Also, one of the main reasons for the failure of Charles Wlliamson's
settlement of Williamsburg(h), which _was_ on the Genesee, was that there
was no convenient markets for local products at an even later time (1790s).
As far as Rochester, the flour city, mentioned by Marla Bennett, it would
come along several decades after the scope of this query.

Aside from a very few products such as lumber which could be sent southward
out of the Finger Lakes by raft to the North Branch of the Susquehana,
hauling goods overland to Lake Ontario would be the primary route to most
markets. Everything west of the Genesee was uninhabited by whites at this
point.

David Minor

>Phil Lord wrote:
>
>> However, you may be at the margins of profitability for potash and other
>>products if taken all the way to Schenectady. Cost was based on days
>>spent paying boatmen, so the further away the market, the less profit.
>>Kingston, Ontario, was an viable alternate, when there wasn't warfare or
>>embargo to deal with.
>
>Far be it from me to argue with Phil on this point, but I'd suggest that
>there is a rather higher degree of probability that prior to 1808 any
>agricultural produce in western New York state was either a) consumed
>locally -- often by new settlers or b) shipped to Kingston and down the
>St. Lawrence.  There is substantial evidence of American vessels landing
>cargoes in Kingston in this period in the customs records, not to count
>all the goods that weren't subject to duties (most of the local
>produce).
>
>The Embargo and Non-intercourse acts changed the dynamics and the Erie
>Canal finished the job, but in the period you were discussing the
>principal outlet for western NY was Montreal.
>
>Walter Lewis
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David Minor
Eagles Byte Historical Research
Pittsford, New York
716 264-0423
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