The official seal of the City of Auburn was designed by local artist Frank Rathbun in anticipation of the 1893 celebration of the centennial of the founding of Hardenbergh's Corners. The seal bears three dates important to the city's history: its settlement by John L. Hardenbergh in 1793, its incorporation as a village in 1815, and its attainment of a city charter in 1848. It also includes the city's Latin motto, Pax et Labor (Peace and Work) and symbols of the region's Native American past and industrial present. (The earliest versions of the seal depicted the arm of a robust working man, with sleeve rolled up and wielding a hammer; this symbol, offensive to the city's industrial elites, did not survive the labor unrest and Red Scares of the earliest decades of the twentieth century.) The seal appeared on commemorative medals issued to each of the students in the city schools during the centennial celebration, on the banners that decorated downtown streets during the 1948 celebration of the centennial of the city charter, and on city documents even today.
31 March 2009
Seal of the City of Auburn
Oliver Swain Taylor
He married Catherine Gould Parsons in Belchertown, Massachusetts, on 4 November 1816. During a portion of their residence at Auburn, the family made its home at 13 Grover Street. Four children were born to the Taylors: Catherine Gould Taylor (b. 16 December 1817, Belchertown); Charles Taylor (b. 15 September 1819, Belchertown), Henry Martin Taylor (b. 7 March 1825, Hadley, Massachusetts), and Edward Payson Taylor (28 September 1827, Homer, New York).
At the age of sixty-three, Taylor was ordained to the ministry. After his death in Auburn on 19 April 1885, Rev. Dr. Taylor was interred in Fort Hill Cemetery.
Aurelius Wheeler
Aurelius Wheeler was for nearly two centuries well-known in local historical circles as the "first white person born in the town of Aurelius." Such "accomplishments" and notable "firsts" were the stuff of much nineteenth-century local history, but became less important as local historical perspectives increasingly encompassed Native Americans, blacks both slave and free, women, and, generally, individuals and groups who did not hold privileged positions. The earliest settlement by European-Americans in the region now known as Cayuga County is, nevertheless, a milestone in the history of Auburn and its vicinity. The obituary of Aurelius Wheeler, which appeared in the city's morning newspaper of 7 November 1870, is included here for that reason, and, as well, because of the colorful and adulatory style of composition that was typical of the era in which it was written.
Another venerable and worthy citizen of this county has gone to his final rest. Aurelius Wheeler, Esq., the fuirst white person born in the military township of Aurelius, died at his residence in Aurelius jus outside the boundaries of this city, on Saturday last, in the seventy-ninth year of his age.
Mr. Wheeler was botn at his father's original farm-house, situated about a mile south of the "Half Acre" sop called ion what was then the township of Aurelius in the county of Herkimer, now in the town of Fleming in the county of Cayuga, on the 28th day of March 1792. His father was the sturdy and intrepid pioneer settler -- Captain Edward Wheeler, of revolutionary celebrity, who had the courage and enterprise to remove with his wife, an infant son Elijah then about two years old and a hired man, from Washington County into this region in the year 1790, nearly three years before Col. Hardenburgh [sic] came, when all this portion of the military district was nearly an unbroken wilderness. He came by way of the Hudson, Mohawk, Oneida, Oswego and Seneca rivers and their several portages, the only route to this section then traveled. He performed the exploit of bringing his family here through those waters in a boat constructed by himself near Fort Edward, whilst his hired man brought his household goods, farming utensils and provisions in a wagon drawn by an ox team along the shores. When the captain arrived at the place of his subsequent domicil, all the military tract belonged to the county of Montgomery. With the assistance of his hired man and his stalwart boys Elijah and Aurelius, after they became old enough to work, the captain cleared up a tract of heavily timbered, but very fertile land, and resided upon it until the 22nd of August 1839, when he died, universally respected by all who knew him, in the 87th year of his age.
Aurelius was the first white child born in the old military township of Aurelius. He at first received from his parents the scripture name of Ezra; but when he was about six years of age, James Emott and Vincent Matthews, the Onondaga Commissioners so called, who were then adjudicating upon disputed land titles in this quarter, upon learning the fact that he was the first white child born in that township, persuaded the captain to allow them to invest him with the title of Aurelius. As soon as he was large enough to wield an axe and until he was grown to manhood, he worked with his father and Elijah in clearing the homestead of superfluous trees and stumps, and reducing it to a very perfect condition for arable agriculture. Having buried two wives, he was living with the third whose maiden name was Jane Thompson, at the time of his death.
Although Mr. Wheeler weas very genmerally known throughout the county, especially to the earlier settlers, he was not a very priominent man outside the neighborhood in which he lived. He was naturally reserved in his manners, and somewhat difficdent, and although he exhibited considerable earnestness at time, in manners which deeply concerned him, he was never very demonstrative. In the domestic citrcle, in the neighborhood in which he lived, in the Democratic party to which he belonged, anjd in the Baptist church of this city, of which he was a member, he was, until his health failed him, a few years since, a solid pillar. He was never ambitious for any official position whatever, but consented occasionally when he was in the vigor of life, to take such offices as supervisor, commissioner of highways, and justice of the peace, in his town, as a part of the burdens incident to citizenship. Whilst he acted as a magistrate, he was proverbial for preventing instead of encouraging litigation. He was throughout his long life a plain, practical, honest man, and a peace maker. He ranked with the pioneer settlers of the county, who were more or less remarkable in their day, for sterling qualities of head and heart. But he, like most of his compeers, has passed away. Upwards of two years ago, Mr. Wheeler began to be afflicted with dropsy. During the most of the last winter his case was considered imminent, and on several occasions his life was despaired of. But he rallied some during the summer months and was able to ride into the city a short time ago. But during all that time he was accustomed to say that he was in daily expectation of the death summons; and that as life had no charms for him, he was ready and anxious to go. He expressed in his dying hours the fullest confidence of a happy immortality.
We tender to the relatives and friends of the deceased our sympathies on account of their bereavement.
Note: Aurelius Wheeler was buried in a small cemetery on Galpin Hill, near the far end of the hill from St. Joseph's Cemetery.
Princeton University
John Foster Dulles, attorney, statesman
29 March 2009
Cayuga County Medical Society
"History of the Cayuga County Medical Society from 1806 to 1876," A Paper Read before the Cayuga County Historical Society by Theodore Dimon, M.D., 4 July 1876
Cayuga County Historical Society
Edward Wheeler, "Historical Sketch of the Settlement of Captain Edward Wheeler in Cayuga County"
13 February 1877
Theodore Dimon, M.D., "History of the Cayuga County Medical Society"
13 March 1877
Gen. John S. Clark, "Champlain's Expedition to the State of New York"
8 May 1877
Benjamin Bradford Snow, "A Record of Current Events"
12 June 1877
Lansingh Briggs, M.D., "Medicine as a Science"
10 July 1877
J. Lewis Grant, "A Trip to the Northern Wilds of Canada"
11 September 1877
Henry H. Bostwick, "Biography of William Bostwick"
9 October 1877
Benjamin Franklin Hall, "Biography of Judge Elijah Miller, Part I," a copy of which is in the archives of The Seward House
13 November 1877
Benjamin Franklin Hall, "Biography of Judge Elijah Miller, Part II," a copy of which is in the archives of The Seward House
Slavery in Cayuga County
Slaves in Cayuga County
Thomas Bramin, paid to John Leonard Hardenbergh $300 for his freedom in 1803
Harry and Kate Freeman
Abraham, freed by Peter Hughes in 1808
Hannibal, born into slavery in 1805, son of John Leonard Hardenbergh's slave "Cate"
Harry, freed by Peter Highes in 1808
Nancy, and her daughter Hagen, born in slavery to John Leonard Hardenbergh
Jane Clark
Harriet Tubman
Slaveowners of Cayuga County
Jehiel Clark
Edward Daugherty
John Herring Hardenbergh
John Leonard Hardenbergh
Israel Harris
Peter Hughes
Jane Clark
A paper read before the Cayuga County Historical Society by Julia C. Ferris, 22 February 1897
The underground railway was like other railways in one particular only-- by its aid passengers were transported. The termini of the railroad were the South and the North. Its route was from Bondage through Suffering to Freedom or capture. Its lines were laid regardless of heavy grades or obstructing waterways. Trips over it were made in but one direction. It had no timetables, no regular stations. Its trainsmen might be colorblind to any hue but sable. Its known agents suffered death. No fares were collected. Stopovers were allowed as the passengers' safety seemed to require. Its completion was not celebrated by silver spike-driving or other ceremonial. No one knows aught of its beginnings save that it had its inception in sympathetic human hearts. Its functions ceased as a result of a few pen strokes January 1, 1863.
Jane Clark is a colored woman about seventy-five years of age who resides in this city. She was born a slave. Her speech, though not always "twisted threads of gold and steel," generally leaves no one in doubt of her meaning. One knows exactly the idea intended when she says, "I can't read anythin' but de Bible, but Ise can read ev'ry word in dat from Genesee to Revolution." Even the words in the Scripture which would appall anyone but a seminary professor have no terror for her.
Her word patrollers is defined by her to be "a lot of men on horses who go roamin' roun' to fine runaways. I suppose dey is called rollers because dey roams aroun' de country. I don't know why pat."
