Teacher of the third grade certificate for Aida A. Austin of Eldred, March 15, 1889. Aida’s highest score of 95 was in Orthography (spelling) and reading.
The first chapter of The Mill on Halfway Brook, mentions the abundance of wildlife in what was once the Town of Lumberland.
Starting in 2008, Cousin Cynthia took photos of the current animals in the area—many deer, turkeys, and eagles. She promised me that one day she would get me a shot of a bear. And recently, when she visited Eldred, she did see a bear as she and friends were looking at Echo Hill and Mountain Grove.
The following descriptions are from “Picturesque Erie: Summer Homes,”
by L.P. Farmer, N.Y., L.E. &R.R., 1888. The distance is from New York City. Week days: 3–8 trains from and 5–8 trains back to N.Y.C.
Sundays: 1–5 trains.
Sparrowbush, N.Y.,
90-3/4 miles
Fare: $2.80; round trip $3.80.
Sparrowbush is a romantic village two miles west of Port Jervis. It is in the midst of some of the finest mountain scenery of the Delaware Valley. The Hawk’s Nest Mountain Road, which is one of the attractions of Sparrowbush, is an unequaled drive. There are many other natural and artificial attractions in the vicinity which commend Sparrowbush especially to the summer visitor.
Boarding houses: Geo. Terwilliger, John R. Patterson (Sparrowbush); and Mrs. Mary Rose.
Pond Eddy, Pa., 99 miles
Fare: $3.05; round trip $4.20
Situated in the Delaware Valley, in the midst of picturesque mountain scenery, with ponds and streams, ravines and glens in profusion. Boating, bathing and fishing of the best. Population, 200. Comfortable and healthful place to spend the summer. Wm. Rixton Hotel. Continue reading
From 1882 until 1907 the Erie Railroad ran excursion trains from New York City and Scranton, Pa., to Shohola Glen—the original of the modern theme parks.
In lower Shohola Glen, Kilgour constructed a large lake, pavilions, galleries, amusement rides including a carousel, a huge dancing and roller-skating platform under the Shohola Viaduct on the Erie Railroad, and a large dining hall and kitchen…
In the upper glen he constructed paths and rustic bridges across the Shohola Creek and through out the park to showcase the natural beauty of the Glen.
Pools of water and formations named Cascade Cavern, Bell Rock, Devil’s Pass, Hell Gate, Terror Grotto, Satan’s Nose, and The Spirit of Dark Waters, were some of the names given to these places of natural beauty…
The park was lighted by colored electric lights, lanterns and electric torches with power being generated on site from a turbine in the old mill.
—shohola.org.
These listings first appeared in Erie Railway publications from 1885–1889.
Washington Lake House, Joseph Tether, Proprietor
Accommodates 30; 20 rooms, adults $6 to $8; children half price; servants $5; transient $1.25 per day. Discount for season. Transportation adults $1; children, half price. Lake of 200 acres only 2 minutes’ walk. Perch, pickerel, bass. Surrounded by forest. Raises vegetables. Plenty milk, eggs butter and poultry.
Spring House, Barryville, George Layman Proprietor
5 minutes walk from Shohola. Accommodates 30; 20 rooms; adults $7 to $8; children under 12, half price; servants $6; transient $1.25 per day. Discount for season. Transportation, $1. Raises vegetables. Plenty fresh milk, butter, eggs and poultry.
Laurel Valley Farm House, Charles Hickok, Proprietor
Accommodates 20; 10 large rooms; adults $7; children $3.50; transient $1.50 per day. Transportation free to weekly boarders. 3 miles from Shohola Glen. Good livery. Will meet guests in response to telegrams. Raises vegetables. Plenty of butter, eggs, milk and poultry.
Lake View Farm House, Edward Prange, Proprietor
Accommodates 20; 13 rooms; adults $7; children $3; servants $5; transient $1.25 per day. Discount for season. Transportation, $1. Raises vegetables. Plenty fresh milk, butter, eggs and poultry. Continue reading
Halfway Brook Publishing presents:
Echo Hill and Mountain Grove!
Echo Hill and Mountain Grove continues the story started in The Mill on Halfway Brook, in the Town of Highland, Sullivan County, New York. It is the second in the series, Memoirs from Eldred, New York, 1800–1950.
The narrative is an account of the change from lumbering, rafting, and bluestone quarrying, to that of running boarding houses in the picturesque hamlets of Barryville, Minisink Ford, Yulan, Eldred, and Venoge (Highland Lake) located near the Delaware River.
Echo Hill and Mountain Grove tells the history of the Town of Highland and its townsfolk (Austin, Leavenworth, Eldred, Myers, Bodine, Bradley, Bosch, Clark, Gardner, Hallock, Mills, Boyd, Horton, Parker, Greig, Stege, Sergeant, Tether, and others), many of whom owned boarding houses.
It includes visits to Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, New York City, and France. Details on the Shohola Depot, Shohola Glen, Shohola House, the Pelton Soda Factory, the Roebling Bridge, the Congregational Church Centennial, Zane Grey, two presidential assassinations, and World War I, are a part of the story.
Echo Hill and Mountain Grove is 2.5 pounds, over an inch thick, and 512 pages packed full of stories from 1880 to 1920 in the Town of Highland, NY.
Click on Look Inside under Echo Hill and Mountain Grove on the right hand side to see a few pages of chapter 3 and the 20 page index. It takes a half minute or more to load.
Echo Hill and Mountain Grove is available for $39.95 (which includes USPS shipping).
Feel free to email any questions to me, Louise Smith:
info (at) halfwaybrook (dot) com.
A special thank you to my husband Gary for a new updated site!
Echo Hill and Mountain Grove has been uploaded, and I will soon have a proof copy. If that isn’t quite right, I will make corrections and hopefully by the end of September Echo Hill and Mountain Grove will be available!!
Thank you so much for your patience.
The summer cottages, hotels and boarding houses thickly planted on the mountain slopes and by the lakes and living streams of Sullivan, Delaware, and Western Ulster Counties, are now tenanted by a larger throng of city visitors than ever before.
…Sullivan County alone offered accommodations at the opening of this season for 8,000 guests, against 6,500 last year, and as a rule every available place of entertainment is filled with New York, Brooklyn and Newark guests.
Taking together Sullivan, Delaware, and the adjoining regions in Ulster west of the Catskills, the number of visitors now being entertained will exceed 15,000…
In the rugged, picturesque, and healthful highland region in question, which has a mean altitude of 1,500 feet above sea level, many city people of means have built for themselves handsome country seats or cozy cottages for Summer abodes.
Perhaps the most magnificent and costly of these country homes are those owned by Mr. George R. MacKenzie, President of the Singer Sewing Machine Company, and Mr. William F. Proctor, Treasurer of the same company, both situated in the town of Lumberland in Sullivan County.
In the same town, Mr. Leon DeVenoge, importer of New York, has a handsome Summer mansion and an estate of 2,000 acres…—The New York Times, “Some of the People Summering in the Catskills,” Middletown, N.Y., August 11, 1888.
1886 lithograph of a busy scene on Broadway in New York City titled: A glimpse of New York’s dry goods district; The largest in the world, covering a space of 135 acres; containing 4,500 firms; employing $800,000,000 capital.
—Source: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division:LC-USZ62-2662.
The Austins often spent the winter in New York City with their Eldred-Austin cousins, possibly through the 1880s. At the turn of the century (1900s) Mort and Jennie Austin and their family often received postcardswith New York City buildings or bridges from friends and boarders .
All this to say that Echo Hill and Mountain Grove is peppered with sidebars related to New York City.
