Stories from the Museum Trail
When Steuben County was first formed in 1796, it was comprised of six towns. Over the years since, those six original communities have turned into nearly 60 (including hamlets, villages, towns).
Each of those communities has its own interesting history, its own compelling characters (heroes and outlaws and innumerable everyday folk who have played a part in the development of Steuben County as a world-class destination). Over twenty of those communities have their own Historical Societies and/or History Museums which, though often found in small unassuming locations, contain a treasure trove of information from and about the past.
As a way to share some of the stories found in these often hidden gems, the sundry History Museums are collaborating to host Steuben County History Weekend which will take place October 19th and 20th and features free admission to all 22 different history museums on the 22 museums on the Steuben County Museum Trail. They have even created a special map designating two trails (a North Trail and a South Trail).
Below is a Special Guest Post by Steuben County Historian, Griffin Bates, who reveals a few of the stories you can learn about when you visit the 22 different history museums and societies on the map.
Steuben County Historical Society
“Walking 100 miles from Buffalo to Bath – Building a Prosperous Life”
Would you walk over 100 miles to build a new home, with no money in your pockets? That was what John Magee had to do in his young adulthood. John was born on September 3, 1794 to Henry and Sarah Mulhollen Magee, and was the second of five total children. His parents emigrated from County Antrim, Ireland ten years prior. Life for the growing Magee family was tough, like any other pioneer family eager to start a new life in the new world. After moving to Groveland, NY in 1805 to start a career in farming, tragedy struck on October 12 of that year as Sarah died, leaving the Father, John (age eleven), and the rest of the family motherless. Despite the loss the family could not stop working. They needed to keep up with the debts piling up, sadly to no avail. Failing to pay off the debts meant that the Sherriff in Livingston County need to sell the Magee’s assets to cover the debt – this ultimately led to the family moving to the completely wild Michigan territory, near Detroit.
The Magee family could not escape hardship as the War of 1812 soon broke out between the British and the American armies. John was only 18 years old when he enlisted alongside his father and brother. After multiple skirmishes in the Michigan area, John was captured in Detroit due to a military blunder by American General William Hull (surrendering his large forces to a much smaller British force). John’s service lasted only four months before he was captured, an even worse was the fact that he was only paid for three months of service (being a POW did not entitle a payment from the American military). Magee was released in January of 1813, to only be recaptured, again, in June of the same year. This time, Magee was able to escape from prison at Beaver Dam, Canada. Many accounts claim that he escaped under a hail of bullets from pursuing British soldiers – this could not be confirmed.
After all the hardship of fighting, imprisonment, and no money to boot, John and his brother Thomas “T.J.” were forced to find a new life and a paying job. Traveling by foot from Buffalo, Bath was the only option since it was the closest settlement that could offer a steady life. Setting off in the Spring of 1816 the brothers made the excruciating journey to Bath, John immediately found a lumber cutting job, picked up an axe, and began chopping wood. He made 25₵ per cord of wood. A good day amounted to two cords of wood cut.
By the time he was in his middle age, John Magee amassed a fortune owning industry, businesses, railroads, and coal supplies. His fortune helped him build his first home on the corner of West Morris and Cameron Streets. Built in 1831, this house is a rare glimpse into the sumptuous life of the Magee family, and the Magee House is an important part of Bath history and the overall Steuben County history. Since then, it has been a private home, the Davenport Library, and currently the home of the Steuben County Historical Society and Historian’s Office – collectively the Steuben County History Center.
Howard Historical Society
“A Lost Panorama of NYC”
Does the name Otis Bullard ring a bell? In the early 1800s Bullard was a significant American painter of his day, and historically he created some unfathomable feats of art. He was from Howard, NY, one of the smaller (but still lively) farming communities in Steuben County, located just off exit 35 on Interstate 86. If you do choose to visit, which I highly suggest you do, you will be surrounded by sprawling landscapes and farms. It is eye-opening to realize that Otis Bullard was one of Howards famous people, a prolific, gifted, and overshadowed figure in American art history.
