New York's Cobblestone Country
But, my mind wanders n the present. My gaze is fixed about the deep window well and recessed windows with wavy patterns in the glass. I'm not a 21st century woman. I'm a pioneer to the wilds of new york.
My spouce and i traveled by ox cart over muddy, rutted roads from Connecticut to construct a farm in the frontier. Our land, purchased n the Holland Land Organization, was covered in dense forest so our first task was to fell the trees and build a log cabin. On the cleared land we planted crops for our sustenance.
As we plowed the fields, we discovered they had been full of fist-sized stones (or cobblestones), evidence that glaciers scoured this land prior to the forests grew. Those pesky rocks had to be moved into position, and as we plowed the cobbles seemed to multiply. It was difficult operate, but the land was productive and we could grow sufficient produce to feed our growing family.
Then the Erie Canal opened in 1825, creating a method to get our create to larger markets. Our farming company flourished, enough to ensure that we began to think about building a much better house for our 10 children. Why not put those pesky cobblestones to use and construct a dandy home - they had been by golly, lying about free in the fields, just waiting to be gathered. And, my husband, children and I had been definitely not strangers to difficult labor.
So we began gathering the stones and we held bees with neighboring families to sort them into piles by size and shape. We figured we'd require about 15,000 cobbles. We needed to dig and cart sand and purchase quicklime from the limekiln a day's cart-ride away, to make our soft lime mortar. And we had to fell more trees and hew them into beams and boards to hand make the frames for our doors and windows.
Erecting the 16-inch thick stone walls was a slow process. It took us 3 years of hard labor to build our house. But, what a fine home - it has stood since 1827, a testament to our loving craftsmanship.
Many of our neighbors constructed their houses of cobblestone - small farmhouses and grand village mansions. Plus they built churches, stores, barns, taverns and even cemetery markers with the cobblestones. In all, over 700 cobblestone structures were built within a 65-mile radius of Rochester, New York and nowhere else on the planet. They were constructed between 1825 and 1860, prior to the Civil War. Every was a operate of folk art; each distinctive. We were all proud of our houses constructed with many hours of sweat and labor.
I'm jolted back to the present as the waitress brings a coffee refill. I'm lucky to live these days where I can choose how to exert my labor. Having 10 children and building a cobblestone house from scratch will not be on my job list. But, touring to see the labors of others certainly is. After lunch at the Cobblestone Restaurant, I'm off on a driving tour to see a few of the other distinctive structures built with cobblestones.
Because the cobblestone structures are clustered in Western New York State, they lend themselves nicely to driving tours. The guidebook "Cobblestone Quest - Road Tours of New York's Historic Buildings" offers 17 self-guided tours for viewing the diversity of cobblestone structures. You can sleep in a cobblestone bed and breakfast, dine in a cobblestone restaurant and go to a cobblestone museum on your tours. You should not gather cobblestones beforehand though.
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