Judging from her own statement, she is an expert genealogist, for she declares with much earnestness, "I knows all my old back parentses names." Her original name was Charlotte Harris. She reached this city and her freedom in 1859 by way of the underground railroad. She then took the name of Jane Lemon, the surname being one adopted by her brother who came by the same route two years earlier. In 1863, she married Henry Clark, an official of the A.M.E. Zion Church who, according to his wiofe's words, "is goin' to heaben han' over fist."
Her mother died when she was an infant. Her maternal grandmother, practically a free woman, readily obtained permission to "bring the child up." When six or seven years of age, she was taken in payment of a debt by William Compton and was the first of many slaves he owned. At the age of eight, she was hired out to the owner of a small plantation. Her daily food here consisted of a puint of cornmeal which was seasoned with salt, mixed with water and baked in the ashes. Her principal duty was, in company with two other children, to bring water a long distance from a spring for culinary purposes for all on the plantation. These three children would start out about four in the morning, make two trips before breakfast, four before dinner, and one before supper. The hair was worn off their heads by the water paild which the children carried on them.
It was one of these early morning excursions that she saw the "stars fall." This scene is vivid in her memory. The children were on their way to the spring. They were not old enough to be alarmed at the unusual sight but ran along trying to catch the stars as they fell. After two years of this service she was taken home by her master. Here she was well-treated and had plenty to eat.
When her master died, the slaves were hired out until his son, Barnes, should be of age. Most of those to whom she was hired ill treated her. When Barnes Compton attained his majority, he returned home and recalled his slaves. Three years from this time, Charlotte's trouble began, the cause of which she attributes to jealousy on the part of her cousin Mary, some years older than herself, whom she had superseded in culinary affairs and the interference of an aunt of her master's who had come to live with him.
She tells of the first whipping she received. She had performed her early morning task of feeding the cows and returned to the house to make the fire and prepare the breakfast for the family. The fire did not burn readily, and the hour for breakfast had passed when her master appeared in the kitchen. He began to whip her when breakfast was late and took that opportunity to settle many old scores, accusing her of saying and doing things which she stoutly denied. This whipping she classes as a severe one and says, "I didn't feel it. Seems like as if I was trustin' in God. Wishes I could trust him so now." She received in all five floggings, three from her master and two from the overseer.
She became accustomed to scenes of severity differing only in detail from those we read about. She determined to escape or die in the attempt. She felt that her hope of escape lay in her bropther William, who lived more than thirty miles away. A white man, one of the "white trash," wrote to her brother addressing it not to William but to another "poor white" who lived about two miles from William's master. A long time had elapsed. No answer from William had been received and Charlotte wondered if one would ever come.
On Whitsunday, which was observed as a holiday, early in the morning, one of the black children came into the house and told Charlotte that somebody wanted to see her at the quarters. Embracing the first opportunity to go there, she was told that Brother Garner wanted to see her in the pines. When she reached the woods she was to hum a particular tune that Brother Garner nmight know she was coming. She had heard of Brother Garner, and knew that he came from Brother William. What should she do? Her duties at the house required her immediate attention. Her anxiety to hear from her brother urged her to go to the pines at once. For a few minutes the conflict lasted which she discretely settled by returning to her house duties. To these she gave her undivided attention. She prepared for dinner, arranged to leave the house for a short time and hastened to the pines. She hummed the designated tune and Brother Garner issued from his place of concealment. Their interview was brief, but long enough to enable them to arrange that Charlotte should start on her journey as soon after dark as she could, joining Brother Garner on the way. She knew nothing about the plans for her future. It was enough for her to know that William had sent for her. She returned to the house and performed her usual duties, selecting at intervals such things as she could take with her and putting them in two pillow cases. Brother Garner's presence is accounted for by the fact that slaves in this part of the country during any holiday season were permitted to visit neighboring plantations without special permission. No attention was paid to the absence of a slave at such a time, as it was presumed that when the time of festivity had expired he would return. She had told no one of her intended flight but her husband and the black woman by whom Brother Garner had sent word to her. Her husband's home was some miles from Charlotte's. he had taken advantage of the holiday privilege to visit his wife, but returned to his plantation early that he might not be suspected of having had anything to do with her escape. While the family were at tea she dropped her bundles out of the window, which was only a short distance from the ground, and soon after began her journey carrying both bundles on her head. After going about two miles she was joined by Brother Garner, who took one of her bundles. They met her husband a few miles farther on and he walked with them an hour. Brother Garner and Charlotte walked all night and met William just before daylight. The sun was just rising when they reached an old log cabin, the property of the white man through whom Charlotte's letter had reached William. She describes this cabin as being "neither water tight nor wind tight." It had bene the intention to secrete Charlotte on board a boat which made regular trips northward; but another captain had taken the place of the trusted one and the plan was not deemed safe. She had for her companion an old woman who had been there two years. They were careful not to be seen about during the day. They were supplied with food by the poor white family.
Charlotte made frequent visits to her brother's home. He had a wife, Sophie, and five children, and seems to have occupied a responsible position on his master's plantation, though not an overseer. It was during one of these visits, in the winter, that she was nearly apprehended as a fugitive. On this visit, when everything seemed propitious, she issued from her hiding-place in the loft and joined Sophie and her five children in the room below. Suddenly, without warning, the door was thrown open and the patrol entered. They were not strangers to Sophie nor she to them. They were surprised to see so many children. Sophie claimed them all as hers, pointing our Charlotte, now more than thirty years old, as the oldest. They discredited this statement and went up to the great house to investigate. Charlotte did not wait for them to return but fled to the old cabin barefooted. For some unexplained reason, the patrol did not return. The cabin was her home until March 1857. Then these friendly whites gave her, her brother and another colored man forged passes granting them permission to go to Washington to see Buchanan inaugurated. These three started about ten o'clock Saturday, walked constantly except when they stopped to kneel in prayer and reached Washington about eleven o'clock Sunday morning. The journey had been a very hard one for Charlotte. Her feet were sore, her legs were stiff and gave out utterly at the door of the friendly black into whose house she had to be carried. Here she remained no longer than was necessary. The family was very poor and was also suspected of harboring fugitives. She hired out as a servant passing as a free woman. When circumstances seemed to indicatethe probability of her being apprehended as a runaway, she would find another place, change her name, and stay as long as that seemed the best course to pursue. William and his companion remained in Washington until night. William reached Auburn in due time. The companion died on the way.
Charlotte's stay in Washington was a prolonged one, nop favorable opportunity offering for her to leave the city until May 1859. She had saved money enough to pay her fare. It was not easy in those days for a known free colored person to travel in safety, else Charlotte might have left Washington long before she did. May 1859 found her in the service of a family who spent the summer months in the North. To these ladies she expressed a desire to go to Auburn to see her brother but did not like to undertake the journey alone and asked to be allowed to go with them. They made an attempt to purchase a through ticket from Washington for Charlotte, but through tickets for colored persons from that point could not be purchased. A ticket was procured for Baltimore. When they reached this city, the ladies requested an acquaintance, a resident of Baltimore who happened to be on the train, to purchase a ticket for their servant. This service he was very glad to render, but soon came back without the ticket and said, "The agent wants to see the girl." "Come Caroline," said one of the ladies -- this was the nher assumed name -- "You will have to go with this gentleman to get your ticket." Charlotee was well aware of the risk she now ran. She was weak, yet strong. Weak in view of the worst, strong with that strength given when one knows that to exhibit weakness is to fail. She rose at once and followed her guide to the agent who said to him, "What is her name?" The gentleman was as ignorant of that as the agent and Charlotte, appreciating the situation, said promptly, "Caroline Butler, sir." "Is she free?" Again, as lack of knowledge, again another prompt reply from Charlotte. "Certainly, sir." "Are you a resident here?" "Yes," said the gentleman, "that gentleman sitting there knows me," and that hentleman looked up from his paper and said, "Certainly I do. That is Mr. --- . " The interview was satisfactory to the agent, the ticket was purchased and Charlotte returned to her seat in the car with a heart much lighter than when she left. She expresses herself thus: "When I got that ticket in thie yer han', seems like as if stones was lifted off my head and shoulders. I had prayed ev'ry step of de way from Washington to Baltimo' an' I thanked God ev'ry step of the way from Baltimo' to New York. 'Twas a miracle an' I a-answerin' for myself, I tell you I allus foun' frens." Her journey from New York, where she left the ladies, was without incident.
Once since the war she visited her old home. She met her former master on the street in Port Tobacco. He did not recognize her at first. She rode out to the plantation with him and spent some days. "Mars Barnes," said she to him one day, "why didn't you advertise me?" "Why, Charlotte," he said, "I knew 'twould be of no use to look for you."
A few years ago, a lady of wealth and social position was called to mourn the loss of a loved one by death. By chance, she met Jane Clark and some conversation ensued concerning her recent affliction. In relating the incident, the lady said, "I have had conversations with many of my friends and with my pastor, but not one of these has given me the consolation and the comfort afforded by the words of that poor, uneducated old black woman."
Jane Clark has waited at this station where she came in '59 more than half her lifetime. Soon a messenger from her elder brother will arrive to guide her on that journey whose route lies through Great Freedom and whose desired terminus is Eternal Happiness.