It is not clear who Otis’ parents were. He was born in 1816 in Howard, NY and likely grew up like many of the families in Howard, hard at work on the farm. But, at an older age, before he was an adult, Bullard had his first shot at painting working for Augustus Olmstead. There he painted signs for the wagons being built at Olmstead’s shop. His talent was far greater than sign painting. By 1838 Bullard moved to Connecticut to pursue his painting, under the tutelage of Philip Hewins. For a while, Bullard was painting for wealthy people around New England and Upstate New York, and he then traveled to Amherst, Massachusetts to paint ten-year-old Emily Dickinson and her siblings.
Famous names aside, Bullard at the end of his career painted over 900 different paintings of different subjects. His ability to capture images and translate them into works of art put him into the limelight as a truly gifted artist. That gift was best seen with his magnum opus (great work) when in NYC, where he often painted narrative based art, he challenged himself with producing an enormous panoramic painting of NYC when its industry started to boom. In 1847 Bullard took around a year to complete his painting. The significance of this painting is its size: it was six feet high and 3,000 feet long! It was not a mural, or some very early precursor to graffiti, but a traditional painting on canvas.
This marvel of achievement was viewed by hundreds of thousands of people, making it an early example of “pop culture” art. It was so widely admired that it became a talking point for many people who saw it in person, or at least heard of its existence. This pride of Otis Bullard, sadly, has been lost to history. It is unknown where this painting ended up, or worse, what happened to it. It is one of the great mysteries of an even greater person from Howard, NY history.
Wheeler Historical Society
“The Good Ghost of Wheeler, NY”
We have heard the story of the “Headless Horseman” of Sleepy Hollow, but have you heard of the “Headless Horse” of Mutton Hollow? Both stories fall into folklore and mythos and served as cultural phenomena. Rather than a maleficent ghost, the Headless Horse is a spirit that guards the people of Wheeler. In the early pioneer days of Steuben County there were plenty of no-good criminals stealing, causing mayhem and scaring the settlers in the area. A gang of rustlers was hiding out on Mutton Hollow Road, they were up to no good. One day there was a terrible accident that burned one of the rustlers. Fearing bringing unwanted attention, no doctor was summoned, and the poor victim of this accident slowly perished.
The anguish felt by the person who died likely attracted the attention of the Headless Horse, an apparition missing its head, with an even more menacing figure mounted on its back. Rather than torment the innocent people of Wheeler, NY this spirit’s sole purpose was to fight off the rustlers, bandits, and no good criminals who hid in the wilderness around Mutton Hollow. Only a few times during the year will the Headless Horse appear in the small town of Wheeler. It’s presence signaling the protection of the innocent and the torment of the criminals.
Steuben County was rife with criminals in its early years. People like Robert Douglas who was hanged for his crimes in Bath, or Rosenkrans, a serial thief who stole from anyone, anywhere, proved that settling here was risky and dangerous. The cultural recognition of the Headless Horse was created out of fear of these criminals, a greater longing for there to be safety and security in Wheeler. The thought of a spirit that was there to protect against criminals was both a comfort and a warning. Should anyone living in Wheeler chose to commit a crime, they would fear attracting the attention of the Headless Horse.
Do you believe there is a spirit haunting the hills of Mutton Hollow Road?
Canisteo Valley Historical Society (Arkport)
“The Arks of Steuben County”
Before there were airplanes, automobiles, railroads or even passable roadways, the quickest way to transport goods from Steuben County to the major port of Baltimore was by river arks. These arks were not built like a typical boat, rather a glorified raft or barge. Rivers can be shallow and offer little room for a boat hull that has a high draft (distance between the waterline to the keel) and so the need for a shallow hull was important for traveling on the river.
