundred or two either
way. By the enumeration of 1915 the population was 2,903, of whom 112 were
aliens.

  The earliest settlements had been almost altogether along what was afterward
the stage route, extending through the central part of the town from its
eastern border through Burke (then West Chateaugay) to what is now the Malone
line.

  The town records for 1810 show a hundred and fifty dollars of the poor
moneys was appropriated for the purchase of a merino ram for the use of the
town, but if anything else of notable interest outside of the licensing of
taverns and of individual effort occurred from the date of the town's first
settlement down to the time of the war of 1812 I have been unable to learn the
fact. Its citizenry in this period was of the same type that we have met in
the sketches of other towns, and possibly averaging a bit better in native
force and shrewdness. Nearly all were Vermonters, to whom a considerable body
of French Canadians were added at about the time of the Papineau rebellion, in
1837 to 1840, while after the completion of the railroad in 1850 large numbers
of Irish who had been employed on the work took up lands and made their homes
here. If the quality of citizenship which had obtained at the original
settlement deteriorated, the less said about it the better, except that the
deterioration which I have in mind was not due either to the French or the
Irish admixture. The early Irish in particular were undoubtedly rough, and
dearly loved their dram and a "shindy," so that it was an unusual holiday when
a dozen to a score of fights did not occur. But education and the sobriety
that the church and property ownership induce have changed all this, and the
Irish element has become really one of the best in the place. Not only
residents of Chateaugay, but people in other places where the records of some
of Chateaugay's former residents are known, will readily understand the loss
in character to which I refer, and will comprehend without explanation why
particular mention of a number of men of prominence can not well be made.

  In not a few cases whole families have become extinct locally, either by
death or removal. Obed Rust was the grandfather of Dr. Elisha A. Rust of
Moira, and the greatgrandfather of Dr. Aloney Rust of Malone, while others of
his descendants are still living in Chateaugay and Burke. Thomas Smith was the
son of Jacob, who had been a revolutionary soldier, as he himself served in
the war of 1812, with the rank of colonel. He was the father of Henry B., Eli
B. and Elisha B., all of whom became men of affairs, and were leaders in
pretty much everything in the town for a good many years. Gates Hoit was a
soldier in the war of 1812, county clerk in 1809 to 1811 and again in 1813 to
1815, represented Clinton and Franklin counties in the Assembly in 1810, 1811,
1812 and 1818, was the right arm of Governor Tompkins here during the war of
1812, and was among the foremost in preparing Franklin county for defense in
that conflict. He was also in the confidential service of the federal
government, or, in other words, a spy; and because of such service he claimed
to have suffered financially in expenses and losses to the amount of $1,397,
for which he petitioned Congress to reimburse him. Twenty years later that
body did vote him three hundred dollars, but though he persisted in demanding
more it was never granted   the charge having been preferred against him that
he had been engaged during the war, in connection with Augustus Douglas and
Samuel Percy, in smuggling cattle across the border to the enemy. Mr. Hoit's
answer was that this action had been employed merely as a cover for his
operations as a spy, enabling him to get into Canada and ascertain conditions
there without incurring suspicion. One lot of cattle that he had started for
Canada was seized south of the border by United States customs officials, but
before they could be driven to safety were wrested from the officers by a
British raid. It is told as an incident of this affair that an American
soldier leveled his musket at Mr. Douglas and would have taken his life had
not John Day struck the gun aside at the instant of its discharge, thus
sending the bullet wild. Mr. Hoit acted for a long time as the selling and
collecting agent for owners of Chateaugay lands who lived in Albany, New York
and elsewhere. He was the grandfather of Mrs. G. G. Gurley of Malone. William
Bailey, also a conspicuous personage, an extensive land owner, and engaged in
many activities, came from Dutchess county in 1796 or 1797. The house in which
he lived was on Depot street and still stands. He was the father of Admiral
Theodorus Bailey, the hero of the taking of New Orleans in 1863, who was born
in Chateaugay in 1805. Mr. Bailey was elected by Clinton and Essex counties to
the Assembly in 1801 and by Clinton alone in 1805, was first judge of the
court of common pleas in 1806, and was an unsuccessful candidate for Congress
the same year. About 1803 or 1804 he opened the Bellows ore mine in Bellmont,
and built a forge near the High Falls in Chateaugay. He is said to have built
a paper mill also at about the same time near the same point, but accounts are
at variance as to whether this mill was ever operated, and possibly it never
existed. He built, too, a saw mill and the Douglass grist mill in 1806 or
earlier. He removed to Plattsburgh in 1811, and died there in 1840. While in
Chateaugay he owned one or two slaves. Justin Day located near what is now the
Burke line, and had four sons, to each of whom he gave a farm. John, one of
the sons, was the father of Henry S., recently deceased at ninety years of
age, and the last survivor of the family. Aaron Beman became sheriff in 1833,
and after the expiration of his term made his home in Malone. Isaac Sebring,
though never an actual resident, his home and business having been in New York
city, one of whose districts sent him to the Assembly in 1809, 1810 and 1811,
was intimately associated with the affairs of the town, and passed a good deal
of time there. He and Theodorus Van Wyck, also of New York, were joint owners
of several thousand acres of land in the town as early as 1806, and still
earlier made many mortgage loans to settlers who were in need. Mr. Sebring
evinced  a zealous interest in the organization of the Congregational church,
and besides giving liberally himself to erect a church building secured
considerable subscriptions for it from his city friends. He was the
grandfather of Dr. John S. Van Vechten and Mrs. Nellie Munger.

