GREENWOOD 



GENERAL DESCRIPTION. 



The town of Greenwood was formed from Troupsburgh 

 and Canisteo, Jan. 24, 1827. West Union was taken from 

 it in 1845, and a part of Jasper was annexed in 1848. It 

 lies upon the western border of the county, and is bounded 

 north by Hartsville, east by Jasper, south by West Union, 

 and west by the county line. Bennett's Creek runs through 

 the east part of the town through a valley excavated from 

 four to six hundred feet below the hill-tops. The central 

 and western part of the town is rolling upland of clayey 

 loam, the valleys being loam mixed with gravel and shale. 



EARLY SETTLEMENT. 



Alexander H. Stephens came up Bennett's Creek from 

 Canisteo, in company with Anson Robinson, popularly 

 known as " Bobinson Crusoe," and commenced the first 

 clearing in the town of Greenwood, a mile north of the 

 present village, on the Hovey Stephens place, in the spring of 

 1821. Ezra Cobey, a Prussian, had previously made a small 

 clearing; three miles down the creek, in Canisteo. The road 

 had been chopped up through the valley and south to the 

 State line, by the land-office, but was not cleared. They 

 worked here during the summer and part of the winter, living 

 in a log cabin and working on their mill, Mrs. John Stephens 

 coming up occasionally to do their cooking. The family 

 did not move into Greenwood until the mill was running. 

 Ezra and John H. Stephens moved up the valley first, and 

 Phineas came soon after. The mill, to which was soon 

 added two ''run" of stones, was built near the Brundage 

 mill, and run by an undershot breast-wheel. The outlines 

 of the old pond are still marked by willows. This was the 

 first mill built in the town, and was operated by Uriah 

 Stephens until 1825, when Colonel John Stephens moved 

 into the town. At this time there was no mill in reach of 

 the settlements down the creek nearer than at Wombough's, 

 on the Tuscarora, and another north, on thj Canisteo. 



Settlement along the creek was made very fast after the 

 mill was built. 



Deacon Jacob Manning, from New Hampshire, came in 

 1823, his family consisting of his wife and one son, Daniel 

 Manning. Dennis Sanford settled back on the hill, to- 

 wards Krusin's Corners, in 1824. Eleazer Woodward 

 came in 1823, from New Hampshire, and opened a tannery 

 on a small stream to the east, near the mill. Sebe Norton 

 and Stephen Pawell settled in the southwest part of the 

 town, on the ridge, and Enoch Ordway and his two sons- 

 in-law, " Hoose" Carr and Ezra Lovejoy, Hiram Putnam, 

 John H. Hoyt, Joseph and Josephus Bachelor, and Jacob 

 Manning settled along and near the creek. Guy Wardwell 

 lived on the strip of land annexed to Greenwood from Jas- 

 per before any other settlement was made in the town. 

 302 



Next to building a mill, the opening of a tavern and cross- 

 roads was an alluring enterprise. 



In the fall of 1824, Levi Davis, of Dryden, Tompkins 

 Co., came and bought the site of the present village of 

 Greenwood, built a log house, and in March, 1825, moved 

 in and opened a tavern. In one corner of the room a bar 

 was fenced off, in which he sold goods, which consisted 

 mainly of tea, snufi", cotton- cloth, tobacco, pork, and whisky 

 (worth twenty cents a gallon at the still), oats, hay, and 

 indigo for coloring cloth. This was the first tavern and 

 store in the town. As business increased, he added a bed- 

 room to the front stoop, and built a kitchen in the rear. 

 Mr. Davis also commenced the manufacture of pot and pearl 

 ashes, which he continued for thirty years. The farmers 

 when clearing their land gathered and saved the ashes, 

 which they boiled down in bad weather, selling the black 

 ash at the store. Seven hundred bushels of ashes were re- 

 quired for a ton of potash, which would be worth from $80 

 to $100. A man could make |10 a month by gathering 

 his ashes and boiling down the proceeds. This was a cash 

 business, the Liverpool market readily absorbing these 

 chemicals, until the Russians entered into competition some 

 years later. The first post-office in the town was at this 

 store. Joshua L. Chapman, then a boy of fifteen, carried 

 the mails on horseback through the dense forest from Hor- 

 nellsville to Canisteo. passing through Greenwood, the jour- 

 ney taking him one day each way. This was in 1828-29. 

 In 1826, Col. Ira Davenport, father of Hon. Ira Davenport, 

 the present State senator, became Mr. Davis' partner. David 

 Foote and Wm. Ferguson, who bought two village lots of 

 Bedmond Davis, a short distance above the store, and opened 

 a coffin and furniture manufactory in 1830, were the next 

 settlers in the future village. Some of their heavy carved 

 work is still treasured by Mr. Davis, as specimens of artistic 

 skill. 



In 1830, Benjamin F. Brundage moved from Bath, and 

 erected a carding and cloth-dressing factory in Greenwood, 

 in which he did a successful business until its destruction 

 by fire in 1846, when it was replaced by the present flouring- 

 mill. Mr. Brundage has been a prominent citizen. Of his 

 seven sons, Bobert L. and Benjamin C. are prominent 

 lawyers ; Israel M. a successful farmer, — he has for several 

 years been supervisor of the town ; and John M. Brundage 

 has been justice of sessions. 



Daniel McCormick came from the county of Antrim in 

 1832, and built a grist-mill at Bough and Ready. In 1834 

 his brother James came, bringing his wife and two little 

 children, arriving in the winter at New York City, where 

 he bought a one-horse wagon, and started up the North 

 River on his overland journey to his new home, which he 

 reached about the middle of January, after twenty-four days 