The village of Arkport, to no surprise, got its name from these arks, and the area where the village is located today was a ‘port’ where arks were built and where these arks were casted-off, traveling down the Canisteo River. Arks required intense labor to build but were easy to scrap once they arrived at their destination. By 1800, the area surrounding Arkport was filled with untouched, old-growth white pine trees, perfect for the building of arks. Building an ark required you to make a slender and shallow hull (approx. 16 feet wide and between 60 to 100 feet long).
An interesting feature and use of the arks was the creation of ‘ark trains’, a string of arks tied together in a manner that allowed the safe navigation of the rivers at once. The uneven terrain of rivers, the sudden dips and runs created a dangerous obstacle for these boats, especially if they were tied together. A solution was to tie them together in such a way as to allow each bot to ‘slink’ over the bumps and runs. Witnessing one of these ark trains would appear as if there were a giant snake slinking down the river, boats bobbing up and down.
The big question is why use an ark? Why couldn’t the settlers rely on simple horse and wagons? The simple answer is that the roadways that existed in Steuben County were anything but useful, and often these roads utilized the narrow Haudenosaunee paths that traversed the landscape. Carrying large quantities of heavy cargo by road would have been too slow, expensive, and frustrating, and could even be dangerous. The use of an Ark allowed tons of cargo to be shipped at once, requiring little effort to propel the craft, and by the time the arks arrived in Baltimore the goods were still fresh. Plus, when an ark arrived in Baltimore the crew would disassemble the ark and sell off the wood as well, making extra money. On the return trip the crew would ride horses or walk back to Arkport, ready to make another trip to Baltimore.
Prattsburgh Historical Society
“Traveler’s Poem of the K&P Rail Road”
Kanona and Prattsburg
A half a dozen trav’ling men,
On Washington’s birthday,
Said good-bye to Kanona, and
For Prattsburg moved away;
The walking was so very bad,
They couldn’t stand the strain,
And so they did the next best thing-
They took a Prattsburg train.
It was an interesting sight
To see that faithful crew
Make up the train for Prattsburg,
While the moments swiftly flew.
‘Twas due to leave at 3.15,
But here I’d like to state,
When it was ready for a start
“Twas fifty minutes late.
There were box cars and flat cars, too,
And cars of every kind;
The freight cars they were all ahead,
The passenger behind;
The engine made an awful fuss
To draw the train along,
We feared ‘twould “bust its biler,”
‘Cause it wasn’t very strong.
It drew the train quite fast at first,
Displaying lots of power;
We hoped to make that Prattsburg run
In about a half an hour.
But soon it settled to a pace
No faster than a walk;
And once or twice it acted queer,
We feared ’twas going to balk.
Then suddenly ‘twould gather strength,
And up the grade would climb;
But when it had to whistle,
It would stop most every time;
For when it to a crossing came,
Where whistle had to blow,
It took its strength for whistling,
So it left no power to go.
That Prattsburg engine surely
Kept us guessing all the time;
And that is why I tho’t to try
To write its pranks in rhyme;
It forward went and backward, too,
And acted like a clown;
The once or twice it stopped quite short
And jumped right up and down.
The grinding of those air-brakes
Kept the train in constant quiver;
Cold chills ran up and down our spines,
And caused us each to shiver;
There never was a broncho
Could perform so many feats;
We got so interested, that
We couldn’t keep our seats.
Our tickets all were limited,
So ’twas our great desire
To reach our destination
Ere our tickets should expire.
We got quite tired and hungry, too,
Yet we were all alive,
When we arrived at Prattsburg
Fifteen minutes after five.
— Irv Nichols
“The Museum Trail Weekend is an opportunity to connect with your local community history. All 20+ museums will be open on October 19 from 10am – 5pm and October 20 from 12 – 5pm. This is your chance to visit an unfamiliar museum near you or to visit a museum that has limited hours during the year. Admission to these museums will be free!
The public can get a copy of the Museum Trail Maps at your local museum or library, or you can get a digital copy of the map by clicking the link https://www.bit.ly/SC-MuseumTrailMap. Every museum will be free, and I encourage you to venture out and explore our complex County history.”