  It is impracticable of course to follow the history of all of the pioneers
and their families, but mention must be made of a few of the second generation
who became especially prominent. Chief of these was Henry B. Smith, the son of
Thomas, who began business life as a merchant, branched out into lumbering and
real estate investment, became first judge of the court of common pleas in
1843, and was State Senator in 1852 and 1853, deputy collector of customs at
Chateaugay for a long period, and collector of the district of Champlain from
about 1853 to 1861. He was a keen, farsighted business man, a capable and
controlling politician, and remarkably successful in all of his undertakings.
His fortune at the time of his death was probably the largest that any one in
the county had accumulated up to that time. Gideon Collins, who came in 1803,
was first judge of the court of common pleas, and his son, George C., a man of
the highest character and of excellent abilities, was school commissioner from
1869 to 1871. The latter was the father of William L. of Chateaugay and of
Grant G. of Malone. Though of a still later generation, Daniel F. Soper and
George G. Gurley left their impress upon the place, and afterward became
prominent in Malone. The former was elected sheriff in 1860, and the latter in
1863. Others of worth and prominence include Daniel S. Coonley, Dr. Hial S.
Farnsworth, Major John A. Sabin, John Hughes, James Mitchell, Dr. William
Mott, John McCoy, Levi N. Stevens (whose son. Henry, has become one of the
leading attorneys of Los Angeles, Cal.), and of course others too numerous to
mention, though it must not be omitted to name Dr. A. M. Phelps, who, though
located here for only a short time, was yet an appreciable factor in the town,
and afterward, as a practitioner in New York city, became one of the most
brilliant and skilful surgeons in the State.

  The Roberts, Douglas, Douglass (there were two distinct lines), Smith and
Beman families were prolific, and some of them addicted to the perpetuation of
favorite Christian names to the degree that there wore John first, second,
third and fourth, and Samuel first, second and third. There was a good deal of
intermarrying, and relationships became close and then involved. The survivors
to-day are pathetically few.

  Chateauguy was an important point on the northern frontier in the war of
1812. At the very beginning of the conflict a detachment of regulars under
Colonel John E. Wool (afterward a general in the war with Mexico and in the
civil war) and Colonel Snelling was stationed in the northern part of the town
for a short time. In the winter of 1813 a smaller body of troops under Captain
Braddum York was there, and at this time a petition, signed by Gates Hoit and
others, and approved by Captain York, was presented to the Governor, praying
for the completion of a block house, already partly built, and with timber and
other material for it assembled on the ground. The Governor subsequently sent
Mr. Hoit one hundred dollars for the project, which had been consummated by
the people themselves before the receipt of the money. This block house was
situate on the west side of the road, about three-quarters of a mile north of
the Four Corners, and not far from Marble river. Captain David Erwin's company
was stationed at it for a time. Afterward another block house, called Fort
Hickory, was built in the northeastern part of the town, and in it Samuel
Hollenbeck alone stood off a party of Canadians who attempted its capture. In
the late summer of 1813 General Hampton arrived with an army of several
thousand men, who camped on the ground now bounded by the railroad on the
south and by Depot street on the east; at a point on the Johnston farm, about
forty rods north of the Catholic church; and in the vicinities of the two
block houses. During this period there was a skirmish with British invaders or
raiders on the Coonley farm, now almost in the heart of the village, in which
the enemy was driven off. Six Americans are said to have been killed, while
the British loss is unknown. Local tradition attributes the attack to a
purpose to draw the Americans into an ambush in Canada. It was from Chateaugay
that General Hampton invaded Canada, only to be humiliatingly defeated by a
greatly inferior force, and shamefully driven back to his encampments. After
his criminal withdrawal of his army from Chateaugay to Plattsburgh in the
autumn of 1813, in practical desertion of General Wilkinson, with whom it had
been planned that he should operate against Montreal, other smaller bodies of
troops occupied Chateaugay from time to time (a detachment from General
Wilkinson's army under Colonel Bissell comprising one of them) until
evacuation in February, 1814, when the British poured in for a day or two
  proceeding east as far as Marble river, and seizing a good deal of private
property as well as military stores that had been abandoned by the Americans.
Not a little of the private belongings so taken was rum. Sickness had
prevailed to an alarming degree in General Hampton's army, and something like
fifty soldiers were buried near the lot on which Thomas Eaton now lives on
Depot street, and perhaps an equal or a larger number on the Johnston farm.
The gruesome work of burial was performed by John Day. The block house near
Marble river was burned at about the close of the war, supposedly set on fire
by a Canadian.

  The next diversion after the war was scheming for bounties on noxious
animals. In 1817 the town voted bounties additional to those offered by the
State and county for wolves, "painters," bears, foxes and even crows,
blackbirds and squirrels. The amount voted for a wolf was fifteen dollars, for
a panther thirty dollars, for a fox four dollars, and for a crow one dollar.
The amount to be paid by the town for a wolf was later increased to twenty
dollars, making with the State and county bounty sixty dollars for each wolf
killed. But the hunters were not satisfied to receive simply what they might
honestly claim under the system, and, operating with collusive officials,
would collect a number of bounties on a single pate, or even palm off dogs'
heads for those of wolves. To reconcile resident taxpayers, to these
fraudulent practices, the hunters paid the taxes of these, and thus the State
at large and non-resident land owners were the only ones who suffered in
money, though it must be assumed that others must have lost in self-respect.
The story of these frauds is told more fully in another chapter.

  Chateaugay has not been without its calamities and tragedies. On July 4,
1841, while firing a national salute on Depot street, the man whose part was
to thumb the vent of the cannon became careless, with the result that when the
next charge was rammed home fire caught it prematurely, and Cornelius Hugaboom
(father of Samuel G. of Malone) was so horribly burned that he died, and a man
named Mason had his arm torn off   the injury proving fatal. The ramrod that
was torn out of the hands of these two struck a girl at the hotel on the
corner below, and injured her severely. The girl was one of a group of
twenty-six assembled on the hotel balcony to represent the different States.

  At Brayton Hollow about 1850 two young men and three young ladies   James
Avers, Garret Percy, Maria Crippen, Eunice Dailey and Sophronia Percy were
enjoying a boat ride on a mill pond, when the boat struck a submerged limb and
overturned. All were drowned. Hundreds gathered to join in the search for the
bodies, two of which were recovered where the water was less than four feet
deep. Mrs. Matilda Foster, the fortune teller of Burke, was called to direct
the search, and is said to have pointed out the place where some of the bodies
would be found. The event occasioned widespread horror and sorrow, and the
funeral services for all of the victims, held in a grove in the vicinity, were
attended by practically every person in town.

