Railroad Station: Union Station, Main St. near foot of Genesee St., for New York Central System, Delaware, Lackawanna & Western R.R., and New York Ontario & Western Ry.
Bus Station: 128 Genesee St. for Greyhound Lines, Central New York Coach Lines, and interurban busses.
Airport: Municipal airport, 6.9 m. W. on State 49; no scheduled service.
Streetcars and busses: Fare 10¢, 10 tokens 75¢.
Taxis: 35¢ anywhere in the city; extra passengers 15¢ each.
Accommodations: 8 hotels; boarding houses, tourist homes.
Information Service: Automobile Club of Utica, Hotel Martin, 225 Bleecker St.; information booths (summer only), north and south city entrances.
Radio Station: WIBX (1200 kc.).
Golf: Valley View municipal course, Roscoe Conkling Park, Pleasant St. and Seymour Ave., 18 holes, 50¢
Tennis: Roscoe Conkling Park; city playgrounds.
Annual Events: Welsh Eisteddfod, New Year’s Day; Proctor Day, Sat. following July 4th.
UTICA (500 alt., 100,063 pop.), trading center and largest mill town of the Mohawk Valley, lies 20 miles east of the geographical center of the State. The almost level city area of about 22 square miles marks the western terminus of the Mohawk highlands; the foothills of the central Adirondacks rise to the north.
Baggs Square, the heart of old Utica, is approached from the north over the river and railroad bridges. Three blocks south is Utica’s ‘busy corner,’ the junction of Genesee, Bleecker, and Lafayette Streets. The principal manufacturing plants are in the eastern part of the city; the knitting mills are in the eastern and western sections. A belt of parks, donated by Thomas R. Proctor and connected by the Parkway, a landscaped boulevard, extends in a rough semicircle across the southern section and is bordered by a residential area of prosperous modern homes.
Power from Trenton Falls, 15 miles north, whirls the wheels of the city’s industries, producing about $50,000,000 in products yearly. Knit goods are the principal product; cotton cloth and cotton goods second, followed by beer, furnaces, metal furniture, firearms, machinery, and brass products. The surrounding rich farm and dairy section is the city’s trading area.
Foreign groups—about one third of the population—include 13,000 Italians, 7,000 Poles, and 5,000 Irish. In the Italian section in northeast Utica, a distinct air of the homeland prevails. Weddings are gala affairs; at funerals files of marchers tramp to the dirge of a muffled band; and Saints’ days are celebrated with parades and fireworks. In the Polish section, near the cotton mills in West Utica, the big social event is the wedding celebration, which lasts several days; every male guest dances with the bride and gives her a cash gift. The Welsh, of whom some 1,200 are foreign born, are occupied principally in the building trades. Y Drych (The Mirror), founded in New York City in 1851 and published in Utica since 1860, is the only Welsh language newspaper in the United States. The Cymreigyddion Society, the largest of a number of singing groups, sponsors the annual Utica Eisteddfod.
The Oneida Indian name for the vicinity of Utica was Yah-nun-da-da-sis (around the hill), in reference to the way their trails circled the near-by hills. At the city site was the only ford across the Mohawk River for many miles; and near by was the hub of trails leading northwest to the portage at Rome, west to Oneida Castle, and east to the settlements on the Mohawk and the Hudson. These trails became the routes of the white pioneers.
The site was included in Cosby’s Manor, a grant of 22,000 acres made by George II to William Cosby, governor of the Province of New York, and others in 1734. In 1758 the British erected Fort Schuyler on what is now Main Street, just below Second Street, close to the river. It was never garrisoned, and was abandoned in the early 1760’s.