Stories from the Museum Trail
When Steuben County was first formed in 1796, it was comprised of six towns. Over the years since, those six original communities have turned into nearly 60 (including hamlets, villages, towns).
Each of those communities has its own interesting history, its own compelling characters (heroes and outlaws and innumerable everyday folk who have played a part in the development of Steuben County as a world-class destination). Over twenty of those communities have their own Historical Societies and/or History Museums which, though often found in small unassuming locations, contain a treasure trove of information from and about the past.
As a way to share some of the stories found in these often hidden gems, the sundry History Museums are collaborating to host Steuben County History Weekend which will take place October 19th and 20th and features free admission to all 22 different history museums on the 22 museums on the Steuben County Museum Trail. They have even created a special map designating two trails (a North Trail and a South Trail).
Below is a Special Guest Post by Steuben County Historian, Griffin Bates, who reveals a few of the stories you can learn about when you visit the 22 different history museums and societies on the map.
Steuben County Historical Society
“Walking 100 miles from Buffalo to Bath – Building a Prosperous Life”
Would you walk over 100 miles to build a new home, with no money in your pockets? That was what John Magee had to do in his young adulthood. John was born on September 3, 1794 to Henry and Sarah Mulhollen Magee, and was the second of five total children. His parents emigrated from County Antrim, Ireland ten years prior. Life for the growing Magee family was tough, like any other pioneer family eager to start a new life in the new world. After moving to Groveland, NY in 1805 to start a career in farming, tragedy struck on October 12 of that year as Sarah died, leaving the Father, John (age eleven), and the rest of the family motherless. Despite the loss the family could not stop working. They needed to keep up with the debts piling up, sadly to no avail. Failing to pay off the debts meant that the Sherriff in Livingston County need to sell the Magee’s assets to cover the debt – this ultimately led to the family moving to the completely wild Michigan territory, near Detroit.
The Magee family could not escape hardship as the War of 1812 soon broke out between the British and the American armies. John was only 18 years old when he enlisted alongside his father and brother. After multiple skirmishes in the Michigan area, John was captured in Detroit due to a military blunder by American General William Hull (surrendering his large forces to a much smaller British force). John’s service lasted only four months before he was captured, an even worse was the fact that he was only paid for three months of service (being a POW did not entitle a payment from the American military). Magee was released in January of 1813, to only be recaptured, again, in June of the same year. This time, Magee was able to escape from prison at Beaver Dam, Canada. Many accounts claim that he escaped under a hail of bullets from pursuing British soldiers – this could not be confirmed.
After all the hardship of fighting, imprisonment, and no money to boot, John and his brother Thomas “T.J.” were forced to find a new life and a paying job. Traveling by foot from Buffalo, Bath was the only option since it was the closest settlement that could offer a steady life. Setting off in the Spring of 1816 the brothers made the excruciating journey to Bath, John immediately found a lumber cutting job, picked up an axe, and began chopping wood. He made 25₵ per cord of wood. A good day amounted to two cords of wood cut.
By the time he was in his middle age, John Magee amassed a fortune owning industry, businesses, railroads, and coal supplies. His fortune helped him build his first home on the corner of West Morris and Cameron Streets. Built in 1831, this house is a rare glimpse into the sumptuous life of the Magee family, and the Magee House is an important part of Bath history and the overall Steuben County history. Since then, it has been a private home, the Davenport Library, and currently the home of the Steuben County Historical Society and Historian’s Office – collectively the Steuben County History Center.
Howard Historical Society
“A Lost Panorama of NYC”
Does the name Otis Bullard ring a bell? In the early 1800s Bullard was a significant American painter of his day, and historically he created some unfathomable feats of art. He was from Howard, NY, one of the smaller (but still lively) farming communities in Steuben County, located just off exit 35 on Interstate 86. If you do choose to visit, which I highly suggest you do, you will be surrounded by sprawling landscapes and farms. It is eye-opening to realize that Otis Bullard was one of Howards famous people, a prolific, gifted, and overshadowed figure in American art history.