Editor's Note
Barnes Compton (1830-1898), the slaveowner from whom Jane Clark escaped, was the second-largest slaveholder in Charles County, Maryland; at one time, he owned one hundred five slaves. Elected to the Maryland House of Delegates (1860-61), he feared arrest by federal authorities and fled to Virginia, where he remained until the war's end. After his return to his plantation after the war, he was arrested and imprisoned at the Old Capitol in Washington for aiding and abetting John Wilkes Booth in the assassination of President Lincoln. (He was released without charge after four days.) Subsequently, Compton was elected to the Maryland State Senate (1867-72), served as the Maryland State Treasurer (1874-85), and represented Maryland in the United States House of Representatives (1885-90 and 1891-94).
Brigham Young
First wife: Miriam Angela Works, daughter of Asa and Jerusha Works, of Half Acre in the town of Aurelius.
Meeting with Benjamin Franklin Hall
Benjamin Franklin Hall
Letter to the Editor of the New York Tribune from Benjamin Franklin Hall (1882)
I do not suppose that anything the late President Fillmore or the late Brigham Young thought or said about methods tried for suppressing polygamy in Utah will have much influence with the present Congress; but I presume a brief disclosure of the opinions of both of those men before they died will do no harm to anyone, in or out of Congress. It is possible that they may do some good, so I benture to relate what theu were and when and how they were expressed.
Meeting with Millard Fillmore
I was in the City of Washington, employed in compiling the official opinions of the Attorneys-General from the formation of the National Goverment, pursuant to an act of Congress, at the time or times of the passage and approval of the several so-called Compromise Measures of 1850, and was personally cognizant of most of the proceedings relating to their passage and approval. Enjoying his confidence as much, I presume, as any Whig in this his native county (the Whig Party being intact before the era of Silver Grays), President Fillmore frequently expressed to me his private opinions respectibng each of those measures befiore he approved them. He seemed to have no misgivings about any of those five measures, except the one erecting a part of ancient California into a separate Territory, to be called Utah; but he had serious scruples of conscience and judgment respecting that. As the "Joe Smith Fraud" was perpetrated in this state, and had left foul tracks in its entire course from this state to Ohio, to Missouri, to Illinois, and to what had been called "Alta California," and as there were then only a very few inhabitants there except polygamists, he was naturally apprehensivce that the erection of such a people into a government, even if it were to be a temporary one, would lead to public scandal and trouble. he did me the honor to ask my private opinion whether it were best for him, in view of all the circumstances attending the passage, of those measures, to sign the Utah bill. I told him plainly that in my opinion his apprehensions of scandal and trouble were warranted by the scandal and trouble the Mormons had created in Ohio, Missouri and Illinois, and that were I in his place I would decline to approve the bill, and send it back to Congress with his reasons. But his just apprehensions were countervailed and removed by Mr. Clay, who was his Gamaliel in politics, so that he signed the bill on the 9th of September, 1850, simultaneously with his signing the bill admitting California as a state and the bill erecting New Mexico into a territory. He obtained the opinion of his Attorney-General before signing the Fugitive Slave Act, which delayed his approval of that to the 20th.And then, to the surprise of everyone to whom he had imparted his fears of scandal and trouble, he indorsed the infamy by appointing Brigham Young, the so-styled President of the Church of the Latter-Day Saints, to the executive office of the new Territory of Utah. That appointment launched the worst form of domestic tyranny, as well as polygamy, in Utah, and gave it character in Europe. An evil star ruled President Fillmore then and thenceforward to the end of his term.
After the death of his wife and daughter, he came to Cayuga County, the scene of his boyhood, a sad and sorrowful man, to seek consolation among his former friends. Many of them gave him a frigid welcome on account of his recreancy to the principles of the party which elected him. But while I disliked that and his treatment of Mr. Seward's friends, of whom I was one, as greatly as anybody here, I had no heart to withhold from him my sympathy in his bereavement, and did not. I called upon his at his hotel often, invited him to my house and to my pew in St. Peter's Church, and accompanied him to Moravia and Aurora, where he was born and where he studied grammar and the law. During that quiet visit, he conversed with me and others very freely respecting his official action concerning the Utah act and his appointment of Brigham Young, and several times mentioned them as his "great mistakes." As he was in deep affliction, I forbore to talk with him about them any more than common civility required, as it was quite enough for the occasion and for my satisfaction to learn from his lips that he was conscious that his course in respect to Utah and the Mormons had been unwise and productive of a series of flagrant political and social wrongs. He forbore to characterize any of the acts of the Mormons as crimes, but seemed to be satisfied with styling them public scandals and wrongs. He said his worst fears of the Mormon Government had been verified by time, and that the evil, so far as he could discern, was utterly remediless, except by repealing the organic act and blotting the territory from the map. It is of little moment to mention it, but, to complete the reminiscence, I will add that I concurred with him in the opinion, and that I have entertained it ever since.
President Fillmore went to Europe soon after that conversation, became a candidate for re-election, was defeated, and became a recluse at his home in Buffalo. I met him once or twice in that city, but had no conversation with him about any public affairs, except about raising troops to put down the late Rebellion.
Meeting with Brigham Young
On the 25th of February 1861, Congress erected out of the west part of Nebraska and Kansas, the north part of New Mexico, and the east part of Utah, the Territory of Colorado; and soon after the inauguration of President Lincoln, in the following March, I was appointed Chief Justice of that terriroty, and went there and established its judiciary. I found a very few polygamists in the territory, two or three slave-owners, with a dozen or more slaves, and several hundred Seceders or Rebels. But they concluded to go away to places more congenial to them soon after the governor and judges made them understand by executive orders and judicial proceedings that they "must obey without debate." Less than a hundred indictments, arrests and imprisonments without trials and convictions did the business, and brought the chaos, as the lawyers styled it, into peaceful order. The second year of our administration, my court was orderly as any here in New York.I never had any official relations with the people of the adjoining Territory of Utah, but I was in the way of hearing of constant difficulties over there between the executive and the federal judges on the one hand and the Mormons on the other. Their nature was frequently described to me by the officersof the territory who came to advise with me, and one by Brigham Young himself, whom I visited in the autumn of 1863 at the request of President Lincoln. Under the idea that it was their bounden duty, even in war times, to issue warrants almost every day against Brigham Young for bigamy, because the Chicago convention which nominated Lincoln in 1860 had classed polygamy with slavery and denounced them as "twin relics of barbarism," the judges, or some of them, provoked him and the Mormons to such a degree that Salt Lake City was convulsed and kept in a state of mutiny all the while, and the officers, when the President was occupied every moment with the war, and could not listen to the complaints of the officers of Utah or of any other territory, were sending constant appeals to him for instant relief to enable them to fight that "twin," just as if that "twin" was more formidable and dangerous than the other. As Mr. Lincoln felt, as he wrote me, "that one was was enough at one time, and that it was best to bear with the Utah 'twin' until the Southern 'twin' was disposed of," he sent me a confidential letter by the hand of an army paymaster asking me to go over to Utah and put a stop to the trouble there if I could. Secretary Seward had told him that Young once lived here in Auburn, that I knew him personally, and that he thought it likely Young would receive me with more favor than he would an utter stranger. I acted upon the hint, and dropped in upon him in the character of a former friend. I sent him my card after my arrival at Salt Lake City, and he responded to the courtesy by calling upon me and invited me to dinner. I accepted his invitation, dined with him and rode with him several times about the city, and once out to Camp Floyd, where United States troops were in garrison to be ready for any emergency which might occur. He said he was glad to have them there to purchase and pay, as they did, for his provisions and provender. They made him a home market for all they consumed.
I stopped there two days, and long enough to gather from him his reasons for inventing polygamy, for making it a church ordinance, and for intrenching the ordinance in his so-called Endowment House so securely that the federal courts with juries could not reach it. In the course of our conversations I ventured to ask him if he were not afraid of being broken up by Congress in the manner they were broken up at Nauvoo by the legislature of Illinois. He very promptly replied that he was not, and gave his reason why. He said that no Gentiles were displaced by the repeal of the act incorporating the City of Nauvoo, but that all the federal officers of Utah were Gentiles, and would be displaced and deprived of their salaries and living by a repeal of the organic act of the territory. He admitted the power of Congress to do so, or to divide or annex the territory to some other territory or state, and that such a measure would tend to weaken them and impair their abiliy to proselytize and recruit their ranks in Europe; but he stoutly asserted his confidence that it would never be done, at least while he lived and retained his reason. I found the judges to be quite as consistent in their line of policy as Brigham Young was in his, and I reported the facts to President Lincoln. It is sufficient to say here that he stopped the war against that "twin" until the other was subdued.
Brigham Young was a remarkably ingenious and far-seeing man in everything relating to his means of resisting the federal courts. He understood the nature and rules of evidence, and the contingencies of a verdict where twelve jurors are required to agree, as well as the most experienced nisi-prius lawyer in the land. As long as his health held out, he defeated all attempts to convict him. When his health failed, he succumbed a little, and died, I believe, in the nominal custody of the marshall.
A conviction of another Mormon has been had since his death; but the Supreme Court at Washington has reversed the judgment for insufficient evidence. The situation is no better than it was twenty years ago. As the lawyers say, polygamy is in status quo.