  In October, 1851, Willie, son of John Kane, aged four years, wandered from
his home in the southern part of the town. The father and neighbors searched
vainly for him through the night and the two succeeding days, when some
wretch, callous to the fathers grief and anxiety, gave a further tragic phase
to the case by insinuating that, the ground having been covered foot by foot
for a considerable distance without finding the child, the father must have
killed him in a paroxysm of rage, and secreted the body. Philander Deming told
the story graphically in one of his Adirondack tales some twenty years later  
how Mr. Kane instantly called a meeting at the school house, and with amazing
calmness and yet righteously indignant confronted those assembled, denying
with dignity the aspersion, and characterizing it as a lie. The search was
resumed after a few days, when "Logan" (Elijah Heading of Bellmont), while on
his way to join the searchers, stumbled upon the body on the bank of Little
Trout river, three miles from Mr. Kane's home. The child was the brother of
Mrs. John E. Bush and of Harvey Kane of Malone.

  In 1856 a tornado swept through the central part of Chateaugay. An account
published at the time stated that in the village there was "complete
desolation; not a building escaped injury, and many were completely
destroyed," while farther east in the town sixty to seventy structures were
destroyed or seriously damaged, and to the west like devastation was wrought.
In the village alone one hundred and twenty-eight dwelling houses, four stores
and the Catholic church
were wrecked, and the Methodist and Presbyterian churches and three school
houses were injured. Many were made destitute, and relief was provided by
contributions from Malone and other places. In August, 1885, a wind and hail
storm broke large quantities of window glass and severely damaged the crops of
more than sixty farmers and many gardens. The estimated loss was thirty
thousand
dollars.

  In 1858, when a new Baptist church was in course of erection, the roof
timbers fell, and injured a dozen workers   some of them very severely.

  During the 1868 campaign the Grant and Colfax Tanners' Club of Malone
attended a political rally at Chateaugay, wearing their uniforms and carrying
banners and torches. Party spirit ran high everywhere, and in few places was
partisanship more virulent than in Chateaugay. After parading through the
principal streets of the, village the procession was entering the hall where
the speaking was to occur when a gang of toughs directed a shower of brickbats
and stones upon the members. A number of persons were badly cut and bruised,
one of whom (Millard Greeno of Malone) so severely that he never recovered.

  A fire in the business section of the village in 1867 wiped out property of
the estimated value of twenty-five thousand dollars. In 1891 the Douglas
tannery, employing a hundred and fifty men, was burned, with a claimed loss to
the owners of sixty-five thousand dollars and the loss to the village of an
industry whose pay-roll was five hundred dollars per day, and that had
contributed largely to its prosperity. In January, 1893, with the wind blowing
a gale and the temperature at twenty-five degrees below zero, a fire swept
eastward from River street, destroying the entire business quarter on the
north side of Main street, with first figures of loss placed at a hundred and
fifty thousand dollars, though this was probably an overestimate. Yet a fourth
fire in 1915, west from River street, involved a loss of about twenty-five
thousand dollars.

  The village of Chateaugay was incorporated in 1868. Its present (1915)
population is 1,196, which is a gain of 151 since 1910. The place has about
everything needed to make it attractive and residence in it comfortable. It
has a strong bank quartered in a fine building, one of the best school houses
and the very best town house in the county, good church buildings, a gravity
system of water works, established in 1880 by a private corporation with a
capital of ten thousand dollars, which takes its supply from springs that are
the source of Boardman brook, and which affords a good pressure for fire
purposes. The village is electrically lighted, its main street is brick paved,
and since 1895 it has had a public sewer system. Its store buildings are
principally two and three story brick structures of a substantial character,
and the mercantile establishments are enterprising and well stocked. The town
house is the outgrowth of a benefaction of William Johnston, Jr., who
bequeathed six thousand dollars to build it. But the town determined that if
it were to have anything of the kind it would have nothing less than a
structure that should be adequate and entirely satisfactory. It therefore
voted three separate appropriations, aggregating thirty-four thousand dollars,
to add to the bequest, and proceeded in 1910 to erect an edifice in which the
two polling places are accommodated, and containing an office for the town
clerk and a large assembly hall for town meetings, with rooms to rent for a
post-office and other business uses, and a cosy and neat theatre, with a
seating capacity of more than six hundred, for entertainments.

  In a historical sermon in 1876 the pastor of the Presbyterian church stated
that the first religious service in Chateaugay was held in 1801 or 1802 by a
Presbyterian clergyman named Huntington, and that the organization of the
Congregational church, in 1816, was effected by Rev. Ashbel Parmelee of Malone
and Rev. James Jordan of Potsdam. All local records of the society of date
earlier than 1830 having disappeared, only fragmentary particulars are
obtainable concerning the movement during the fifteen years following its
inception. The three clergymen named are understood each to have visited the
place occasionally during this interval as missionary preachers, and the
minutes of the Presbytery of Champlain show that Rev. Jacob Hart was ordained
there in 1822. Mr. Hart is known to have been pastor for several years
subsequently, and since his time the church has had resident pastors
continuously except as a vacancy may have existed now and then for a few weeks
or possibly a few months. Prior to 1822 the school house had been used in
common with the Baptists for a place of worship, but the latter claimed right
of occupancy for three-quarters of the time, which meant contention between
the denominations or that other accommodations must be had. The difficulty was
surmounted through the generosity of Isaac Sebring, who provided a meeting
place for a time at his own expense. Then, in 1825, steps were taken looking
to the erection of a church edifice, Mr. Sebring securing subscriptions to the
amount of $228 and two hundred and forty-five acres of land from his city
friends, and himself giving the sum of $469.42. The frame was raised in 1828,
Mr. Sebring taking pains in his report of the affair to state that the work
proceeded "in great harmony, without accident, dispute or intoxication." The
building was not completed until 1842. In the same year the form of
organization was changed from Congregational to Presbyterian. The society had
included Burke until 1845, when twenty-five of its members were given letters
of dismission to form a church of their own in the then new town. The church
building was wrenched and unroofed by the tornado of 1856, and was repaired
and inclosed with brick at a cost of three thousand dollars. Further
improvements were made in 1866, and ten years later new furnishings and a new
organ were procured. The old edifice having come to be regarded as not
commensurate with the wealth and necessities of the society, it was razed in
1902, and the present building erected on the same site at a cost of nearly
ten thousand dollars. The society is clear of debt, and has a membership of
about one hundred and twenty.