It is not clear who Otis’ parents were. He was born in 1816 in Howard, NY and likely grew up like many of the families in Howard, hard at work on the farm. But, at an older age, before he was an adult, Bullard had his first shot at painting working for Augustus Olmstead. There he painted signs for the wagons being built at Olmstead’s shop. His talent was far greater than sign painting. By 1838 Bullard moved to Connecticut to pursue his painting, under the tutelage of Philip Hewins. For a while, Bullard was painting for wealthy people around New England and Upstate New York, and he then traveled to Amherst, Massachusetts to paint ten-year-old Emily Dickinson and her siblings.
Famous names aside, Bullard at the end of his career painted over 900 different paintings of different subjects. His ability to capture images and translate them into works of art put him into the limelight as a truly gifted artist. That gift was best seen with his magnum opus (great work) when in NYC, where he often painted narrative based art, he challenged himself with producing an enormous panoramic painting of NYC when its industry started to boom. In 1847 Bullard took around a year to complete his painting. The significance of this painting is its size: it was six feet high and 3,000 feet long! It was not a mural, or some very early precursor to graffiti, but a traditional painting on canvas.
This marvel of achievement was viewed by hundreds of thousands of people, making it an early example of “pop culture” art. It was so widely admired that it became a talking point for many people who saw it in person, or at least heard of its existence. This pride of Otis Bullard, sadly, has been lost to history. It is unknown where this painting ended up, or worse, what happened to it. It is one of the great mysteries of an even greater person from Howard, NY history.
Wheeler Historical Society
“The Good Ghost of Wheeler, NY”
We have heard the story of the “Headless Horseman” of Sleepy Hollow, but have you heard of the “Headless Horse” of Mutton Hollow? Both stories fall into folklore and mythos and served as cultural phenomena. Rather than a maleficent ghost, the Headless Horse is a spirit that guards the people of Wheeler. In the early pioneer days of Steuben County there were plenty of no-good criminals stealing, causing mayhem and scaring the settlers in the area. A gang of rustlers was hiding out on Mutton Hollow Road, they were up to no good. One day there was a terrible accident that burned one of the rustlers. Fearing bringing unwanted attention, no doctor was summoned, and the poor victim of this accident slowly perished.
The anguish felt by the person who died likely attracted the attention of the Headless Horse, an apparition missing its head, with an even more menacing figure mounted on its back. Rather than torment the innocent people of Wheeler, NY this spirit’s sole purpose was to fight off the rustlers, bandits, and no good criminals who hid in the wilderness around Mutton Hollow. Only a few times during the year will the Headless Horse appear in the small town of Wheeler. It’s presence signaling the protection of the innocent and the torment of the criminals.
Steuben County was rife with criminals in its early years. People like Robert Douglas who was hanged for his crimes in Bath, or Rosenkrans, a serial thief who stole from anyone, anywhere, proved that settling here was risky and dangerous. The cultural recognition of the Headless Horse was created out of fear of these criminals, a greater longing for there to be safety and security in Wheeler. The thought of a spirit that was there to protect against criminals was both a comfort and a warning. Should anyone living in Wheeler chose to commit a crime, they would fear attracting the attention of the Headless Horse.
Do you believe there is a spirit haunting the hills of Mutton Hollow Road?
Canisteo Valley Historical Society (Arkport)
“The Arks of Steuben County”
Before there were airplanes, automobiles, railroads or even passable roadways, the quickest way to transport goods from Steuben County to the major port of Baltimore was by river arks. These arks were not built like a typical boat, rather a glorified raft or barge. Rivers can be shallow and offer little room for a boat hull that has a high draft (distance between the waterline to the keel) and so the need for a shallow hull was important for traveling on the river.