In 1772 the Cosby tract, on which the quitrents were unpaid, was bought at public sale by Philip Schuyler, John Bradstreet, and others for about 1,300 pounds. In 1773 the Weaver, Reall, and Demuth families, descendants of the Palatines and staunch patriots, moved from German Flats to the north bank of the Mohawk River where it is crossed by the present North Genesee Street. In 1776 their settlement was destroyed during an Indian-Tory raid. After the Revolution new homes were erected; and in the floodtide of westward migration the settlement grew rapidly as a trading and transportation center. Among the early settlers was Peter Smith (1768–1837), who came in 1787 and who in later years was a partner of John Jacob Astor.
Quick to sense the possibilities of the place as an outpost for the Indian trade was John Post of Schenectady, who loaded family, employees, and merchandise on boats and made the trip west in nine days. Post erected a home and warehouses and sent his boats on regular trips to Schenectady, to bring back, not only goods to trade with the Indians and settlers, but also more Yankees and English to settle and become his customers. In 1792 a bridge was built across the river, and the next year stagecoaches ran from Albany; a church and a schoolhouse were erected in 1794. In 1796 Gerrit Boon, agent of the Holland Land Company for its northern tract, erected a three-story brick tavern; his purpose was to make the place a market and shipping point for the produce of his settlers. In 1798 the settlement, with a population of 200 in 50 houses clustered at the foot of the present Genesee Street, was incorporated as a village, and the present name was determined on by a chance selection from a hatful of paper slips.
After 1825 the Erie Canal brought new prosperity—new industries and Irish and German immigrants. The population, 2,972 in 1820, jumped to 8,323 in 1830. The city was chartered in 1832, and in the same year engine and boiler works joined the already existing plow factory, gristmill, iron foundry, and pottery. In 1836 the Chenango Canal and the Utica & Schenectady Railroad were completed and a clothing factory was opened. Stove and furnace manufacture was begun in 1842.
The textile industry, the backbone of Utica’s economic structure, began with the opening of the woolen mills in 1847 and of the cotton mills in 1848. The manufacture of locomotive headlights was started in 1851, of steam gauges in 1861, of firearms in 1862, of knit goods in 1863. Frank W. Woolworth opened his first five and ten cent store on Bleecker Street in 1879; it was a failure. The manufacture of worsted and caps was started in 1886. A wave of Italian and Polish immigration, attracted by the varied industries, reached its crest in 1910. During the World War the Utica plant of the Savage Arms Company, which manufactured the Lewis machine gun for the British Government, had a total production equal to about two thirds of Great Britain’s entire output of that weapon.
POINTS OF INTEREST
1. BAGGS SQUARE, junction of Main, Genesee, and Whitesboro Sts., the site of old Utica, was the center of the village until the Erie Canal stimulated growth. It is named for Moses Baggs, who built a log tavern on this site in 1798 and replaced it in 1813 with the Baggs Hotel, which was razed in 1932.
In the square is the PROCTOR MEMORIAL BUILDING (open 9–5 daily), a small one-story structure of early French Renaissance design, constructed of sandstone with a finial surmounting the sloping roof. The building, which contains the records of the Baggs Hotel, was erected in 1933 by Mrs. Thomas R. Proctor in memory of her husband, Thomas Redfield Proctor (1844–1920), who bought the Baggs Hotel in 1869 and made it one of the best known hotels in the East. In 1891 he married Maria, daughter of James Watson Williams, Utica capitalist. While on a European trip he conceived the plan of the magnificent park system that he donated to the city. Frederick Towne Proctor (1856–1929) came to Utica in 1887 and married Rachel, sister of his brother’s wife.
2. The HORATIO SEYMOUR HOME (private), NW. corner of Whitesboro and Hotel Sts., a severe three-story structure in the post-Colonial style, was built in 1810 and is now occupied by a manufacturing concern. The original Dutch oven and fireplace are intact. Horatio Seymour (1810–86), came to Utica at the age of nine from Pompey, New York. He studied law, represented the county in the State assembly, served as mayor of Utica and as governor (1853–5 and 1863–5), and in 1868 was Democratic candidate for President.