  Methodism had a beginning in Chateaugay at about the same time with
Congregationalism, as Rev. Henry Ryan, a circuit rider, visited the town in
1802, and three years afterward a class of six members was formed, with
Benjamin Emmons as leader. It is supposed that from 1805 Methodist services
were held more or less irregularly, but by whom until 1831 I have no knowledge
except that Rev. James Erwin says that "Barzillia Willey, James Covel,
Jonathan Newman, William Chase, Isaac Puffer and others carried the gospel
through the valleys of St. Lawrence and Franklin counties from the year 1800."
The first regular appointment by conference to Chateaugay was that of Rev.
Lyndon King in 1831. Mr. King had been a Bangor man, a brother of John, Rev.
Rufus and Harry King, and was the father of the late Alden King, of Malone,
and of former Congressman William King, deceased, of Minnesota, and an uncle
of William A. King and a great uncle of Floyd P. King, of Malone. At the time
of his Chateaugay appointment he had just been ordained, having previously
been a local preacher. He is said to have been a good sermonizer, and
especially strong in exhortation; but after a time he became discontented, and
went over to the Wesleyan Methodist denomination; then denounced all church
organization; became a spiritualist; and by his own arrangement his funeral
sermon was preached by a Universalist. In 1835 Mr. Erwin was sent to
Chateaugay in charge, with Harris Kingsley, a local preacher, and John E.
Stoddard as co-workers. According to Mr. Erwin, the latter had been in the
district at that time for several years, which suggests that Chateaugay must
have had Methodist ministration for some time preceding the location there of
Mr. King. Chateaugay circuit at this period had a circumference of four
hundred miles   extending south into Bellmont, west to the Malone line, north
over to Covey Hill and down to Lachine in Canada; it included Ellensburgh
also. It required six weeks for a rider to cover the territory, and thus, with
three men working, each appointment averaged to be given a service once in two
weeks. Mr. Erwin portrays then conditions vividly. A circuit rider's outfit
included a horse, saddle, saddle-bags, and a book or two; and his dress
was a white or drab fur hat, a cape and clothes made as plain as possible,
forming a sort of uniform, so that "you could tell a Methodist preacher
anywhere by his dress." His pay was a hundred dollars a year if he were
single, with a hundred dollars additional if married, together with an
allowance of sixteen dollars for each child under seven years of age, and of
twenty-four dollars for each child between the ages of seven and fourteen
years, and also of from twenty-five to fifty dollars for "table and feed." For
his own first year in the ministry as a circuit rider Mr. Erwin received only
fifty dollars, and even divided that amount with his associate rider, who was
a man of family. A rider customarily traveled from fifteen to thirty miles on
a Sunday, always on horseback, and spent from six to eight hours in meetings.
At the first service which Mr. Erwin held in Chateaugay, in a stone school
house in the northern part of the town, people came from points fifty miles
distant, and residents in the locality entertained them all   some single
households caring for as many as twenty or thirty each, and even on this scale
a part of the visitors had to be lodged three miles away and others in barns,
so scant was the population. The occasion was a quarterly meeting; and for
lovefeast on Sunday morning, the school house proving insufficient to hold the
crowd, the barn of Amaziah Smith was used. The temperature was below zero, a
carpenter's bench served for a pulpit, and seats were arranged in the stable,
on the barn floor and in the haymow and even on the hayloft. Rev. Silas
Comfort, the presiding elder, was present, accompanied by another nonresident
preacher. Judge of the character of the country at this time from Mr. Erwin's
statement that on his journeys in Canada he had to sleep in a straw bunk or in
a trundlebed with the children, shivering from cold; fowls roosting overhead,
and pigs and calves at his feet; and breakfasting with benumbed, hands and
wearing his overcoat and muffler. Mr. Erwin says, further, that in Canada
wolves then traveled in large packs, while panthers and bears abounded, so
that when moving to an appointment at night he had to be accompanied by a
guard, carrying firebrands and rifles. Even under such conditions it was
customary to proceed shouting hymns, and to stop now and then to hold a prayer
meeting in the snow. The first church building erected by the Methodists in
Chateaugay was not provided until 1854. The tornado two years later damaged it
badly, but it was soon repaired, and answered the needs of the society until
1880, when it was demolished, and the present commodious and substantial brick
building erected on the same site at a cost of about twelve thousand dollars.
The church is free from debt, and has two hundred and thirty members. A
Methodist Episcopal church was built at Earleville in 1891.

  A Baptist church was formed under the leadership of Elder Isaac Sawyer in
1817, with eleven members, and there were never enough accessions to make the
organization really strong. The erection of a church building was begun in
1820 on Depot street, two or three doors south of the Chateau, and it was
eighteen years later when it was finished. The parish had originally included
West Chateaugay, where, when Burke was erected in 1844, two-thirds of the
members resided, and organized a new church   leaving the mother body weaker
than ever. Nevertheless the Depot street church was deemed unsatisfactory and
insufficient,, and in 1858 construction of a new one was begun on Franklin
street   services being held while the work was in progress in the
Presbyterian church. The society, becoming gradually more and more feeble,
finally went out of existence, and about 1899 its church building on Franklin
street was demolished to make place for dwelling houses.