It seems to me, therefore, that Congress is forced to the alternative iof leaving the evil to the efficacy of time and further anti-Mormon forces there, in the shape of railways and Protestant schools and churches, or of repealing the organic act, annexing the domain to the adjacent states and territories, and of declaring polygamists to be criminals and incapable of voting and holding office-- the very remedy suggested by the President who launched the evil, and the only one which Brigham Young in his lifetime feared.
Source
A clipping of this letter-to-the-editor of the New York Tribune may be found in a volume of pamphlets on Mormonism in the Wisconsin State Historical Society Library at Madison, Wisconsin.
26 March 2009
St. Mary's Church
Thomas A. Maher (1868-1869)
Myles J. Laughlin, D.D. (1869-1877)
William E. Mulheron (1877-1913)
William F. Payne (1913-25)
John J. McGrath (1925-1932)
William E. Cowen, S.T.D. (1932-61)
James D. Cuffney (1961-79)
Edward A. Zimmer (1979-1992)
Robert J. Schrader (1992-2004)
Frank E. Lioi (2004- )
The following priests have served as assistant pastors at St. Mary's Church:
Rev. Dr. Massan
Rev. Dr. Lynch
Eugene Pagani
W. Thurston
J.H. Russell
William Morrin
J.H. Connolly
Max Casimir
Joseph hendricks
John Donnelly
George V. Burns
F.J. Burns
James H. Day
James Hickey
F.J. Burns
John J. McGrath
Joseph P. Quinn
John F. O'Hern
James J. Gibbons
John B. Doran
John R. Fitzsimmons
E.J. Dwyer
S.J. Byrne
Patrick J. Smyth
Arthur LeMay
Daniel Quigley
Victor J. Hurley
Charles E. Muckle
Raymond Quigley
Samuel J. Houghton
Rt. Rev. Francis B. Burns
John P. O'Beirne
John M. Ball
Leo Mooney
George Macauley
Joseph Margrett
Timothy J. McGrath
Armand Benoit (Albany)
Robert H. Fennessy
J. Joseph O'Connell
William D. Tobin
Walter Carron
Ralph Meyer
Rt. Rev. Leslie G. Whalen
Joseph McNamara
Paul J. Lynch
Charles L. McCarthy
Robert J. Downs
Robert G. Smith
Charles irwin Sullivan
Edwin B. Metzger
Guy J. Wertz
William Cosgrove
Gerald J. Guli
Robert L. Kress
Arthur J. Hack
Ignatius St. George
Rt. Rev. James D. Cuffney
Most Rev. Dennis W. Hickey, D.D.
Edwin Agonis, O.M.C.
Richard C. Tormey
E. Leo McManus
John F. White (Archdiocese of New York)
Charles Langworthy
John Patrick Norris
James C. Enright
Anthony valenti
David Gramkee
Robert J. Kanka
Bernard Casper *
Robert T. Werth
Joseph Catanise
Thomas Corbett
David Faraone
Patrick Guiany Sullivan
Lee P. Chase
John D. Dillon
Steven Lape
B. Munjala Wakhungu
Michael Creedon
Pastor of St. Peter's Church, Butler, Pennsylvania (1847-1850); St. John the Baptist Church, Lockport, Niagara County, New York (1852- ); St. Patrick's, Lockport (founding pastor, 1857-58); Holy Family Church, Auburn.
In a sermon at Holy Family Church shortly after the outbreak of the Civil War, Fr. Creedon expressed his support for the cause of the Union:
"I wish every man who can leave his family to enlist. This is the first country the Irishman ever had that he hcould call his own country. The flag of stars and stripes, the only flag he can fight under and defend as his own flag. Now is the time of a nation's peril. Let every Irishman show that he is worthy to be a part of a great and glorious nationality... Let every rishman show he is true to the flag which always protects him."
Inspired by their pastor, sixty men went in a body from the church to the armory and were sworn in.
25 March 2009
Arthur A. LeMay
Arthur A. LeMay, a priest of the Diocese of Rochester, served as an assistant pastor at St. Mary's Church, Auburn, from 1914 to 1917, and again for a brief period in February 1921. He was born in Watertown on 7 December 1887, the son of Napoleon LeMay, a native of Montreal, and Anna McGoldrick, a native of Ireland. He received his early education at St. Mary's School, Rochester, and Ovid High School, Ovid; he completed studies in philosophy at St. Andrew's Seminary, Rochester (1908) and theological studies at St. Bernard's Seminary, Rochester (1914). On 6 June 1914, he was ordained to the priesthood for the Diocese of Rochester by Bishop Thomas F. Hickey.
Shortly after the entry of the United States into the "European War," Fr. LeMay enlisted as a chaplain in the United States Army and received a first lieutenant's commission on 6 February 1918. He was assigned to the 148th Machine Gun Battalion and sailed for France one week after receiving his commission. While en route to the battlefields of World War I, he was injured and was hospitalized in the U.S. He returned to France with the 64th Infantry Regiment of the Seventh Army Division, and took part in the battles of St. Mihiel and in the Meuse-Argonne Offensive. In the latter battle, he was disabled by gas and hospitalizzed. He was the recipient of the Silver Star for gallantry in action and the Purple Heart in recognition of his injuries. In his book The Greater Love (1920), George T. McCarthy, another chaplain in the Seventh Division, made numerous references to Fr. LeMay, attesting to the high esteem in which he was held by the chaplains and soldiers of the Seventh Division.
On 19 April 1919, Fr. LeMay was discharged from the service at the military hospital at Oswego. He spent three years in army hospitals due to the injuries he received in France. On 12 July 1922, he was appointed Catholic chaplain to the Soldiers' and Sailors' Home at Bath, and in the same year was selected as chaplain to the New York Department of the American Legion, in which capacity he served in 1923 and 1924. In addition, he was chaplain to the Disabled American Veterans for seventeen years. After serving for thirty-one years as its Catholic chaplain, Fr. LeMay retired from the Veterans' Administration Hospital at Bath on 30 June 1953. he died on 30 March 1955, and was interred in his family's plot in Holy Sepulchre Cemetery, Rochester.
Robert M. Egan
Robert M. Egan was born in Auburn on 2 June 1922. He was baptized in Holy Family Church and confirmed in St. Alphonsus Church, his home parish. After completing theological studies at St. Bernard's Seminary, Rochester, in 1954, he was ordained to the Roman Catholic priesthood for the Diocese of Rochester. He thereafter was assigned as assistant pastor to a succession of parishes: Blessed Sacrament Church, Rochester (1954); St. Mary's Church, Waterloo (1958); Immaculate Conception Church, Rochester (1959); St. Jerome's Church, East Rochester (1962); St. John's Church, Clyde (1967). Fr. Egan was appointed to his first pastorate when he was assigned to St. Bernard's Church, Scipio (1972), which included misson churches at Genoa and Fleming. In 1981, Fr. Egan became pastor of St. Anthony's Church, Groton, where he served for sixteen years until his retirement in 1997. Upon his retirement, he resided in his native city. He died on 17 May 2005. Bishop Matthew Clark presided at his funeral mass at St. Alphonsus Church.
St. Bernard's Seminary
Peter Paul Brennan
Edward Joseph Byrne (1905, 1908)
Joseph Catanise (M.A., M.Div.)
Paul Joseph Cuddy
James Cuffney
John Dillon
Robert M. Egan (1954)
John Francis Gormley
Arthur A. LeMay (1914)
Paul McCabe
Edward Zimmer
Edward Joseph Byrne
Edward Byrne was born at Auburn on 1 December 1880. On 10 June 1905, he was ordained to the Roman Catholic priesthood at St. Bernard's Seminary, Rochester, where he had completed his theological studies. In 1908, he was awarded a Doctor of Sacred Theology (S.T.D.) degree from the same seminary. His studies were continued at l'Ecole Biblique in Jerusalem and at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome, where he earned a Doctor of Philosophy degree. Upon the completion of his graduate studies, he returned to Rochester as a member of the faculty of his alma mater.
Monsignor Byrne was a professor of Sacred Scripture at the diocesan seminary until his death in 1952. in addition, he actively pursued his interest in the history of Rochester and the history of the labors of French Jesuit missionaries among the Iroquois. With his friend Alexander M. Stewart, he lobbied successfully for the dedication of new bridge at Free Bridge to the memory of Fr. Rene Menard.
John Whitefield Hulbert
John Whitefield Hulbert represented Massachusetts in Congress prior to settling in Auburn. He was born in Alford, Massachusetts, on 1 June 1770 and graduated frm Harvard University in 1795. After studying law, he was admitted to the bar in 1797. He practiced his profession in his native village, and served as a director of the Berkshire Bank in Pittsfield. He was elected as a Federalist to the United States House of Representatives, filling the vacancy in the Thirteenth Congress caused by the resignation of Daniel Dewey. He was re-elected to the Fourteenth Congress (1815-17), and was not a candidate for renomination in 1816.
Upon completion of his term in Congress, Hulbert moved to Auburn in 1817 and resumed the practice of law. He died in Auburn on 19 October 1831 and was interred in North Street Cemetery.
Washington Benevolent Society
In an effort to electioneer for votes, the Federalist Party promoted the establishment of Washington Benevolent Societies at the local level. These political organizations were popular from 1800 to 1816. Often, moral and political addresses were delivered before the local Washington Benevolent Society on February 22, the anniversary of the birth of the first president.
