streets (Page 2)

This street was a challenge with more research needed, for sure. I thought it might be somewhat easy because it was “laid out on land owned by Wadsworth Estate.” There was a C.H. Wadsworth who lived at 80 Fitz Avenue (now West Main Street), so it seemed like a slam dunk. Not so! For starters, C.H. Wadsworth died in 1926, but the property labeled “Wadsworth Estate” is showing up on the 1888 map, and the street was accepted in 1915. The street was listed in city directories as early as 1906. Which Wadsworth left the estate, who was C.H. Wadsworth, and what connection did heRead More →

This street is simply named because of the orchard that was located where the street is today. I mistakenly thought that the orchard belonged to the Randall family, but when I looked more closely at maps, I realized it was part of land that belonged to Josiah Hart. (The Randall family did have a large amount of land, including orchards, on Main Street.) Just who was Josiah Hart? This will be far from a complete look at the man because there are very few leads that I was able to follow. As always, with more time, probably more resources could be found but there isRead More →

  Judge Hiram Crandall was born in Chenango County in 1818 and died in Cortland County in 1881 after living much of his life here. Crandall Street is named after this much loved citizen of Cortland Village. Hiram Crandall’s parents were Richard Crandall and Abigail Ransom Crain. Richard operated a distillery in Norwich in the 1820s but lost everything. He moved to Hornby , Steuben County, and started another, smaller, distillery which also had financial difficulties. He moved to Burdette, Schuyler County, and operated a large distillery for five years before moving to Cortland. It would seem that Richard was a man with a bitRead More →

  According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, excelsior means “fine curled wood shavings used especially for packing fragile items.” Excelsior Street was named after the Excelsior Top Company, a manufacturer of tops, dashes, and trimmings of the carriage trade. Perhaps the company got its name from the fine wood shavings that resulted from all of the work that went into the production of carriage items. It seems excelsior was also used to indicate high quality products at one time. Perhaps we will never know the origins of the name of the company, but Excelsior Street was named after the company because it opens directly acrossRead More →

  Willow Avenue is named after the 14 willow sprouts that were planted on both sides of Otter Creek by Horace Dibble sometime between 1847 and 1852. That is a very short street story, so maybe we should take a look at Horace Dibble, the man responsible for the trees. Horace Dibble was born in Greene River, Columbia County, New York on November 21, 1801 to Lucy King and Ebenezer Dibble. The Dibble family moved to Moravia in 1809. In 1821, young Horace visited the Cortland area to look for work. He had recently completed his apprenticeship of wool carder and cloth dresser. He stayedRead More →

Dunsmore Avenue was named after D.F. Dunsmoor, according to the newspaper article I’ve been using to sleuth out the history of Cortland’s streets. I love it when there is an actual name attached to the street because that usually means it shouldn’t be hard to find information….not the case this time! I was determined to learn more about this street because City of Cortland Historian Kate O’Connell had told me that there was a park there on that corner that was similar to my favorite park, the Floral Fountain Trout Park which was over on South Franklin where the DPW is today. It should haveRead More →

Right around the corner from Cortland County Historical Society is a peaceful side street called Jewett Avenue, named after Dr. Homer Octavius Jewett. Dr. Jewett owned much of the land which makes up the street today. Dr. Jewett was a long practicing and respected physician in Cortland in the 19th century. Homer Octavius Jewett was born on March 31, 1819 in Madison County, the eighth of nine children. He was the youngest boy. His father was Walter Jewett and his mother was Betsey Rockwell. They moved to Madison County from Lanesborough, Massachusetts in 1806. The land Walter purchased was heavily forested and he cleared mostRead More →

  There are some families that we encounter in our trips to the family files and archives that stand out because of the amount of information we have about the family, and the Samson family is one of them. This family preserved their lineage much better than many families do. They could easily trace their roots back to both Miles Standish and John Alden of the Mayflower because they kept records and passed the information from generation to generation. They were proud of their heritage, and there were several ancestors who were quite adventurous, including Deborah Sampson, a cousin who served in the Revolutionary WarRead More →

  Last week, Cortland celebrated PorchFest on VanHoesen Street and we had a request to see what we could turn up on the origins of the street. Since we were there, it made sense to make Van Hoesen our next topic! I spent all morning going through files, vital statistics, scrapbooks, and city directories to try to find out if the 1908 newspaper article I’ve been using to track down the names of streets was accurate this time. The story states that VanHoesen Street is named after Daniel VanHoesen. Seeing a name always makes me happy because it usually means the research is not goingRead More →