At Home in the Huddle 2: Friday

Garbage Day!

It's 66.6 degrees

Today: Hazy sunshine and very humid. Record heat. High near 90.

Tonight: Partly cloudy and oppressively muggy. Low near 70.
Saturday: Warm and humid with some sunshine and clouds. Scattered thunderstorms. High: 80, Low: 61
Sunday: Rain likely with a chance of thunderstorms. High: 74, Low: 57

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From the O-D website: "Rt. 12 Contruction to start in 2008" describes improvements to be made at Chuckery Corners, Summit Road.

I just got this E-note from Sharry Whitney of "Mohawk Valley Living, " who wrote: " I don't know how little Waterville did it, but they are currently our second-most watched video. Our current champion is Ilion, but their episode was 6 months ago. Waterville just aired a week ago and is already gaining on them!
We had fun in Waterville and we are so glad we returned -downtown looks so nice. We've even had people from Waterville tell us they didn't know about the library's gardens!"

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(Click to Enlarge.)

A view we've never seen.

Summer on Barton Avenue.

The "Bamboo" is blooming, again.

Planning ahead, I see!

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Boys' Soccer lost to Herkimer, last night, 2 - 1
Boys' Varsity Football will be in Richfield Springs, tonight, at 7:00.

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A few days ago, a local gentleman asked me where I got the name "The Huddle" for the blog. I think that he'd grown up in Waterville, but had never heard the story of "How Waterville Got it's Name," so I dug out this - probably the most accurate of several versions of the same:

From Pomroy Jone's 1851 "Annals of Oneida County."

"In the year 1808, the Sangerfield Post Office which had been previously located in this village, was removed to the Centre.

In this year or the year preceding, the village, which from its first settlement had no other local name than the Huddle, received the name of Waterville. In the fall of the year, on a certain evening, Doctor Sherman Bartholomew, Josiah Bacon, Reuben Bacon, Isaac Terry, and John Williams, Esquires, were together in the tavern kept either by Eli Hotchkiss, or Pardon Keyes, now the dwelling house of Doctor E. A. Munger*, and among other topics, the name of the village became a subject of conversation, and it was unanimously agreed that the village deserved a more dignified name and that it should have one. After the suggestion of a variety of names, Doctor Bartholomew proposed that of Waterville, to which they all assented, and by that name it has since been recognized. It was not however generally known by that cognomen out of the village, until the Waterville Post Office was established in 1823. The name Waterville was selected, because not only agreeable, but a very appropriate one. The writer would not, like a certain lady author, intimate, that Whiskeyville would have been more appropriate, believing that pure water is more congenial to the tastes of a majority of its citizens than whiskey.

I've added the rest of Jones' remarks about Waterville because they're the sort of bits of basic history that are good to review, now and then, and which newcomers may find interesting.

In the year 1806, the village had thirty-two dwelling houses and stores, and 300 inhabitants. It has now (1851) a bank with a capital of $100,000, five large dry good stores, an extensive drug store, a large grocery and provision store, a large tannery connected with the boot and shoe-making, for foreign markets, an extensive copper, sheet iron, and tin manufactory, and organ manufactory, which employs many hands, a large woolen factory, two grist and flouring mills, a distillery for the making of pure alcohol, three furnaces, two machine shops, two taverns, and three houses for public worship.

There is now constructed a plank road from this place through Clinton to Utica, and another to Utica, via Paris Hill, as also the Earlville and Waterville plank road, on the east side of the swamp. It has a select school for young ladies, and an excellent district school. The village contained on the 1st of January, 1848, 1014 inhabitants, nearly one half the whole number in the town.

*That building was moved to Babbott Avenue, a long time ago, and is now the residence of Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence Pesto.

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An E-letter from Brian Tuttle, in Montreal certainly got my attention:

Have you ever used www.wikipedia.com - the editable online encyclopedia? When last I checked, the entry for "Waterville, NY" was pretty meager. There are so many people in Waterville (such as yourself, Louis Langone, and the Falks) who know the history that it is a shame that the entry is so small. I encourage you (or someone else) to expand on this entry!"

I havn't done anything about it, but - after looking at the wikipedia entry - I agree that someone should! (It says that Waterville was named for Waterville, Maine. I don't think so!)

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Also online:

History of the Hop Industry from Amos O. Osborn's "History of Sangerfield", 1886.
And then read an aricle about the Hop Extract Works by the late M.L. "Pete" Peterson.

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