The Washington Benevolent Society
of the County of Cayuga
The Constitution of the Washington Benevolent Society, of the County of Cayuga; together with the Farewell Address of George Washington; and the Constitution of the United States and of the State of New York was printed at Auburn in 1813 by H. & J. Pace. That pamphlet is recorded in Shaw & Shoebridge (#30463). The following is an excerpt from that publication:
"Whereas associations formed to dispense charity, cultivate brotherly love, diffuse useful information, and to inculcate sound moral and political principles, have a tendency to promote individual happiness and the public welfare. And whereas it is desirable, that those who form such associations should render them communicative of the virtue and the good example of illustrious men, wherever it can be done consistently with the objects of their institution,.. And whereas the preeminent virtue, inestimable public services, and meritorious example of George Washington entitle his memory to every mark of respect and consideration from a grateful people, and furnish an admirable pattern of imitation, We the subscribers have formed ourselves into a Society, by the name of the Washington Benevolent Society, of the County of Cayuga, as well to testify to our sincere veneration for the memory of the illustrious Washington, as to cherish the remembrance of, and inculcate his wise, benevolent, and pure maxims and principles...
"1. Each member shall, at the time of his admission, pay to the treasurer, for the use of the society, the sum of two dollars.... 2. The funds of the Society shall be applied to purposes of charity and the diffusion of useful information among our fellow citizens.... 3. Officers.... 9. Any member who shall conduct himself unfaithfully and unworthily may be expelled by the vote of two-thirds of the members who shall be present at his trial, which trial shall be had before the same number of members, and conducted in the same manner as in case of an officer.... 14. Every person who shall hereafter become a member of this Society shall signify his assent to these articles, by subscribing his name thereto."
For Further Information
David Hackett Fischer. The Revolution of American Conservatism: The Federalist Party in the Era of Jeffersonian Democracy.
24 March 2009
Caroline Adriance
Caroline Adriance was the daughter of Jacob and Elizabeth Humphrey Adriance, who settled in Cayuga County in 1816. Caroline was born in Scipio in 29 October 1824. At age sixteen, Caroline accepted Christ as her personal Savior as a result of a conversion experience during a religious revival. She was admitted to membership in the Dutch Reformed Church at Sand Beach, where a Ladies' Foreign Missionary Society was formed in 1852; Caroline was among its charter members.
In 1859, in response to a call from the Board of Foreign Missions of the Reformed (Dutch) Church, Caroline travelled to Japan with a small band of missionaries led by the former pastor of that congregation, Samuel Robbins Brown. Brown had previously served as a missionary at Canton, China. The small band of missionaries from the Sand Beach Church included Rev. and Mrs. Guido Verbeck, Miss Mary E. Kidder (who became Mrs. E.R. Miller of the Northern Japan Missions), as well as Rev. and Mrs. Brown. Although the Board of Foreign Missions was unable to fund her participation in the mission, she chose to participate at her own expense.
I recollect well the anxiety you felt on my account because I was single and alone, with no protector, and I presume you have often wished to know how your poor lone cousin was getting along. Could you have been permitted to have looked into my home in Japan you would have seen me surrounded with blessings far more than you could have imagined. I will not attempt, nor do I wish to make you think, that it was no trial to leave brothers, sisters and friends to whom I was strongly attached; the dear little church of which I was a member; my own native land, which none could love more than I. Can anyone think that it was not a trial, and a severe one, too, to be separated from all these with little expectation of ever seeing them again? But, strong as are ties which are (for a season, at least) severed, I do not regret the course I have taken, and I am not sorry I am in Japan. I trust I am where the Father would have me, and that He has something to do in this far off land."
"She hath done what she could."
Henry Hall
Nathaniel Garrow
Nathaniel Garrow was born at Barnstable, Massachusetts, on 25 April 1780. He received his early education in the common schools and "followed the sea." He settled in Auburn in 1796. In 1809, he was appointed justice of the peace, and he served as sheriff of Cayuga County (1815-19, 1821-25). As a Jacksonian Democrat, he was elected to the House of Representatives and served in Congress for one term (1827-29). He was United States Marshall for the Northern District of New York from February 1837 until his death at Auburn on 3 March 1841. Initially interred in the family burying ground on his estate, he was subsequently reinterred in Fort Hill Cemetery. Garrow Street, on the city's south side, is named in his honor.
North Street Cemetery
Gershom Powers, Congressman
Ulysses Freeman Doubleday, Congresman
Gershom Powers
Gershom Powers was a teacher, attorney, prison official, judge and Congressman. A native of Croydon, Sullivan County, New Hampshire, he was born on 11 July 1789, the son of John Powers. His parents were too poor to provide for him an early education, and he was largely self-educated.
From 1801 to 1803, Gershom's cousin Cyrus Powers taught in a school in the town of Sempronius, Cayuga County, New York, in the village now called Moravia. At the time, the school consisted of a double-log house that served also as a church. Cyrus was succeeded in that rude classroom by his brother David Powers, and, later, by his cousin Gershom Powers, who studied law while also preparing lessons. By 1814, the school was in the charge of Abigail Powers, sister of Cyrus and David, and cousin of Gershom. Abigail would become the wife of Millard Fillmore, who was to serve as the nation's thirteenth president.
In 1810, Gershom was admitted to the bar and began practicing law at Auburn. He was appointed superintendent of the Auburn State Prison in 1820. In that capacity, Powers endeavored to make the institution less costly to the state. Toward that end, in 1828 he introduced the contract labor system under which the prison leased prisoners to local businesses. The prison received the prisoners' daily wages, which averaged twenty-seven cents per day. While the system was an economic success, the mistreatment by prisoners under the system became a source of much controversy in the community and throughout the state. The "Auburn System" of prison discipline, which was developed under his supervision, became well-known in the United States and Europe. He was the author of A Brief Account of the Construction, Management and Discipline... of the New York State Prison at Auburn (Auburn: U.F. Doubleday, 1826).
Powers became the first judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Cayuga County (1823-28). He was elected as a Jacksonian Democrat to the Twenty-first Congress (1829-31), during the first administration of Andrew Jackson and at a time when both houses of Congress were dominated by Jacksonians. During ghis single term in Congress, Powers served as chairman of the Committe on the District of Columbia. Having declined to seek renomination for the congressional seat, he was appointed inspector of the prison at Auburn on 2 April 1830, in which capacity he served until his death at Auburn on 25 June 1831. Powers was buried in North Street Cemetery.
Edward Hagaman Hall
Author of numerous books and studies, including A Guide to the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine in New York City; The Catskill Aqueduct and Earlier Water Supplies of the City of New York; Philipse Manor Hall at Yonkers, New York: The Site, the Building and Its Occupants (1912); Stony Point Battle-Field: A Sketch of Its Revolutionary History, and Particularly of the Surprise of Stony Point by Brigadier General Anthony Wayne on the Night of July 15-16, 1779.
George H. Ferris
George H. Ferris was born in Hillsdale, Michigan, on 26 December 1858, studied at Princeton University, and graduated from Auburn Theological Seminary in 1878. Shortly after the completion of his divinity degree in May of that year, he married Lucy Hall, daughter of Abigail Farnam Hagaman and Benjamin Franklin Hall, a former mayor of Auburn. On 5 November 1878 the couple sailed for India as missionaries of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.
During their sixteen years of service to the mission at Panhala, about 300 miles southeast of Bombay, Rev. and Mrs. Ferris learned Marathi, an Indo-Aryan language of the Marathi people of western India. They translated leaflets, tracts and portions of the Bible into that language.
On only one occasion did the Ferrises return to the United States for a visit. "The distance from home and the dangers to which she had been exposed in a land so full of injurious climatic influences, noxious reptiles and beasts of prey, made her return in the summer of 1889, with her husband and four children [Chauncy, Ralph, Herbert and Phoebe Ruth], born in India, all in safety and good health, an event of sufficient importance in the family to be celebrated in some special manner," according to a printed remembrance of the event.
Thus, the extended family gathered for Thanksgiving at the home of Charles F. Houghton in Corning on 28 November 1889. Rev. Ferris said the blessing before the meal. The patriarch of the family, Benjamin Franklin Hall, addressed his descendants at dinner, seated, for he was too feeble to stand. He said he "believed in grandchildren," and he recalled the election to the presidency of the current president's grandfather, noting that "Tippecanoe and Tyler too" was among the best-remembered political war-cries of his day. Acknowledging his own sense of growing infirmity, he expressed his doubt that the entire family would again be gathered together, and he reaffirmed his pride in his children and their families. Lucy Hagaman Hall likewise addressed the family at dinner: "Few if any parents have the reason to be as proud and happy as your father and I on this occasion. Here are all our living children and grandchildren, all of noble lives and high aims and of each one we hope it may truly be said that the world is a better place for their having lived. Into each life some dark days must come and in ours, we have been safely carried through, thanks to God, by these noble sons, and with the help of all, as each in turn has grown to maturity and we are come to a haven of rest, even in this life.... I thank God for all these noble lives. May their children be all to them that they have been to us."