  Though resident Catholics preferred formal request to Bishop Hughes as early
as 1840 for assignment of a resident missionary priest to the place,
Chateaugay continued to remain a part of the Hogansburgh parish until 1849,
and then of Malone until 1863. In 1844, however, Rev. James Keveney of
Hogansburgh procured a church building to be erected, but so far as is known
no priest held service in it, or even visited the town except in response to
occasional sick calls, until Rev. Father McCabe of Malone assumed charge in
1849, and said mass at such infrequent times as he could make opportunity. The
church building was destroyed by the tornado of 1856, and rebuilding was begun
under the direction of Rev. Father Thaves of Malone. It remained, however, for
Rev. Father Edmond De Pauw, who in 1863 was transferred from the post of
assistant at Malone to be pastor of the newly formed St. Patrick's church of
Chateaugay, to finish the work. The charge then embraced Burke, Ellenburgh and
Cherubusco, and included nearly six hundred Irish and French families. During
the first year of Father De Pauw's ministration here one hundred and fifty
persons were confirmed at one time, and during the year 1868 five hundred. As
to conditions prevalent when Father De Pauw assumed charge and as to the
results wrought under him I condense from a Catholic writer, the Rev. J.
Talbot Smith, who apparently felt privileged to say what a Protestant might
hesitate to write: The people had been practically without restraint for forty
years, "and their moral conduct found no guide or corrective except those
which innumerable whiskey shops and unlimited dancing were able to supply. * *
* The church itself was little better than a barn, with no pews, badly heated,
and so unfinished that the snow found entrance, and the sacred wine froze in
the chalice. When the priest made preparations to introduce pews into the
church, the twelve trustees protested, and, finding their protest vain,
resigned. A collection was announced for the second Sunday to raise funds
for purchasing wine, breads, altar furniture and other necessaries.
Twenty-five coppers were collected. * * * A people with little faith and low
morals, spending their substance on drink, and their virtue and health in
riotous living and drunkenness, spurred to attend church only by a kind of
feeble self-respect which was more a tradition than a reality;" but Father De
Pauw corrected disobedience and rebellion, organized temperance societies, and
fought whiskey selling and whiskey drinking in the confessional and at the
polls. His influence everywhere was for good, and he won the esteem and
affection not only of his own people, but of the entire community. In 1885
three thousand confessions were made, and "whiskey law," the dances, the
youthful immorality and the public scandals had disappeared. No equal work has
ever been done by any priest in Northern New York, so far as I am aware, with
the exception of that accomplished during a part of the same period by Rev.
Father LeGrand and Rev. Father Blanchard in Malone. Since the completion of
St. Patrick's church there have been expended in each of three or four years
from five hundred to twenty-five hundred dollars (something like seven
thousand dollars in all) for improvements   vestments, a bell, etc.  and also
in 1890 the sum of seven thousand dollars for a parsonage. There are now about
three hundred families in the parish, Burke, Ellenburgh and Cherubusco having
been set off from it since Rev. Father De Pauw assumed charge half a century
ago.*

  * St. Patrick's church was struck by lightning on Wednesday evening, July
12, 1916, and the belfry flashed almost instantly into flame, which crept
under the roof and soon enveloped the entire structure. Only the foundation
walls and a mass of debris remained to mark the site. There was an insurance
of $7,500 on the building and contents, most of the latter of which were
saved. The loss was, of course, much greater.

  There have been three distinct attempts to establish and maintain an
Episcopal church in Chateaugay. The first had its inception in 1833, and had a
feeble existence until 1839, during which time such services as were held were
conducted by the rector of St. Mark's in Malone. In 1849 Henry B. and Elisha
Smith, Oel Sunderlin, Theodore T. S. Beman and others organized St. Peter's
church, which also had a languishing existence for three or four years, and
was visited once by Bishop Huntington. The services of this organization were
held in the Presbyterian church. St. John's Church in the Village of
Chateaugay was founded in 1869, and continued as an organization, though
without much activity for most of the time, until 1891, when it was declared
extinct. Until it erected a house of worship of its own, it occupied the
Baptist church; but services were irregular and infrequent except during one
brief period when it had a resident missionary. The mortgage on its own
building was eventually foreclosed, and the structure made over into a
dwelling house by William L. Collins. It is now the property of the W. B. Ryan
estate.

  Chateaugay had a Masonic Lodge (Rainbow) as early as 1809, which, however,
went out of existence in anti-Masonic times, something like twenty years
later. A memorandum among Gates Hoit's papers states that when a British force
was in Chateaugay in 1814 some of the men broke into the hall of Thomas
Smith's tavern, which was the old Franklin House, burned in 1857, and which
stood on the site of the present Beman Block, and stole a carpet and the lodge
jewels. Mr. Hoit and Samuel Sanborn followed the British to Cornwall in the
hope of regaining the stolen property, but were denied an interview with the
commandant, and were ordered to leave the place forthwith; but before
departing notified the officer in writing of the purpose of their visit.
Though they were given no reply, the commandant must have communicated the
facts to Montreal Masons, as the latter afterward wrote that the missing
articles had been taken into Upper Canada, and were not recoverable. However,
the Montreal Masons sent in their place new jewels which were more valuable
than those that had been stolen. A successor to Rainbow Lodge was chartered as
Frontier Lodge, No. 517, June 6, 1862, which now has one hundred and
thirty-five members. Chateaugay Grange, No. 964, was organized in January,
1903, and has a present membership of one hundred and ninety.

  Wadhams Council, No. 469, Knights of Columbus, was organized January 14,
1900, with fifty-three charter members, who have now increased to two hundred
and thirty.

  The Bank of Chateaugay was chartered as a State institution October 16,
1887. George Hawkins of Malone headed the movement to give the town banking
facilities, and until his death was the bank's president. It prospered from
the outset, and has been of great benefit to the place. Its charter having
expired, expediency seemingly counseled liquidation, with the formation of a
new bank under the national system, which began business October 16, 1907,
with the late Bruce C. Bort as president. It has a capital of $75,500, surplus
and undivided profits in September, 1917, aggregating $73,608.36, and deposits
amounting to $429,435.48. It is the fourth largest bank in the county, and, as
the figures show, it is strong and thoroughly sound, and its management is
excellent.

  B. F. Roberts Post No. 576, G. A. R., was organized in August, 1885   the
name supposedly having been taken in honor of the town's first settler, who
was, however, B. S. instead of B. F. The name was changed to Admiral Bailey
Post in 1890. Admiral Bailey was born in Chateaugay in 1805. The post had a
hundred and twenty-five members at one time, and now has only fifteen.