The village of Arkport, to no surprise, got its name from these arks, and the area where the village is located today was a ‘port’ where arks were built and where these arks were casted-off, traveling down the Canisteo River. Arks required intense labor to build but were easy to scrap once they arrived at their destination. By 1800, the area surrounding Arkport was filled with untouched, old-growth white pine trees, perfect for the building of arks. Building an ark required you to make a slender and shallow hull (approx. 16 feet wide and between 60 to 100 feet long).
An interesting feature and use of the arks was the creation of ‘ark trains’, a string of arks tied together in a manner that allowed the safe navigation of the rivers at once. The uneven terrain of rivers, the sudden dips and runs created a dangerous obstacle for these boats, especially if they were tied together. A solution was to tie them together in such a way as to allow each bot to ‘slink’ over the bumps and runs. Witnessing one of these ark trains would appear as if there were a giant snake slinking down the river, boats bobbing up and down.
The big question is why use an ark? Why couldn’t the settlers rely on simple horse and wagons? The simple answer is that the roadways that existed in Steuben County were anything but useful, and often these roads utilized the narrow Haudenosaunee paths that traversed the landscape. Carrying large quantities of heavy cargo by road would have been too slow, expensive, and frustrating, and could even be dangerous. The use of an Ark allowed tons of cargo to be shipped at once, requiring little effort to propel the craft, and by the time the arks arrived in Baltimore the goods were still fresh. Plus, when an ark arrived in Baltimore the crew would disassemble the ark and sell off the wood as well, making extra money. On the return trip the crew would ride horses or walk back to Arkport, ready to make another trip to Baltimore.
Prattsburgh Historical Society
“Traveler’s Poem of the K&P Rail Road”
Kanona and Prattsburg
A half a dozen trav’ling men,
On Washington’s birthday,
Said good-bye to Kanona, and
For Prattsburg moved away;
The walking was so very bad,
They couldn’t stand the strain,
And so they did the next best thing-
They took a Prattsburg train.
It was an interesting sight
To see that faithful crew
Make up the train for Prattsburg,
While the moments swiftly flew.
‘Twas due to leave at 3.15,
But here I’d like to state,
When it was ready for a start
“Twas fifty minutes late.
There were box cars and flat cars, too,
And cars of every kind;
The freight cars they were all ahead,
The passenger behind;
The engine made an awful fuss
To draw the train along,
We feared ‘twould “bust its biler,”
‘Cause it wasn’t very strong.
It drew the train quite fast at first,
Displaying lots of power;
We hoped to make that Prattsburg run
In about a half an hour.
But soon it settled to a pace
No faster than a walk;
And once or twice it acted queer,
We feared ’twas going to balk.
Then suddenly ‘twould gather strength,
And up the grade would climb;
But when it had to whistle,
It would stop most every time;
For when it to a crossing came,
Where whistle had to blow,
It took its strength for whistling,
So it left no power to go.
That Prattsburg engine surely
Kept us guessing all the time;
And that is why I tho’t to try
To write its pranks in rhyme;
It forward went and backward, too,
And acted like a clown;
The once or twice it stopped quite short
And jumped right up and down.
The grinding of those air-brakes
Kept the train in constant quiver;
Cold chills ran up and down our spines,
And caused us each to shiver;
There never was a broncho
Could perform so many feats;
We got so interested, that
We couldn’t keep our seats.
Our tickets all were limited,
So ’twas our great desire
To reach our destination
Ere our tickets should expire.
We got quite tired and hungry, too,
Yet we were all alive,
When we arrived at Prattsburg
Fifteen minutes after five.
— Irv Nichols
“The Museum Trail Weekend is an opportunity to connect with your local community history. All 20+ museums will be open on October 19 from 10am – 5pm and October 20 from 12 – 5pm. This is your chance to visit an unfamiliar museum near you or to visit a museum that has limited hours during the year. Admission to these museums will be free!
The public can get a copy of the Museum Trail Maps at your local museum or library, or you can get a digital copy of the map by clicking the link https://www.bit.ly/SC-MuseumTrailMap. Every museum will be free, and I encourage you to venture out and explore our complex County history.”