Rev. and Mrs. Ferris returned to India, leaving their three sons in the care of Rev. and Mrs. E.M. Wheny, who had labored in the mission field in India for two decades. While on mission business in Bombay in 1894, Ferris was stricken with a kidney ailment. While returning to his mission station, Ferris was hospitalized at Poona, where he died on 7 March 1894.
22 March 2009
John Coleman Bennett
John Coleman Bennett was a leading Christian theologian who applied ethical principles to the urgent issues of modern society. Born on 22 July 1902 in Kingston, Ontario, Bennett was educated at Williams College, Oxford University, and Union Theological Seminary in New York. He spent his entire career as a seminary professor, beginning at Union Seminary in 1927. From 1930 to 1938 he was a member of the faculty of Auburn Theological Seminary.
Bennett's first book, Social Salvation (1935), was followed by Christianity and Our World (1936). The former set forth his lifelong conviction that societal problems must be an integral part of Christian thinking; the latter championed the existence of a common morality upon which Christian ethics must build and to which it must appeal. From 1938 to 1943, Bennett taught at the Pacific School of Religion at Berkeley. In 1939, he was ordained a Congregational minister. His book Christian Realism appeared in 1941. In 1943, Bennett returned to Union Theological Seminary, where he became dean of the faculty in 1955 and in 1960 became the first holder of the Reinhold Niebuhr Professorship of Social Ethics. He served the seminary as its president from 1964 until his retirement in 1970. As a professor and administrator at Union, Bennett forged alliances with seminaries of various faiths, including the Jewish Theological Seminary and the Woodstock Theological Seminary, a Roman Catholic institution.
Bennett's other published works include Christian Ethics and Social Policy (1946), Christianity and Communism Today (1948; rev. 1960), The Christian as Citizen (1955), Christians and the State (1958), Nuclear Weapons and the Conflict of Conscience (editor; 1962), When Christians Make Political Decisions (1964), Christian Social Ethics in a Changing World (editor; 1966), and Foreign Policy in Christian Perspective (1966).
Prominent in the ecumenical movement, Bennett was an official leader in deliberations on the church and the social order at the Amsterdam (1948), Evanston (1954), and New Delhi (1961) assemblies of the World Council of Churches. He served the National Council of Churches of Christ in the Unites States in various positions. With his friend and colleague Reinhold Niebuhr, Bennett founded the influential journal Christianity and Crisis in 1941 and continued as its editor for many years. He became politically engaged as vice- chairman of the Liberal party in New York State (1955-1965) and, in 1960, as a leading Protestant defender of John F. Kennedy's candidacy against those who feared a Roman Catholic president. His involvement in political and social issues extended to participation in the civil rights movement, protests against the war in Vietnam, opposition to the use of nuclear weapons, and, late in his life, advocacy of gay and lesbian rights within the church. Bennett's final book The Radical Imperative was published in 1975, although he continued to contribute articles to Christianity and Crisis until 1993.
Bennett died April 27, 1995. New York Times obituary on 2 May 1995.
Ransom Bethune Welch
Born in Greenville, New York, in 1825, Ransome Bethune Welch completed his undergraduate studies at Union College, from which he graduated in 1846. After two years of theological studies at Andover Theological Seminary, he completed his divinity degree at Auburn Theological Seminary, from which he was graduated in 1852. He labored for the American Tract Society in Mississippi in 1853-54, and in the latter year was ordained by the Dutch Reformed Church in Gilboa, New York, where he served as pastor until 1856. He served the congregation at Catskill until 1859. In 1860, he was appointed professor of logic, rhetoric and English literature at Union College, where he taught until called in 1876 to Auburn Theological Seminary as professor and chair of Christian Theology.
Welch was prominent in the Presbyterian Church at the national and international levels, serving as a delegate to the Presbyterian Alliance at Belfast in 1884 and at London in 1888, and to the centennial conference of foreign missions at London in the latter year. He was the author of Faith and Modern Thought (1876) and Outlines of Christian Theology (1881), and in 1881 became an associate editor of the Presbyterian Review. His honors included Doctor of Divinity degrees from the University of the City of New York (now New York University) (1868) and Rutgers University (in the same year), and a Doctor of Laws degree from Maryville College (1872). Welch died on 29 June 1890 at Healing Spa, Virginia, and was interred in Auburn's Fort Hill Cemetery.
Memorial tributes to Welch were delivered by Prof. James Stevenson Riggs and others in the First Presbyterian Church on 11 November 1890. The addresses were published at Auburn in the following year.
Welch Memorial Hall, a classroom building on the campus of Auburn Theological Seminary, was completed in 1894 and named in his honor, as the construction of the classroom building and chapel was made possible by the professor's bequest to the seminary of $36,000. The gray and red stone building, connected to Willard Memorial Chapel, is one of the very few extant sites associated with the seminary, which relocated to New York City in 1939. Prior to the acquisition of the historic site by the Community Preservation Committee, Welch Memorial Building contained a white marble sculpture memorializing Welch by Herbert Adams and his wife Adeline Valentine Pond Adams. Regretably, the work of art was removed by Michael Dwyer prior to his sale of the building to the Community Preservation Committee. The 51 by 78-inch triptych relief sculpture, signed "Herbert Adams Adeline Adams MDCCCXCVIII," includes a waist-length portrait of Welch and bears the following inscription:
Ransome Bethune Welch DD LLD
Born January XXVII MDCCCXXIV
Died June XXIX DCCCXC
To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death to guide our feet into the way of peace teaching every man in all wisdom that we may present every man perfect in Christ.
The January-February 1899 edition of The Auburn Seminary Review contained an article entitled "Unveiling of the Welch Memorial."
Community Preservation Committee
The Community Preservation Committee of Cayuga County, Inc., was established in 1983 in conjunction with an exhibit at the Schweinfurth Memorial Art Center entitled "Auburn Illustrated: A History in Architecture." Since its inception, the Committee has promoted awareness and preservation of the cultural and historic resources of Auburn and Cayuga County. Its offices are located on the former campus of Auburn Theological Seminary, in the Willard Memorial Chapel and Welch Memorial Building.
Willard Memorial Chapel
Willard Memorial Chapel, on the former campus of Auburn Theological Seminary, was a gift to the seminary from Caroline and Georgianna Willard in memory of their father, Sylvester Willard, who for forty years served as secretary to the seminary's board of trustees, and their mother, Jane Frances Case Willard. A fine example of the Romanesque Revival style of architecture, the gray and red stone building was completed in 1894. It is one of a very small number of remaining buildings associated with the once-beautiful seminary campus.
The chapel is "the only example of a complete Tiffany interior," according to Harold Jaffe, President of the Louis Comfort Tiffany Society. Designed by the Tiffany Glass and decorating Company of New York, the chapel features fourteen opalescent windows, nine leaded glass chandeliers, mosaic floors, oak wainscotting, and carved oak and gold stencilling. It features a stunning stained glass window of "Christ Sustaining Peter on the Water" inspired by a painting by Frederick Shields. One of the nation's preeminent interior designers, Tiffany is remembered for beautiful ornamental lamps and stained glass windows, but he and his firm also created mosaics, silver, jewelry and pottery. His works decorated the homes of the country's most prominent families, and in 1881 he redecorated the reception rooms of the White House. According to J. Alistair Duncan, author, appraiser, and Tiffany expert, "the value of the individual items in the Willard Chapel is based on the fact that they are a part opf a uniqure interior, one of significant importance within Tiffany's total work. Practically all his other church interiors have been destroyed through the years, which makes it especially important that the Willard Chapel be kept intact for the appreciation of both the public and art historians.
After the relocation of Auburn Theological Seminary in 1939, the chapel was sold to the Seventh-Day Adventist congregation, which used the site as a place of worship for decades while preserving its artistic and architectural integrity.
In [1989-90], the property was acquired by a local antique dealer who planned to dismantle the chapel, sell its interior components piecemeal at auction, and convert the building into a rock-music nightclub tentatively called "Rock of Ages." When the sudden sale and preposterous plan became known, the Community Preservation Committee mobilized to raise funds to purchase and preserve the chapel. Among the first to make a pledge of financial supporty was Rev. Grant S. Miller, of the seminary's Class of 1936. The CPC publicized the historic and artistic importance of the chapel, highlighted its value as a destination for tourists, made the site accessible to the community for cultural events and special occasions, and successfully raised funds from donors large and small to purchase the property by the deadline set by the new owner.
The Willard Memorial Chapel and the adjoining Welch Memorial Building achieved National Historic Landmark status in 2005. The site is maintained by the Community Preservation Committee, whose offices are located in the Welch Memorial Building.
Willard Memorial Chapel and Welch Memorial Building
Marijane Meaker
"I was very much formed by books when I was young. I was a bookworm and a poetry lover. I think of myself, and what I would have liked to have found in books those many years ago. I remember being depressed by all those neatly tied-up, happy-ending stories, the abundance of winners, the themes of winning, solving, finding -- when around me it didn't seem that easy. So I write with a different feeling when I write for young adults. I guess I write for myself at that age."
Marijane Meaker was born in Auburn. She received her undergraduate education at the University of Missouri. She then moved to New York City and sold her first story to Ladies' Home Journal in 1951. As M.J. Meaker, she wrote Hometown, a novel set in "Cayuta," a small city in the Finger Lakes region whose street names, people and other attributes comprised a thinly-disguised portrait of the author's native city.
