Geneva1877 April The New York Central, the Erie Railroad, the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Baltimore Railroad announce an end to their rate war and a 10% reduction in wages. State Adirondacks photographer Seneca Ray Stoddard takes a portrait of promoter-builder William West Durant at his Camp Pine Knot. ** The New York State Reformatory at Elmira opens. It's the first to result from the prison reform movement. Albany Socialite Huibertje Pruyn (Hamlin) is born. Rochester School principal Anna Galbraith moves to Lafayette Street. 1878 Jan 22 Edward Collins, founder of the Collins steamship line, dies in New York City. May 21 Aviation pioneer Glenn Curtiss is born in Hammondsport. Jul 11 President Rutherford B. Hayes removes Chester A. Arthur as Collector of Customs of the Port of New York and Naval Officer Alonzo B. Cornell, in defiance of New York City bosses. Oct 27 Bank robber "Western George" L. Leslie pulls off his greatest heist, stealing $3,000,000 from the Manhattan Savings Institution. Nov 13 The first telephone on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange is installed. Nov 17 Author-teacher-bacteriologist Hans Zinsser is born in New York City. City Elevated railway tracks are built on Third and Sixth Avenues. ** Brooklyn printer J. H. Wehman begins publishing song sheets. ** Wealthy businessman William C. Rhinelander dies, freeing the family estate, held in trust, for distribution to his heirs. ** Industrialist Edward Cooper, running on the Republican ticket, defeats Democrat August Schell to become mayor, serving 1879-1880. ** Theodore N. Vail is named general manager of the American Bell Telephjone Company. ** Mount Sinai Hospital describes Tay-Sachs disease for the first time in the U. S. ** Philanthropist Mrs. William Choate founds the New York Exchange for Woman's Work to enable women, especially Civil War widows, to sell homemade goods and earn money. State A building is erected at Charlotte to house life saving crews. ** Hamilton College confers an honorary LL.D degree on canal builder John B. Jervis. ** A contractor for the Rochester and State Line Railway hurries through a track-crossing-track project before he can be halted by the crews of the established Erie and Central Railroad, in Le Roy. ** Rochester's Vacuum Oil Company, drilling in Middlebury, strikes salt on the Hayden farm, founding a local industry. Albany The Prospect Hill Pumping Station reaches a capacity of 10,000,000 gallons of water per day. Rochester Two Italians are fined $50 apiece for using the child of one to play in the saloon band of the other. ** George Eastman begins manufacturing the photographic dry plate. Syrause Construction begins on Joseph Lyman Silsbee's Dutch Reformed Church. 1879 Jan 16 New York City gets 13 inches of snow. Feb 22 Frank Winfield Woolworth opens his first five-cent store, in Utica. March Workers reopening an entrance to an Ellenville lead mine discover the bones of David M. Smith, a telegrapher for the local D & H Canal office, who had disappeared 13 years previously. May 8 Rochester inventor George B. Selden applies for a patent on a gasoline-powered vehicle. June Perfectionist John Humphrey Noyes, warned of an attempt by James William Towner to depose him, flees his colony at Oneida and flees to Canada. Aug 20 Noyes sends his followers in Oneida a message, partially renouncing "complex marriage". Oct 5 Writer-educator-musician John Erskine is born in New York City. City Scots author Robert Louis Stevenson travels by train from New York City to San Francisco. State Charlotte's import revenue drops to $148,000, from an 1855 peak of $1,534,000. ** Spiritualism's Lily Dale Assembly is founded, in Chautauqua County. ** Wayne County peppermint farmer Peter Hill dies, leaving his land to his son Edmund, a lawyer. ** Le Roy's first salt well is drilled. ** General John S. Clark of Auburn draws a map of the Groveland Ambuscade of 1779 (the Boyd-Parker murders). ** The state now has approximately 5360 miles of railroad track. ** W. H. Vanderbilt begins selling some of his holdings in the New York Central Railroad, in London, England, through the offices of Morgan and Company. ** A steamboat company, The Hudson River Line, is incorporated by Van Santvoord and Associates. Rochester William Reynolds sells Corinthian Hall to Samuel Wilder, who remodels it as the Academy of Music. ** The library of the Rochester Theological Seminary on East Avenue opens. 1880 July 1 Albany's Fort Orange Club is organized. Oct 15 Ruth Bryan, daughter of the woman who used Batavia, New York's Holland Land Office building for a dance studio, deeds the property to the Batavia Free Methodist Church. City The Rhinelander family builds Charles W. Clinton's Manhattan Apartment House. Clinton's 66th Street and Park Avenue armory is also completed. ** Democrat businessman William R. Grace defeats Republican Wiiliam Dowd to become mayor, serving 1881-1882. State The approximate date the Empire Stove Foundry is built, in Troy. ** Corning's population nears 5,000. ** Rochester's Bausch & Lomb Company opens a sales office in New York City. Batavia A monument is erected in Batavia Cemetery to lapsed Mason William Morgan, by the National Christian Association Opposed to All Secret Socieites. ** Buffalo lawyer Grover Cleveland tries a case here. ** A fire destroys 11 buildings on the east side of State Street. The Pioneer Sheds will be erected on the site, as a livery stable . David Minor Eagles Byte Historical Research Rochester, New York 716 264-0423 http://home.eznet.net/~dminor