Our sister paper, the Steuben Courier in Bath, is celebrating its bicentennial. Because of mergers the Courier story goes back to 1816, and last week we looked at what life was like 200 years ago. But the paper actually called the Courier dates to 1843. What was the world like then, when The Steuben Courier first hit the streets?

*John Tyler was president — the first “accidental president” who succeeded to office on the death of his predecessor. Queen Victoria was ruling in Great Britain. (Believe it or not, Tyler still had two living grandchildren at the end of 2015.)
*There were 26 states. William C. Bouck was governor of New York. Robert Campbell, Jr. was Town Supervisor, and Benjamin Smead was Mayor of Bath. Town population was probably a little under 6000.
*Steuben County had 46,138 people in the 1840 census. 288 of them were non-white.
*Edgar Allen Poe published “The Gold-Bug” and “The Tell-Tale Heart” in 1843. Charles Dickens published A Christmas Carol, and Londoners sent the first Christmas cards.
*Ulysses S. Grant graduated from West Point. Future President McKinley was born, and Francis Scott Key died. So did Sequoyah, and so did Noah Webster.
*The Town of Avoca was formed on April 12, taking land from Bath, Cohocton, Howard, and Wheeler.
*Keuka, a crude double-hulled vessel with a central paddlewheel, was operating on Keuka Lake. It was the first steamboat in Steuben County. The Corning-Blossburg short-line railroad ran through the southeastern part of the county. The Erie Canal, Crooked Lake Canal, Chemung Canal, and Chemung Feeder Canal were all busy.
*There was no Catholic church in Bath, but the Episcopal, Methodist, Baptist, and Presbyterian churches were already here.
*Schuyler County did not yet exist.
*The map was peppered with names that would have been familiar to 1843 readers, but not to us: Crooked Lake (Keuka Lake); Little Lake (Waneta Lake); Mud Lake (Lamoka Lake); Poor Lake (Loon Lake); Liberty (Cohocton); Bloods Corners (North Cohocton); Bartlets Mills (Bradford); Kennedyville (Kanona).
*Washington Street was still called St. Patrick’s Street, but the name would change by 1850, possibly because in the interim a Catholic church DID open in Bath. Many people were hysterical about immigrants in those days, especially IRISH and CATHOLIC immigrants. There was a whole political party — very active locally — dedicated to keeping them out. Their official name was the American Party, but most folks called them Know-Nothings. For excellent reasons.