76 



HISTORY OF STEUBEN COUNTY, NEW YOKK. 



county bar, residing in Corning from 1860 to 1870. He 

 was a member of the Legislature in 1862. Died in 1875. 



Alvin F. Payne was a partner of Mr. Sherwood, 

 firm of Sherwood & Payne, Corning. He commenced 

 practice here in 1863, and remained till 1868, when he 

 removed to New York. He was a member of the Legis- 

 lature from Long Island City in 1876. 



Charles H. Berry, Esq., commenced practice in 

 Corning about 1850; remained till about 1855, when he 

 removed to Minnesota, where he has since been attorney- 

 general. 



Hon. C. N. Waterman practiced law in Corning from 

 1851 to 1853. He removed to Minnesota, and became a 

 judge of the Supreme Court of that State. The firm here 

 was Berry & Waterman. Mr. Berry died in Minnesota. 



Isaac C. Herridon belonged to the bar of Corning 

 about 1855. In 1861 he was appointed secretary to Hon. 

 Andrew B. Dickinson, United States minister to Nicaragua. 

 He is now dead. 



Some of the other members of the bar who practiced in 

 Corning were as follows : 



George N. Middlebrook, 1850 ; remained about two 

 years ; now resides in New York. 



William K. Logie, 1860 ; enlisted in 1861 ; killed in 

 battle at the head of 141st Regiment, of which he was 

 colonel. 



AzARiAH LoNGWELL, 1864; firm of Longwell & 

 Graves. 



George 11. Graves, firm of Longwell & Graves, 1860- 

 70 ; removed to Minnesota, where he died. 



Jacob H. Wolcott, 1870 ; removed to Utah in 1874. 



CHAPTER XVI. 



THE COUNTY PBESS. 



BATH. 



Col. Williamson was directly connected with the in- 

 troduction of the printing-press into the Genesee country. 

 The two first newspapers were established under his au- 

 spices and patronage. Early in January, 1796, he procured 

 from Northumberland, or Sunbury, Pa., a second-hand 

 newspaper-office, and enlisted as printers and publishers 

 William Kersey and James Eddie. They issued the " Bath 

 Gazette and Genesee Advertiser." This was the first news- 

 paper published in Western New York. 



It is presumed that Mr. Kersey may have had a connec- 

 tion with the paper, not as printer, but as one of Mr. 

 Williamson's agents at Bath. He was a Friend, as would 

 appear from his letters. In one of them, written to Col. 

 Williamson at Albany, he speaks of having located some 

 new settlers, and at the same time asks for some new type, 

 urging that the type they had brought from Pennsylvania 

 is "old and worn out." "We, on considering the case, 

 conclude it is best to have a sufficient quantity of new type 

 to complete the ofiice, so that we may do business in good 

 fashion ; therefore, request that, in addition to the order by 

 Capt. Coudry, thou may be pleased to send us as soon as 

 may be, two hundred weight of small pica or bourgeois. 



We have some encouragement to pursue the business, but 

 many of our patrons complain of the badness of the print, 

 and that not without sufficient cause." Mr. Kersey was at 

 the time one of the judges of Steuben County, and informs 

 Col. Williamson that he and his associates had been " in- 

 dicted by the grand jury for not holding an election at the 

 Painted Post for a representative in Congress." 



The next newspaper established under the auspices of 

 Col. Williamson was also in the year 1796, but a little later 

 than the Bath Gazette. He induced Lucius Carey, who 

 had been publishing a paper at Newburgh, to sell out and 

 establish himself at Geneva. Mr. Carey forwarded his 

 printing materials by water, and came himself with his 

 household goods by land. On his arrival he wrote to Col. 

 Williamson at Albany that he had ended a long and expen- 

 sive journey, had arrived and found his house unfinished, 

 and no room provided for his office. Says he, " I am now 

 lying idle, and how long I shall I cannot say, only for the 

 want of a room to work in. My house was to be done in 

 July, and it is a mortifying reflection to me to have my 

 parents hear that I must lay idle for the want of a house, 

 when I had spoken so much in praise of the town, and 

 been the means of a number coming to it since I was here 

 in the winter." He says he almost repents of his bargain, 

 yet " with the loan of one hundred dollars, he thinks he 

 can get a paper out, and moving along, if he can get a 

 room." After a while his dwelling-house was finished, and 

 a far better one it must have been than pioneer printers 

 usually enjoy, for the amount paid for it by Mr. Williamson 

 was over two thousand dollars. In April, 1797, he brought 

 out the first number of the ^^ Ontario Gazette and Genesee 

 Advertiser^ The paper was continued about a year and a 

 half at Geneva, when it was removed to Canandaigua, and 

 in 1802 sold, and its name changed to the " Western Re- 

 pository and Genesee Advertiser.'^ Mr. Carey died in 

 Canandaigua in 1804. 



The large and long names of papers in those days was a 

 common feature throughout the newly-settled regions of 

 New York. They were designed to stretch out over a wide 

 and sparsely-populated section, and bring in patronage 

 and advertisements from all directions. Hence the names 

 " Western Advertiser," " Genesee Advertiser," etc., so 

 often attached to the names of the local places where the 

 papers were published. It was a shrewd method of catering 

 for patronage to a wide extent of country, but even then 

 the pioneer papers obtained but a very meagre support, and 

 many of them were short-lived ventures, which failed in a 

 few months. Where they were sustained, it was generally 

 at great sacrifice and long-continued struggles, if not to say 

 privations, on the part of the editors or publishers. Few 

 men deserve more at the hands of the public than those 

 who toiled long and arduously to establish good newspapers 

 and printing-offices. 



The progress of these first papers was quite encouraging. 

 Col. Williamson, in 1798, said: 



" The printer of the Ontario Gazette dispenses weekly 

 not less than one thousand papers, and the printer of the 

 Batli Gazette from four to five hundred." 



This was a good beginning, certainly, for papers not yet 

 two years old, and in a country just beginning to be settled. 