  An agricultural society for the eastern towns of Franklin county and the
western of Clinton county was organized in 1871, but no exhibitions were held.
In October, 1906, the Chateaugay Agricultural Society for Bellmont,
Chateaugay, Clinton, Ellenburgh and the surrounding country was incorporated
with a capital of $10,000. Grounds south of the railroad station were bought
and fitted up with buildings and a race track, and annual exhibitions were
held for four years, when a too ambitious offer of purses for trotting races
(one of which was $10,000) brought the society to grief and bankruptcy. Its
grounds were sold under mortgage foreclosure. James A. Farley, the strike
breaker and owner of a number of fast horses, confident that he himself would
win the race, guaranteed the purse, but when the horse of another came first
under the wire he welched, and the society collapsed.

  The first newspaper published in Chateaugay was the Journal, established
June 4, 1867, by I. VanBuskirk and A. N. Merchant, with C. H. Boynton
associated with it later. Its life was short, and after three or four years it
was displaced by the Star, with Mr. Merchant as publisher. T. K. Milne
eventually bought the Star, and, failing to make a success of it, discontinued
publication in 1877.
The same year A. H. Merritt and Chas. H. Huntington of Malone started the
Record, independent in politics, and sold in 1884 to Julius D. Beckwith. In
1892 Ferrell & Neher published the Franklin County Democrat as a campaign
paper, and in the autumn of the same year bought the Record, consolidating the
two. The Record is still published, with Frank W. Ferrell as editor and
manager. Hon. Warren T. Thayer, now the county's representative in the
Assembly, founded a new Chateaugay Journal in 1896, and after a few years sold
it to A. W. Roberts, who continued its publication until his death, when
Walter Murray bought the property. The office was destroyed by fire in 1906,
and thus the paper died.

  The Chateaugay Electric Light and Power Company, incorporated in 1894, with
a capital of $6,000 and with Ernest A. Douglass owning nearly all of the
stock, installed a plant at the Douglass grist mill, and for a few years
lighted the streets, residences and business places. In 1902 the Chasm Power
Company (present capitalization $35,000) was incorporated, with Charles L.
Bentley president, and developed a superb power at the chasm. The dam is
nearly fifty feet in height and the actual head ninety-odd feet, with an
estimated potential development of twenty-five hundred horse power. After a
few years the new company acquired the Douglass plant, which has since been
dismantled. The Chasm Power Company's transmission lines extend into some or
the farming districts of the town, to Brainardsville in Bellmont, and through
Burke into Constable and Malone. Dr. John S. Van Vechten is the present
president, E. E. Humphrey secretary, and E. S. Duffy treasurer. Dr. Van
Vechten and Hon. Warren T. Thayer hold a majority of the stock.

  The first creamery in Chateaugay, and the second in the county, was built by
Adam M. Bennett south of the village in 1871, and was afterward owned by B. 0.
Roulston. It was discontinued about 1909. Two or three others were built in
1872, and from that date onward ten or a dozen more. The builders were: Watson
Sunderlin, Maple Grove Creamery, operated for only two or three years; Porter
W. Douglas, Big Spring Creamery (once rented by C. C. Douglas), which went out
of existence about 1900; William L. Collins, Maple Street Creamery, once
burned, then rebuilt by C. C. Douglas, and afterward owned by Wills Bros., but
closed within the past year or two; W. S. Douglas, east of the village, and
run only four or five years; Don E. Seabury, Boardman Spring Creamery, built
about 1878, and owned later by George Green, who discontinued it about 1888;
Tim. Costello, in the Quaker settlement, about 1878, and operated afterward by
A. W. Miller until about 1906, when it burned; Sam. Cook and Harrison Hill,
near the confluence of the Marble and Chateaugay rivers, about 1878, and
operated for three or four years, when it burned; Selden Phelps, Crystal
Spring Creamery, prior to 1876, in the southern part of the town, and
afterward owned by W. B. Ryan, and then by 0. F. Chase; Charles L. Bentley, on
River street, about 1893, but operated for only two or three years, and also
the Electric Creamery, near the railroad, which has become a part of the
Spellman produce store; Ira Doud, in the Jericho district in 1885, which was
burned after five or six years: a stock company, in the Jericho district, now
known as the Alder Spring Creamery and owned by J. E. Leach; and a stock
company in the village in 1909. The only creameries now in operation are the
Alder Spring and the stock company's in the village. Ralph Swinburne built a
cheese factory in the northern part of the town in 1872, and operated it for
several years.

  The establishment of a milk shipping station by the Sheffield Farms Slawson
Decker Company about 1910 has doubtless been a contributory cause to the
closing of some of the creameries, and it would not be surprising if it should
eventually shut up the two that have managed to survive, for it pays more for
milk than a creamery can earn for its patrons in making fifty-cent butter.
This concern in the season of flush production in 1916 distributed to the
farmers $25,000 a month, and is now of such volume even in the winter that its
milk purchases are a third more in dollars, with expectation that they will at
times mount to $75,000 or more per month. The prices paid by it in 1917 for
three and eight-tenths per cent. milk ranged from $1.80 to $3.60 per hundred
pounds, and for milk richer in butter fat it paid as much as $3.95. In 1917 it
acquired additional land, and began a work of alteration and enlargement which
will involve an expenditure of about a quarter of a million dollars. It is to
make condensed milk, and has a contract with the government for its entire
product. This line of business is said to be very profitable, and will enable
the company to pay high prices for milk.