KEY FOR UTICA MAP
1. Baggs Square 2. Horatio Seymour Home 3. St. John’s Roman Catholic Church 4. Utica City Hall 5. Grace (Episcopal) Church 6. Oneida Historical Building 7. Rutger B. Miller House 8. Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute 9. First Presbyterian Church 10. Baron Von Steuben Statue 11. Forest Hill Cemetery 12. New Forest Cemetery 13. Utica & Mohawk Valley Cotton Mills 14. Utica State Hospital 15. Masonic Home
3. ST. JOHN’S ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH, SW. corner of John and Bleecker Sts., erected in 1869, a red brick structure in the Romanesque style with twin spires, dominates the downtown skyline. The leaded glass designs of the windows have been copied by other churches.
4. The UTICA CITY HALL, SW. corner of Genesee and Pearl Sts., erected in 1852–3, was designed by Richard Upjohn. The yellow brick building has a sober, Italian-Lombard Romanesque character which contrasts sharply with the English Gothic Grace Church near by, by the same architect. A heavy square tower subdivided by stone string courses dominates the exterior. The interior has been repeatedly altered.
5. GRACE CHURCH (Episcopal), SE. corner of Genesee and Elizabeth Sts., built in 1856–60, was also designed by Richard Upjohn. The entrance tower, added in 1870 by Upjohn’s son, Richard M., has a tall stone spire that was rebuilt in 1933 by his grandson, Hobart B. Upjohn. The tower masks the broad reversed gambrel roof. The strong solemn dignity of the exterior contrasts with the richer character of the spacious interior. The nave is roofed with arched timber trusses. The chancel was designed by Richard M. Upjohn in 1890.
6. The ONEIDA HISTORICAL BUILDING (open 2–5 weekdays, free), intersection of John and Elizabeth Sts. and Park Ave., constructed of buff brick with steep tile roofs and stepped gable ends, is an excellent example of the Flemish Gothic style. Designed by Richard Morris Hunt, it was donated in 1896 by Mrs. J. Watson Williams, mother-in-law of the Proctor brothers. The building houses a collection of curios, paintings, portraits, and books and manuscripts associated with Oneida County.
7. The RUTGER B. MILLER HOUSE (private), Rutger Park, Rutger St. opposite John St., designed by Philip Hooker, is a two-story post-Colonial stone house with a three-bay main section topped by a hip-roof, twin end chimneys, and a ‘captain’s walk.’ Begun in 1820 by Judge Morris S. Miller and completed by his son, Rutger B. Miller, about 1830, in its early days the house was called ‘Miller’s Folly’ because of its remoteness from the village of that time.
Roscoe Conkling (1829–88) bought the house in 1863 and made it his home. Conkling practiced law in Utica, served as mayor, and married Julia, sister of Horatio Seymour. He was elected to Congress in 1858, and while still a member of the House was elected to the Senate. He resigned from the Senate in 1881, together with his colleague, Thomas C. Platt, as a protest against President Garfield’s appointments in New York State and sought re-election as a rebuke to the President but was defeated. Conkling regarded political patronage in the State as his preserve, and as political ‘boss’ looked askance on the civil service reform movement. In 1877 he said, ‘When Dr. Johnson defined patriotism as the last refuge of a scoundrel, he was unconscious of the then undeveloped capacities and uses of the word “reform”.’
8. The MUNSON–WILLIAMS–PROCTOR INSTITUTE (open 9–5 weekdays), 312–18 Genesee St., occupies the former homes of Frederick T. and Thomas R. Proctor, yellow-painted brick Victorian mansions with bracketed eaves, set back on carefully landscaped grounds. The collection includes family heirlooms, paintings, and rugs. The institute was incorporated in 1920 but plans for its development were delayed until after the death of the members of the Proctor family, who bequeathed to it their homes and the bulk of their estates.
In 1936 the Arts Guild of New York City moved its school to a remodeled garage on the grounds of the institute and, under the name of the School of Related Arts and Sciences, began to offer courses in visual arts, the history and philosophy of art, and comparative symbolism.