Under the pseudonym Vin Packer, she published a series of "pulp fiction" paperback novels. Among them was Girl on the Bestseller List, also set in "Cayuta," which tells the story of a young woman who is murdered after writing a thinly-veiled novel about her hometown. In 1990, Meaker permitted that novel to be reprinted as a fundraiser for The Cayuga Museum, and in that year she was the featured speaker at the museum's annual dinner.
Her books for young adult readers have been published under the pseudonym M.E. Kerr. the first of these, Dinky Hocker Shoots Smack! (1972) met with critical and popular success and was adapted into an ABC-TV "Afterschool Special." It was followed by Gentlehands (1972), If I Love You, Am I Trapped Forever? (1973), The Son of Someone Famous (1974), Is That You, Miss Blue? (1975), Love Is a Missing Person (1975), I'll Love You When You're More Like Me (1977), Little Little (1981), What I Really Think of You (1982), Me Me Me Me Me: Not a Novel (1983), Him She Loves? (1984), I Stay Near You (1985), Night Kites (1986).
As Mary James, she has published works for children, including Shoebag.
Meaker resides in East Hampton.
For Further Research
20 March 2009
18 March 2009
Thommie Walsh
Thomas Joseph Walsh III was born in Auburn on 15 March 1950. After graduation from Auburn High School, he studied at the Boston Conservatory of Music, but left the school in his junior year to tour with Disney on Parade. After the national tour of Applause! he played a small role in the film version of Jesus Christ Superstar. He made his Broadway debut in the cast of Seesaw (1973) and in the same year appeared in Rachel Lily Rosenbloom (and Don't You Ever Forget It). In 1975, Walsh participated in a series of conversations among Broadway dancers about their experiences and aspirations, and these conversations became the basis of A Chorus Line (1976) in which Walsh originated the role of Bobby, based in part on his own experience. With Baayork Lee, another member of the cast, he co-authored On the Line (1990), a history of the origin and development of A Chorus Line.
As a choreographer and director, Walsh's credits include The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (1978), A Day in Hollywood / A Night in the Ukraine (1980), Do Patent Leather Shjoes Really reflect Up? (1982), Nine (1982), My One and Only 91983), Marilyn: An American Fable (1983) and My Favorite Year (1992). He directed Donna McKechnie's one-woman show Inside the Music (2002). Walsh won Tony Awards for best choreography in A Day in Hollywood / A Night in the Ukraine (1980) and My One and Only (1983), and was nominated for Tony Awards for best choreography in Nine (1982) and for best direction of a musical for My One and Only (1983).
At the time of his death in 2007, Walsh was preparing a musical adaptation for Broadway of A Tale of Two Cities for of A Tale of Two Cities for a Broadway opening.
The Ten Commandments of Life
Thommie Walsh was the guest speaker at the commencement exercises of Auburn High School's Class of 1980. His remarks included his "The Ten Commandments of Life."
People are unreasonable, illogical and self centered.
Love them anyway!
If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.
Do good anyway!
If you are successful, you will win false friends and true enemies.
Succeed anyway!
The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow.
Do good anyway!
Honesty and frankness makes you vulnerable.
Be honest and frank anyway!
The biggest men with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men with the smallest minds.
Think big anyway!
People favor underdogs but follow only top dogs.
Fight for the underdog anyway!
What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway!
People really need help but may attack you if you help them.
Help people anyway!
Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth.
Give the world the best you've got anyway!
William Griggs Stahlnecker
William Griggs Stahlnecker served as mayor of Yonkers (1884-86), and then represented New York's 14th District in the United States House of Representatives, (1885-1893).
"William G. Stahlnecker, former mayor of Yonkers, a politician of note, who represents the annex district of New York, is one of the handsomest and most popular men in the social life of the Representatives' circle. In his constituency reside the most opulent and poverty-stricken of New York's population. Among the former was Samuel J. Tilden, and is Jay Gould. Mrs. Stahlnecker, formerly Miss Elizabeth Fairchild, is a lady of great beauty, and one of the favorite married ladies in social life. " -- De Benneville Randolph Keim, Society in Washington, Its Noted Men, Accomplished Women, Established Customs, and Notable Events
Truman Adams Merriman
Truman Adams Merriman was a member of Congress, representing New York in the House of Representatives. He was born in Auburn on 5 September 1839 and received his early education at the Auburn Academy. After completing his undergraduate education at Hobart College in 1861, he joined the United States Army. He served as captain of a company that he had raised and that was attached to the Ninety-second Regiment, New York Volunteer Infantry. After mustering out as a lieutenant colonel in December 1864, Merriman studied law and was admitted to the practice of that profession in 1867. He relocated in 1871 to New York City, where he worked as a journalist and was president of the New York Press Club (1882, 1883, 1884). He won election as an Independent Democrat to the Forty-ninth Congress in 1884, and won re-election as a Democrat to the Fiftieth Congress in 1886; he was not a candidate for renomination in 1888. Stahlnecker died in New York City on 16 April 1892 and was interred in Fort Hill Cemetery, Auburn.
Raymond W. Van Giesen
Raymond W. Van Giesen was born in Auburn on 25 January 1906. After graduating from Auburn High School, he completed his undergraduate education at Hobart College, where he played lacrosse for four years and was named All-American in that sport in 1930-31. In 1931, he commenced a fifty-eight year career as an educator. He taught science and coached football, hockey and lacrosse at Fayetteville High School. He served as supervising principal (a position now called "superintendent of schools") from 1951-61, and became the first superintendent of schools of the newly-created Fayetteville-Manlius Central School District. In 1999, that district honored him by naming the Fayetteville Elementary School and Wellwood Middle School complex the "Raymond W. Van Giesen Campus." Van Giesen was the recipient of the Hobart Alumni Medal and was inducted into the Hobart College Hall of Fame.
Hobart College
"Went to Auburn to see Mr. Chedell. I talked to him about the endowment and he promised to give, but has not decided how much." -- From the journal of Abner Jackson, President of Hobart College (1858-67), 27 February 1861
Kinsella, Joseph L., attorney (B.A., 1981)
Merriman, Truman Adams, Congressman (A.B., 1861)
Messenger, Ray Stillson, attorney
Musso, Nick (2002)
Throop, Montgomery Hunt (A.B., 1846; A.M., 1864)
Van Giesen, Raymond W.
Villano, Michael (1999)
17 March 2009
William Horace Hotchkiss
William Horace Hotchkiss was an attorney whose specialties included bankruptcy law and the emerging legal field now called vehicle and traffic law. He was born in Whitehall, Washington County, New York, on 7 September 1864, and was educated at Hamilton College (A.B., 1886; A.M., 1889). After admission to the bar in 1888, Hotchkiss worked as an attorney in Auburn until 1890 as a member of the firm Teller & Hotchkiss, and served as the clerk of the Cayuga County Surrogate's Court (1887-89).
Hotchkiss practiced his profession in Buffalo until 1912, as a member, successively, of the Parker & Hotchkiss, Parker, Hotchkiss, Miller & Templeton, and Hotchkiss & Bush firms; during this period, he was the referee in bankruptcy for Erie County (1898-1909). He promoted the development of legislation to regulate the operation of motor vehicles, and drafted New York State's Motor Vehicle Law of 1904. He was elected president of the Erie County Bar Association, the National Association of Referees in Bankruptcy, the American Automobile Association and the New York State Automobile Association. His published works include Collier on Bankruptcy (fourth edition), a work initially authored by another Auburn attorney, William Miller Collier. His expertise in the field of bankruptcy led to his appointment as lecturer on bankruptcy at the New York Law School and at the Cornell Law School.
Hotchkiss was the first New York State chairman of the National Progressive Party, and was a signer of the original call for the establishment of the Progressive Party in 1912. The Progressive Party was the result of a split in the Republican Party during the presidential campaign of 1912, in which Theodore Roosevelt lost the Republican nomination William Howard Taft. The party is often called the Bull Moose Party, a reference Roosevelt's boast that he was "as strong as a bull moose."
16 March 2009
Josiah Hopkins
Josiah Hopkins was born on -- April 1786 at Pittsford, Vermont. He was educated by the pastor of his church and subsequently by Rev. Lemuel Haynes, a well-respected "colored" minister of Rutland. Hopkins completed theological studies at Auburn Theological Seminary, and later received degrees of an honorary nature from Middlebury College (M.A., 1813; and D.D., 1843). he was licensed as a Congregational minister in 1810 and worked as a missionary preacher in western Vermont for one year. He was the pastor of the Congregational Church at New Haven, Vermonth, from 1809 until 1830. While residing there, he authored The Christian Instructor (Middlebury, 1825), a theological textbook that passed through numerous editions.
In 1830, Hopkins accepted a call to the pastorate of the First Presbyterian Church at Auburn. He remained in that pastorate until 1846, resigning as a result of failing health. He labored as a home missionary in the Western Reserve region of Ohio, returning to New York State to minister in the vicinity of Seneca Falls from 1851 until 1855. On 21 (27) June 1862 he died at the water cure at Geneva, where he had sought treatment for asthma. Hopkins was twice married, first in 1808 to Orril Dike of Pittsford, and later to Lavinia Fenton of Rutland, Vermont.
