NIAGARA COUNTY: AN ACCOUNT OF ITS AGRICULTURE 

 AND OF ITS FARM BUREAU 



PART I 



THE AGRICULTURE OF NL\GARA COUNTY ^ 



" Niagara " is a name known around the world, calling to mind one of 

 the greatest of waterfalls. The territory adjacent to the river has its Indian 

 traditions and its history of Indian, French, and British strife. The French 

 visited it first in 1626 and found it to be a valuable center for the fur 

 trade, for at that time the Indians were using the Great Lakes, with a 

 portage at the falls, as their trading route to the French fort at Quebec. 

 Some fifty years later La Salle began the building of forts and trading 

 houses along the Niagara Ri\^er. In 171S a French writer spoke of the 

 country thus : 



" The Niagara Portage is two leagues and a half to three leagues long, 

 but the road over which carts roll two or three times a year, is very fine, 

 with very beautiful and open woods through which a person is visible 

 for a distance of six hundred paces. The trees are all oaks and very 

 large. The soil along the whole of that road is not very good. Above 

 the first hill there is a Seneca village of about ten cabins, where Indian 

 corn, beans, peas, and watermelons and pumpkins are raised, all of which 

 are very fine." 



This region was coveted by the British, and in 1759 they captured it. 

 The British held it until 1796, when it became the property of the United 

 States. 



The early history of Niagara is one of warfare and of Indian trading. 

 Even when it was under French control, it was claimed b}^ both Massa- 

 chusetts and New York; and later, although it was under British control, 

 New York claimed it and considered it a part of several difi^erent counties. 

 Not until 182 1 was Niagara County erected with its present boundaries, 

 about eighteen miles north and south bv thirtv miles east and west, and 

 in its present rectangular shape. It is bounded on the north by Lake 

 Ontario, on the east by Orleans and Genesee Counties, on the south by 

 Erie County and the Niagara River, and on the west by the Niagara 

 River. It has an area of five hundred and twenty-two square miles. 



While the territory embraced by the botmdaries of Niagara County was 

 among the first in the States bordering on the Great Lakes to be visited 

 by white men, its settlement did not commence in earnest until the begin- 

 ning of the nineteenth century. The greater part of the population, 

 prior to 1800, was connected with the garrisons, and no definite attempt 

 to follow agriculture was made. In 1800, when the first tax roll for land 

 west of the Genesee River was made out, there was not a single taxable 

 person within the boundaries of the present Niagara County. 



In 1802 the first agricultural settlement was made on the lake shore near 

 Fort Niagara (Fig. 2, page 2085). From 1802 to 1812 many settlements were 



1 Some of the historical data used in this circular are taken from Soil Survey of Niagara County, 

 New York, published by the United States Bureau of Soils. 



131 [2081] 



