Tag Archives: Kanona

A Trip Through (Some of) the Hamlets

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There are two cities and 32 Towns in Steuben County, and in the Towns there lie 14 incorporated villages. (Thirteen and a fraction if you want to be persnickity, since Almond lies mostly in Allegany County.)

*Then there are places that are now only the faintest of memories… Hermitage, Lumber City, Beartown, Liberty Pole, Harrisburg Hollow. Once they were homes, and they were loved, and now they’re all but forgotten.

*But the official map of Steuben County also shows 72 (!) named-but-unincorporated communities, sometimes called hamlets or settlements, and each of these is interesting in its own right.

*Coss Corners and Unionville lie in the southern upland stretches of Bath, on County Road 10. Coss Corners is now just a handful of houses around the crossroad, but Unionville still has enough homes to form its own little community… though not enough to support, as it did in 1873, a school, a tannery, a shoe shop, and a blacksmith.

*Also in Bath we find Kanona… originally Kennedyville. The Erie Railroad, the DL&W, and the Kanona & Prattsburgh railroad all had stations here, a concentration that supported five hotels along with churches and other businesses. Interestingly Kanona still earns much of its bread from travelers, supporting two large truck stops at Exit 37 on I-390.

*Prattsburgh, of course, lay at the other end of the K&P. Once an incorporated village, the community gave up that distinction some years ago. But like Kanona, it is still a settlement of some size, supporting a library, several historic churches, a lovely square, the central school, and the Narcissa Prentiss House Museum. Narcissa was an early graduate of the school (Franklin Academy), and arguably Prattsburgh’s most famous citizen. She has a monument in front of Franklin.

*Her husband-to-be, Dr. Marcus Whitman, practiced in Wheeler, in the Town of the same name. Wheeler was also (much later) on the K&P. Wheeler’s in the horse-and-buggy country. It has an active church, a Grange, a monument to Marcus, and the old one-room school (now a residence).

*Campbell lies almost in the center of the Town of the same name. Also a rail stop in days gone by, Campbell has the Campbell-Savona High School. The “Stone House” by the river was once a blacksmith shop. The old Presbyterian church (more recently an antique store) had a brush with future fame in the 1880s, for the pastor’s teenaged daughter would become the hyper-prolific novelist Grace Livingston Hill, beloved by generations of readers.

*Hornby, or Hornby Forks (in the Town of Hornby) has an active church, the town historical museum (in the old one-room school), and a very early World War I monument.

*Keuka, on Keuka Lake in the town of Wayne, used to be called Keuka Village or Keuka Landing. It was the site of a much-visited resort, Keuka Hotel, where such luminaries as Fred Waring and Hoagie Charmichael entertained the guests. The Hotel’s gone, but Keuka’s still a busy lakeside place in the summers.

*Keuka’s down at the lake level, but Wayne, or Wayne Village, is up on the height. It lies partly in Schuyler County, and it’s where you’ll find the Town offices.

*Hartsville, in the like-named Town on the western fringe of the county, has a fair number of houses, a church, and the Town offices, but no longer any consumer businesses. Jasper (in Jasper), on County 417, is a rather bigger place, with its own library. Like Wheeler, Jasper is horse-and-buggy territory.

*Gang Mills in Erwin got its name from sawmills that once operated there, where the Tioga and Conhocton Rivers come together (and where they flooded catstrophically in 1935 and 1972). If we were naming it today, we’d call it Gang Shopping Centers!

From Muskets to Mustangs — 2015 Steuben Couny Hall of Fame (Part I)

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The 2015 class of Steuben County Hall of Fame was honored on May 2. As usual, they were three in number. All three are deceased. All three are male. All three are military veterans, but only one was honored strictly for his military service, and one partly so.

JOHN KENNEDY lived so far back that we don’t have any clue about his appearance – not even a sketch or a silhouette. He was one of the Kennedys of Kennedyville – now called Kanona.

During the War of 1812 he was an ensign in the militia, and on October 31 of that year General van Rensellaer ordered an attack across the Niagara River. Many of the militia balked, insisting that they were organized only for defense of the state, not for an offensive out of the country into Canada.

The frustrated general asked for volunteers, and Kennedy stepped up. Once they had crossed his company captain reported himself sick and hustled back to the American side. When the new commander was badly wounded Kennedy gathered his own men and whatever disorganized troops he could find into a scratch company with himself at the head… all the time under fire. The Battle of Queenston Heights became a series of small fights, in which Kennedy led from the front, always in danger. He even led his untried and untrained force on a bayonet charge that broke up an attack by redcoat veterans.

Two years later he was back, now captain of a new Steuben County company at the siege of Fort Erie. Once he led a sortie to capture a fortified artillery position, drive off its troops, sabotage the big guns, and rush back to safety. Instead of medals in those days they gave out brevets, or honorary promotions. Kennedy was jumped up three ranks to colonel.

Back home he ran an inn a Kennedyville, held several public offices, and in 1825 became the second elected sheriff in Steuben history – the first to be elected without having earlier held the spot by appointment. Eventually he moved out Dansville way, but only spent six months there before his death at 42. Sad to say, no one now even knows where he’s buried.

JAMES W. EMPEY of Bath joined up for World War II when he turned 18, and in 1943 arrived in Corsica to start flying Spitfire fighter planes against the Germans. A year later he was using the far more modern P-51 Mustang, and in one of these he shot down five German aircraft – making himself an “ace” – in thirty days.

Considering that most pilots never shot down an enemy, this was a remarkable achievement – perhaps the only “ace” ever from Steuben County. After the war he became an Air Force test pilot.

A couple of decades later he was back in the fight, sick and tired, he said, of 18- and 19-year-olds coming back from Vietnam in body bags. Disbelieving youngsters called him the Red Baron as he slipped into the cockpit wearing his goggles, white scarf, and leather helmet from World War II. Now instead of testing cutting-edge aircraft he was taking to the skies in a slow unarmed Cessna O-1 “Bird Dog” (first used in 1947), getting in close to spot and mark enemy positions so that the F-100 Super Sabres could jet in and blast them. He retired as a lieutenant colonel with a Silver Star, two Distinguished Flying Crosses, and no less than 27 air medals.

Next week: a look at the third 2015 inductee, Dr. Joseph E. Paddock.