Hopkins was the author of the gospel hymn "Oh Turn Ye, Oh Turn Ye, for Why Will Ye Die?" His hymn, "Lord, Thy Love Has Sought and Found Us," is sung to the melody of "Till He Come," by L. Mason.
Lord, Thy Love Has Sought and Found Us
LORD, Thy love has sought and found usWandering in this desert wide,
Thou hast thrown Thine arms around us,
For us suffered, bled and died:
Sing my soul! He loved thee,
Jesus gave Himself for me.
Hark! what sounds of bitter weeping,
From yon lonesome garden sweep,
'Tis the Lord His vigil keeping,
Whilst His followers sink in sleep.
Ah, my soul, He loved thee,
Yes, He gave Himself for me.
He is speaking to His Father,
Tasting deep that bitter cup,
Yet He takes it, willing rather
For our sakes to drink it up.
Oh what love! He loved me!
Gave Himself, my soul, for me.
Then that closing scene of anguish;
All God's waves and billows roll
Over Him, there left to languish
On the cross, to save my soul.
Matchless love! how vast, how free,
Jesus gave Himself for me.
Hark again! His cries are waking
Echoes on dark Calvary's hill;
God, my God, art Thou forsaking
Him who always did Thy will?
Ah! my soul, it was for thee,
Yes! He gave Himself for me.
Lord, we joy, Thy toils are ended,
Glad Thy suffering time is o'er,
To Thy Father's throne ascended,
There Thou liv'st to die no more.
Yes, my soul! He lives for thee,
He who gave Himself for me.
Lord, we worship and adore Thee
For Thy rich, Thy matchless grace;
Perfect soon in joy before Thee,
We shall see Thee face to face.
Yet e'en now our song shall be,
Jesus gave Himself for me.
Universalist Association of Auburn
A belief in the worth and dignity of every individual, and an emphasis on social and humanitarian endeavors rather than strictly doctrinal concerns, has been a hallmark of the Universalist movement since its beginnings in Gloucester, Massachusetts, in 1790. The Universalists opposed war and slavery, and were staunch advocates of free public education. Many adherents to Universalism played prominent roles in the reform movements that flourished in the early decades of the nineteenth century.
Among the most controversial teachings of the Universalists was the doctrine of universal salvation, from which the church derived its name. That doctrine held that evil was the result of social maladjustment rather than sin, and comprised a rejection of Calvinism, predestination, and the strict Puritan outlook that had dominated New England. Presbyterians and Congregationalists denounced the doctrine as unbiblical and as a disincentive for the conduct of a Christian life. Universalist preachers traversed New England and New York, engaged in heated disputes with Presbyterian and Congregationalist clergy. This controversy extended to Auburn, where the Presbyterian-sponsored Auburn Theological Seminary had been founded in 1818 to train ministers in the Calvinist tradition.
Auburn was home to a small but vibrant Universalist community. The first Universalist gathering in the village took place in 1812, when two men and eighteen women met in the home of Lyman Paine, just south of the Owasco River on Meridian Street (now called North Street). At that service, Rev. Paul Dean preached a sermon reflective of his Universalist principles, the first such sermon in Auburn. Many of those in attendance "unquestionably went there trembling with apprehension, lest their neighbors should discover... that they had dared to hear God represented as the Father and Friend of all His creatures."
The Universalist Association of Auburn was formally organized on April 12, 1821, in the school on Academy Green. Without a church edifice of its own, the congregation worshipped on the second story of Cayuga County's wooden courthouse and in various other public places.
In 1827, Ulysses F. Doubleday began publishing The Gospel Advocate and Impartial Investigator at Auburn; it was considered "the most widely circulated and most influential periodical in this country devoted to Universalism." When Doubleday found himself in need of an editor for the newspaper, he engaged Orestes A. Brownson, a twenty-four year-old Universalist minister who relocated to Auburn and served the pastoral needs of the Universalist congregations in Auburn, Geneva and Ithaca. With in a short time, Brownson, by his editorial denunciations of the efforts of the "evangelical" clergy to strictly enforce the keeping of the sabbath in the village, incurred the wrath of Rev. Dirch Cornelius Lansing, a founder of the theological seminary and pastor of the Presbyterian Church. Lansing, in turn, used his pulpit to denounce the errors of "liberal" Christianity.
After Josiah Hopkins succeeded Lansing in the pulpit of the Presbyterian Church, the Universalists encountered a more eloquent foe. Hopkins had not pursued a collegiate course of study, but prepared for the ministry under the tuitelage of Lemuel Hayes, "the esteemed colored minister of Rutland." As a preacher and as a scholar, Hopkins acquired an enviable reputation in Vermont, where he engaged in ministry for over two decades prior to his relocation to Auburn. Upon his arrival at Auburn, the new pastor determined that the community would fall prey to "the most pernicious error" that was Universalism unless he effectively presented and defended "orthodox" views. "There was never a time," he wrote, "when correct views on this subject were needed more than at the present." He described Auburn as "a field over which was not very sparingly scattered those who professed to believe in the doctrine of universal salvation." During his pastoral career in the village, and as a member of the seminary's board of trustees, Hopkins continued his study of Universalist teachings in order to be better equipped to show them to be false. After more than three decades in this work, he compiled his arguments in a small volume entitled The Scripture Doctrine of Endless retribution Candidly Presented and the Doctrine of Universal Salvation Shown to Be Unphilosophical, Unscriptural and False. The book purported to include direct proof of everlasting punishment and the moral depravity of mankind. Hopkins died on 21 June 1862 while the book was in press.
Hopkins was by no means alone in his vilification of the Universalists. New converts at evangelical revivals were often described as former Universalists. Religious newspapers described prominent criminals as adherents to the doctrine of full and free salvation. A student in the Auburn Female Seminary, whose family was affiliated with the suspect denomination, was required to write over and again, "Universalism! Veritable wickedness!"
In October 1844, Rev. John Mather Austin became the pastor of the Universalist community in Auburn, which had become known as the First Universalist Church. He promptly joined the ongoing debate between the advocates of universal salvation and those of "endless retribution." He was quick to respond to attacks from neighboring pulpits and in the local press.
A particularly fierce antagonism existed between Mather and the pastor of the First Baptist Church, J.S. Backus, author of a derisive book entitled Universalism, Another Gospel, or J.M. Austin against the Bible. The vitriolic volume was the presult of Austin's self-proclaimed success in public debates with Methodist Rev. David Holmes at Genoa in 1847 and 1848; Backus had sought to draft a treatise that would remedy the deficiencies of Holmes' arguments in those debates. "Although their doctrine of the endless tortures of their fellow-creatures was defended in that discussion," claimed Austin, "although the arguments pro and con are fairly reported, yet these reverend gentlemen are nervous, and restless, and far from being satisfied with the fruit springing up from the debate. At last their distress became unbearable, and gave birth to a book entitled Universalism, Another Gospel."
Not to be outdone, Austin wrote A Critical Review of a Work by Rev. J.S. Backus, entitled Universalism, Another Gospel, or J.M. Austin against the Bible. "Believing they richly deserved rebuke," he wrote later, "I did not spare these gentlemen, but applied the lash with some severity. Of course, they were not pleased with this. Who ever knew the erring to be pleased when their sins were held up to the gaze of the world? Their predicament was truly pitiful."
The orthodox pastors were satisfied neither by the results of the Genoa debates nor by Backus' published attempt at damage control in the aftermath of those debates. They determined that Rev. A.B. Winfield, pastor of the Dutch Reformed Church at Owasco Outlet (commonly called the Sand Beach church), should be their spokeman. Thus, commented Austin, "an instrument was found who in taste, in habits, in blind prejudice and stupid ignaorance, was precisely fitted for just such work.... Curous spectacle! A Baptist blundering to prop the platform of a Methodist; and a Dutch Reformed running to pick up the fallen Baptist. Three sects, bitterly opposed on fundamental principles of religion, concealing for the time being their enmity and jealousy of each other, to unite in showing their contempt and hatred of Christ's glorious Gospel of Universal Reconciliation!"
It was not the debate on the doctrine of universal salvation, however, that introduced Austin to Winfield, nor the latter's work entitled Antidote to the Errors of Universalism. Rather, Winfield attracted Austin's attention when he delivered a controversial sermon at the funeral of the Van Nest family in March 1846. Austin, who vehemently opposed the death penalty, was aoppalled by Winfield's call for swift and violent retribution in Winfield's bitter and vengeful sermon at the Van Nest funeral at the Dutch Reformed Church. "Their sudden and sanguinary death," recalled Austin, "filled all with the deepest distress and horror. Yet it was precisely one of therse cases which tests the Christianity of professotrs of religion, and shows whether they have really been born again or not. It determines whether their hearts conceal a rankling spirit of malice and revenge, or the pitiful and forgiving spirit of Christ, toward the erring." Austin did not resist the temptation to denounce Winfield's views from the Universalist pulpit and to distibute printed copies of his sermon. He reminded his audience that "The dear Redeemer prayed for his murderers."
Daniel Livermore served as the pastor of Auburn's Universalist congregation from 1855 to 1857. He and his wife, Mary Ashton Rice Livermore, were prominent in the abolitionist, temperance and women's rights movements.