  The story of the many mills which at various times have lined the streams in
Chateaugay runs to a period too remote and is too involved to make present
recital of it in detail possible. Of the grist mills the first was built by
Elisha Howard in Platt's Hollow in 1797 for Nathaniel Platt of Plattsburgh,
though Hough tells that even before this David Mallory had hollowed the top of
a stump, bowl shaped, and, suspending a pestle above it from the limb of a
tree, undertook with so rude a contrivance to crush the scant crop of corn
raised in the locality. What became of the Platt mill no one appears to know,
though the premises would seem to have been owned thirty-odd years later by
Benjamin Blackmore. Doubtless the next real grist mill was built by William
Bailey, earlier than 1806, which he sold in 1817 to George W. Douglass and
Simeon Bellows. It was situate on the west bank of Chateaugay river, a mile
west of the village, and in 1835 was replaced by the present mill, on the east
bank. Bellows sold his interest in 1823 to John Scriver, and he to Douglass in
1839. The property has remained ever since in the Douglass family, but has
been idle for a number of years. Next came the mill in the northern part of
the town, at Earlville, which was built by Reuben Church at an unknown date,
and sold by him in 1852 to David and John Craik. It passed out of existence
about twenty years later. In 1859 John A. Sabin and John B. Bort built a grist
mill on the Boardman Brook, in the village, which was bought by Willard S.
Alvord and W. W. Scriver in 1868   Scriver selling in 1872 to Alvord, who
continued to operate it until it was burned, a number of years later. Still
another mill was built by Mr. Bort in 1868, on the Chateaugay river, just
above the Douglass property. It passed to the ownership of Eli B. Smith, who
sold it in 1874 to William W. Scriver and John W. Roberts, who operated it for
several years. It was dismantled eight or ten years ago.

  The sawmills have been numerous, but none of them large. The first was
erected in 1797 or 1798 for Mr. Platt, near the grist mill in Platt's Hollow.
William Bailey is understood to have built one early, but at what point is
unknown. Simeon Bellows had one near the Douglass grist mill, and leased it in
1822 to George W. Douglass. It was burned. Of the many others only the
following are traceable, and even as to these dates and chains of ownership
can not be followed with certainty: William Hilliker, John Vernal very early,
George Hilliker, Rufus Copps, Alfred Copps, Alexander Lewis, John H. Keese in
1833, Thomas Bennett, James Brown and Hiram Palmer (afterward leased to Henry
B. Smith, and then to John P. Badger), Eli B. Smith and Willard S. Alvord  
eleven mills in all on the Marble river, some of them more than three-quarters
of a century ago; Ephraim Percy and Comfort Brayton at Brayton Hollow, the
Percy mill having been owned later by Garret Percy, William Wood, and John P.
Badger and John A. Johnston, and that of Brayton having been built by George
Beach before 1834; Samuel Cook, a short distance below Brayton and Percy;
Frank Atwater, above Brayton, and owned subsequently by Samuel Stewart, and
then by Ezra Sweet; Edward Lancto, about 1850, near High Falls; Reuben S.
Church, in the northern part of the town, at an unknown date, but sold to the
Craiks in 1851, and by them to William Philp; Selden Phelps, near the Bellmont
line   the property going later to Oscar F. Chase; and Harrison Hill in the
northern part of the town. It was from this mill that Mr. Hill, then an ardent
Democrat, drew a load of slabs to the village for a bonfire in celebration of
the election of President Cleveland, and in his enthusiasm burned the wagon as
well as the slabs. The Alvord mill was erected as a steam mill because the
flow of water in the Boardman brook had been diminished by taking the spring
as a source of supply for the village, and its surplus power was used in
operating the grist mill. The only sawmill now in operation is one in the
village, owned by Harrison Hill, and operated by steam power.

  A planing mill which did a large business and employed a dozen or fifteen
men was built by George T. Hall near the railroad station in 1873, but was
torn down after a few years.

  There used to be six starch factories in the town, which were under many
changes of ownership during their existence. One was built near High Falls by
Clark A. Patterson; one in the extreme southern part of the town by George T.
Hall, who had as partners later Wm. S. Douglas and Christopher Briggs, and
which was owned also by Douglas & Chase; one on Marble river, built by Thomas
Bennett, and then owned by Adams & Jenkins, and finally by Jenkins alone; one
on the same stream, near its junction with the Chateaugay, which numbered
among its owners George B. Greene, John P. Badger, Andrew J. Day, George T.
Hall, and John B. Hayes; one by Patterson and Douglass, on Marble river; and
one at or near the site of the Craik grist mill, built in 1873 by W. W. & H.
E. King, of Malone. Destruction of starch mills by fire was not infrequent,
and the Greene factory was burned twice in as many years.

  The first tannery was built by Jacob Smith on his farm in the northeastern
part of the town, and the second probably by his son, Colonel Thomas Smith, on
the Boardman brook. At least it was sold by him in 1829 to William V. Derby,
remaining in the Derby family until 1876, though leased during the Civil War
to Enoch Miller of Malone,. and in 1872 to Clark Brothers. In 1876 William S.
Douglas bought it, and in association with his son, Hiram A., enlarged it to a
mammoth establishment, in which over a hundred men were employed. Market
conditions for leather were then unfavorable, and the concern lost money. It
was burned in 1891. Had this misfortune been averted and business continued a
few years longer, the tannery would have earned a fortune, as prices became
higher almost at once after the fire. Calvin S. Douglass had a small tannery
near his grist mill about 1885. Harvey Higgins operated it for him.

  Edgar A. Keeler erected a foundry on the Boardman brook, near the tannery,
in 1861, and operated it until 1865, when he sold to P. L. Lyman and Samuel M.
Moore, but came into ownership again five years later. During the Lyman-Moore
control they added and ran a carding mill. The building was destroyed by fire
in 1871.

  In 1892 Alexander Johnston and Bruce C. Bort, operating under the name
Chateaugay Pulp Company, built a pulp mill a half a mile above the High Falls.
Afterward William Johnston came into sole ownership, and the property is still
operated and owned by his estate.

  In 1895 Charles E. Martin and J. Ovette Smith of Plattsburgh and Bruce C.
Bort, John S. Van Vechten. Daniel S. Coonley and Adam M. Bennett of Chateaugay
organized the High Falls Pulp Company, capitalized at fifty thousand dollars,
and built a pulp mill at the High Falls. Some of the original stockholders
dropped out, and B. S. W. Clark bought an interest. The capital was increased
to one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and a paper mill was added. The
business is still continued, and is prosperous. New York World interests are
the present owners.*

  * This mill was burned April 28, 1918, with an estimated loss of $300,000;
insurance, $250,000. It is to be rebuilt, larger than before.