9. The FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, SE. corner of Genesee and Faxton Sts., erected in 1922, is a brick structure with limestone and wood trim in the late Georgian Colonial style, with pedimented portico and well-proportioned tower.
10. The BARON VON STEUBEN STATUE, at Parkway entrance facing Genesee St., donated to the city by its German citizens, was unveiled on German Day, August 3, 1914. The sculptor was J. Otto Schwizer. Cast in bronze and mounted on a high granite pedestal, it shows von Steuben in a cocked hat wrapped in his voluminous military cloak.
11. In FOREST HILL CEMETERY, Oneida St. at Ballantyne Brae, is the SACRED STONE OF THE ONEIDAS, a rounded oblong stone on a three-stepped granite base, which is said to have served as an altar for many Indian rites and for the councils of the entire Iroquois Confederacy. According to legend, the stone miraculously appeared in the Oneida village at the foot of Oneida Lake and magically followed the tribe from one settlement to another.
12. In NEW FOREST CEMETERY, Oneida St. at Baker Ave., is the FOUNDER RATHBONE MONUMENT, a white granite monument on the highest slope of the cemetery, erected in memory of Justus H. Rathbone (1839–88), native son of Utica and founder of the Order of the Knights of Pythias. Impressed by the story of Damon and Pythias, Rathbone set out to induce men to follow their example. In 1864, while working for the U.S. War Department, he organized the first lodge, composed entirely of Government clerks.
13. The UTICA & MOHAWK VALLEY COTTON MILLS (open 9–4 weekdays; guides), State St. between Court and Columbia Sts. extending to Fay St., represent the consolidation of several mills, the oldest of which was opened in 1848. The company is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of sheets and pillow cases; the plant contains 138,000 spindles and 3,500 looms.
14. The UTICA STATE HOSPITAL (open 10–12, 2–4 Wed. and Sun.), Court St. between York and Whitesboro Sts., opened in 1843, was the first State institution for the insane. The main building was erected under the direction of three commissioners, General Francis E. Spinner, Captain Elam Lynds, and Captain William Clarke. Clarke had built several Utica buildings and is credited with the design, though he may well have had the assistance of a professional architect. The structure, 550 feet long and constructed of gray Trenton limestone, includes a central four-story section of offices, staff quarters, and attic chapel and three-story side wings with self-contained groups of patients’ rooms for classification by sex and ailment.
The exterior of the building comprises one of the noblest examples of Greek Revival architecture in the United States. The severely plain side wings, broken only by pedimented end pavilions, act as a foil to the august portico of the central block. The six Doric columns, built up of coursed limestone, have eight-foot diameters and are 48 feet high. The grand scale of this remarkable building recalls that other masterpiece of Greek Revival stonecutting, the Schoharie Aqueduct (see Tour 12). In 1857 a fire gutted the structure, leaving few traces of the original interior.
Dr. Amariah Brigham, the first superintendent of the Utica State Hospital, a pioneer believer in the therapeutic value of manual labor for patients, installed shops for carpentry, shoemaking, tailoring, blacksmithing, and whittling. For a number of years the patients wrote, edited, and printed their own magazine, Opal. Here Dr. Brigham began to publish the American Journal of Insanity, the first periodical in its field.
15. The MASONIC HOME, Bleecker St. near the east city limits, dates back to 1842, when Greenfield Poke contributed $1 toward its establishment. In 1889 the Grand Lodge purchased 160 acres and later acquired another 140 acres. The first building was erected in 1893; at present there are 19, arranged in a semicircle. The varied styles of the buildings reflect the changes in architectural taste since the nineties; most prominent are the Romanesque and neoclassic. The children attend the Utica public schools; those that show promise are given a college education.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Oriskany Battlefield, 9 m. (see Tour 12). Adirondack State Park, 20 m. (see Tour 21).
