This is one of my favorite photos courtesy of my mom. The Eldred Stage by Halfway Brook.
The Eldred Stage by Halfway Brook
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Halfway Brook Village or Eldred, New York
This is one of the super maps that my husband created for The Mill on Halfway Brook. Both the early names and current names are shown.
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Tagged Eldred, Halfway Brook, Highland Lake, Yulan
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Eldred, New York, another view
View of Eldred from behind the schoolhouse. Across the street was the first Parker House built by James Y. Parker in the early 1870s. The hotel was owned by several families before it burned down in I think it was the 1930s.
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Eldred, New York
Main Street looking South, Eldred, N.Y.
Eldred, New York
The next few posts will feature family postcards or photos of the village of Eldred, New York, where my Austin and Leavenworth relatives lived.
This first photo was in Great Aunt Aida Austin’s photo album and looks to be a postcard. It is a view of Eldred looking west from the vicinity of Highland Lake and Proctor Roads.
For those of you who have read The Mill on Halfway Brook, the house on the right was that of C.C.P. Eldred, son of James and Polly Mulford Eldred. C.C.P. was the postmaster for a number of years.
On the far left is the home of Abel Sprague Myers and his second wife Maria Hankins. The house was a boarding house at one time and called Orchard Terrace. I don’t know when the home was originally built.
Second from the left is the Congregational Church built in 1835.
The Methodist church, built in 1859, is in the distance and has a steeple on it. I have read that there was no steeple on the Methodist or the Congregational Church until after 1900.
However, in my great-grandmother Mary Ann Austin’s 1879 letter, she mentioned they were to have put the steeple up in July of that year. I don’t know whether that happened or not.
I do have two photos that will be in book two of the churches with no steeples.
If you have more information on any of these Eldred photos, please feel free to leave a comment on this site or contact me by email:
info at halfwaybrook dot com
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On organizing “Echo Hill and Mountain Grove”
Organizing the boarding houses that will be in “Echo Hill and Mountain Grove.’
Since April, I have been working on Echo Hill and Mountain Grove, book 2 in the series, Memoirs from Eldred, New York, 1800 to 1950.
Echo Hill Farm House, owned by my Leavenworth relatives, and Mountain Grove House, owned by my Austin relatives, were just 2 of the many boarding houses of Highland, New York, located within 5 miles of the Delaware River.
Echo Hill and Mountain Grove covers the years 1880 to 1925 and includes many of the boarding houses/summer homes that were near Yulan, Barryville, Eldred, and Highland Lake (Venoge for a time). (EH&MG ends at 1925 and 400+ pages.)
Boarding houses continued to be a main part of the economy of the area until the 1960s and will be included in Book 3— 1925 to 1950.
The boarding houses changed names and owners through the years and brain boggle set in. The photo above shows my attempt at organizing the years, the locations, the names, and owners of the boarding houses. The different colors are not significant; they were the colors available at the time.
This project was/is powered by tea—the cup sitting on the table in the background highlights my new kitchen completed during the writing of The Mill on Halfway Brook.
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Tagged Austin, Barryville, Eldred, Highland, Highland Lake, Leavenworth, Yulan
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1609–1909 Navigating the Hudson River
This is 1909 Postcard is in the Austin collection of my mother.
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Eldred News, February 17, 1919
Tri-States Union, Port Jervis Newspaper
Eldred February 1, 19197
It is a raw, cold day, so different from the spring weather of last week.
Mr. and Mrs. Ernest Clark came in town to spend Sunday with her parents last Saturday. They found plenty of mud on their way here in their car.
There was some excitement Tuesday evening over the law suit at Justice Eldred’s. Even the ladies turned out. Barryville was well represented as both parties resided in that place.
Mr. John Love lost one of his horses of paralysis. His mate is all right again and is being worked today.
Mr. A.T. Sergeant is slowly recovering from his severe illness.
Mr. Alvin Hill is getting better slowly. He does not like the “flu.”
Mrs. Web Labarr has been confined to the house for a few days.
Mr. N.B. Myers was hit by a limb on the knee in the woods the other day and has not been able to work since.
Mrs. M. Hoatson was ill a few days last week with Neuralgia. She is staying with Mrs. C.W. Wilson.
The singing class will meet Wednesday evening in Sunshine Hall. All are invited.
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Robinson, Illinois, Febrary 6, 1918
This is one of the Lone Scout letters written to my uncle McKinley (Mac) Austin in 1918.
Robinson, Illinois, February 6, 1918
Dear Mac,
Well, you did indeed answer that horrid, horrid letter. I hope you tore it up.
Today in algebra class, Mr. Hedden threatened to throw me out of the window because I never exercised my cerebrum getting three pages of algebra problems. Daddy says I am the leader of Mischief Makers in this town. But I just can’t help it.
The other day, one of the Seniors dared me to put a torpedo or something under the Professor’s chair and I did. I always take a dare, though I shouldn’t.
The result was that he (the professor) caught his trousers on fire and Sidney Beans, the boy who dared me to put it under there, burnt his trousers trying to save the professor.
Sidney ruined his trousers and also played part of hero so therefore, though he has about a dozen suits, a different one every day almost, the high school gave him money enough for a good pair of trouser, he bought a real cheap pair, black and white checked, and kept the rest of the money.
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Election 1908
These postcards were sent to my Austin grandparents in 1908.
William Howard Taft, Secretary of War and close friend of President Theodore Roosevelt was the Republican Party candidate for President of the United States in 1908.
The Democratic nominee was William Jennings Bryan. Bryan had been defeated in 1896 and 1900 by Republican William McKinley, but he was very popular with some in the Democratic Party.
“The full dinner pail for mine” most likely refers to the 1900 U.S. presidential slogan of William McKinley: Four more years of the full dinner pail .
William H. Taft was elected President.
Posted in Book excerpts, Echo Hill and Mountain Grove
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