  The Chateaugay Excelsior Company was incorporated by W. T. Thayer, A. M.
Bennett, E. E. Humphrey and C. L. Bentley in 1902, and the Star Excelsior
Company by W. T. Thayer, F. W. Beman and Dr. J. W. Campbell in 1907. The Globe
Excelsior Company was incorporated in 1907 by C. L. Bentley, Adam M. Bennett
and Floyd Shufelt. Each of these companies built and operated a mill. That of
the Globe was bought by the Chateaugay in 1910, and the Star was burned in
1911. The present stockholders in the Chateaugay Company are W. T. Thayer, A.
M. Bennett and D. E. Seabury. There are few lines of manufacturing which
experience a wider range of activity and depression, and when prosperity
prevails the returns are exceptionally good. In one year one of these
companies paid dividends of two hundred per cent.

  If public inns offered less luxurious accommodations in the olden time than
those of to-day, the wayfarer had at least a wider choice then, for a tavern
was to be found every two or three miles throughout this section. Most of them
were at first merely the rude farm residences of the landlords, with a spare
room or two for guests, and some were only log cabins. Their customers were
altogether either residents who patronized the bar or immigrants from New
England requiring a night's lodging and a meal or two on their way to the
locations which they had in mind for homes farther to the west. A little later
the taverns became a bit more pretentious, but fewer in number, and the
distance between them greater. These were usually relay points for a change of
the stage coach horses, such changes being made once in every eight or ten
miles. The Chateaugay town records show no less than nine licenses granted to
taverns in 1806, and I am told that the fee at that time and for a number of
years subsequently was three dollars each. Two of the nine were located in
what is now Burke, and one in Clinton. The other six of the licenses were to
Chauncey Mooers at a point two and a half miles east of the present village;
Abner Pomeroy, in the eastern part of the town, or possibly just across the
Clinton county line, which was designated in a military order in 1813 as the
place where one detachment of American troops should be stationed; and James
Ormsbee, Aaron Beman, Nathan Beman and Jesse Ketcham, all of whom except
perhaps Ketcham lived within the present village limits. Ketcham's location I
have been unable to fix, but incline to the opinion that it was near the Burke
line. In 1810 these same town records show licenses granted to Barnabas Hatch
(the father of James in Burke), whose inn was located about two miles west of
Chateaugay village; to John Vernal, who was then at the Chauncey Mooers stand;
to Samuel Person, two miles south of the Corners; and to Ralph Shepard and
Amos Eldridge, in the village. In 1811 Colonel Thomas Smith was licensed.
According to the best information that I am able to obtain, Colonel Smith had
then built the Franklin House, which stood on the northeast of the Four
Corners, and which was continued as a hotel under different landlords until it
burned in 1857. It was kept at one time by Harry Hilliker, and later by Fred
Vaughn and______ Cartwright. Other pioneer landlords were Buckley Johnson,
Ashbel and John Sanborn, and William G. and Samuel Roberts. Nicholas Hall had
a hotel a number of years later in the now seemingly unsuitable locality about
a mile west of the village, Garret Percy one in Brayton Hollow, and Deacon
Roberts one on the Boardman brook. The Vernal hotel was sold in 1831 to
William Hilliker, who conducted it then for a short time, and again for many
years. A part of the original house is still standing, and is occupied by
Melvin Hilliker. L. E. Risley was landlord here for two years, as lessee from
Hilliker, when he built a new house near by, on the county line. It was burned
twice within two years. Risley continued to keep it until 1852. The Roberts
House, now the Chateau, was originally a log structure, built in 1837 by John
and Alonzo Roberts, who were landlords there for a considerable time, and who
replaced the log with a frame building. Among their successors have been
Chauncey Smith, Samuel Roberts, Timothy Ladd, George Ladd & William Mansfield,
Julius D. Roberts, George Howe, Luke Brooks & Jefferson Roberts, Cyrel
Hutchins, W. H. Finn, Dwyer & Jenkins, and now Thomas Dwyer. Jenkins & Dwyer
practically rebuilt and modernized the house a few years ago. The Union House
was originally the residence of Theodorus Roberts, and fronted on Main street.
When the Mitchell and Jackson block was erected it was moved a little to the
south and made to face on Depot street. Included among its proprietors have
been T. P. Roberts, Alanson Roberts, M. A. Knappin, Hoel S. Farnsworth & Son,
Silas W. Hatch, Jacob Morgan, John Duffin, Robert Simpson, and now Mrs.
Duffin. The proceedings of the board of supervisors for 1857 show that Mr.
Knappin presented a curious petition. It recited that he had paid forty
dollars for a license, and demanded a return of the money because the license
had failed to give him a monopoly of the liquor traffic   grocers and others
having engaged in the business without licenses. Of course Mr. Knappin's
petition was ignored.

  General Winfield S. Scott was once a visitor to Chateaugay on a military
tour of inspection   probably at about the time of the Canadian rebellion,
when United States troops were stationed along the border for enforcement of
the neutrality law. The story is told that his gigantic size (he is said to
have weighed three hundred and thirty pounds) occasioned a good deal of
comment, whereupon one resident declared that there was a still bigger man
living in the vicinity, viz., Matthew Reynolds at Brainardsville. Dispute
arising over the claim, a yoke of oxen was sent to Brainardsville for Mr.
Reynolds, upon whose arrival it was shown that he weighed thirty pounds more
than General Scott.

  Among some of the older residents the tradition is prevalent that Chateaugay
might have been the shire town of the county had its supervisor not accepted a
bribe to absent himself when the matter was decided. The originator oś the
story, as well as those who have accepted it as true, must have overlooked the
facts that at the time Chateaugay was a part of Clinton county, that Franklin
county was not then in existence and of course had no board of supervisors,
and that Malone was named as the county seat by act of the Legislature upon a
citizens' petition, because, as explained in the legislative committee's
report, the town was nearly central as regards the then and probable future
population.