The First Land Office

The Holland Land Company, having obtained full title to this immense tract of land in western New York, employed Joseph Ellicott as chief surveyor to lay out townships and subdivide the towns into lots. The company's

first land-office was opened in Batavia in 1801 . . Their advertising gave such glowing accounts of the splendid soil, timber and water-power of this section that it was not long before the pioneer settlers began arriving in ever increasing numbers.

Page Nine

The Villiage Nucleus

WHERE and how did Gowanda start? The next time you cross the corner of Buffalo and Perry Streets, pause a moment and imagine how it must h'ave looked to Turner Aldrich on that day in 1810 when he began clearing the land at that point. As the initial Gowanda settler, this venturesome Quaker had come up the Cattaraugus with his family of three sons and three daughters. The first route taken by the pioneers who had purchased land in the town of Collins was via Buffalo to Irving and thence across the Cattaraugus Reservation.

across the Cattaraugus Reservation. Turner Aldrich was one of those Connecticut men who migrated to Western New York in the early wake of the Holland Land Purchase

He took up 707 acres covering both sides of the Cattaraugus which comprised_ a large portion of the present village of Gowanda. He built a log house on the east (Erie) side of the stream. The land he cleared rewarded him with a bountiful crop of corn and potatoes

Surrounded by fine timber, with water power readily available, Aldrich soon decided on a saw-mill opposite his home. He hollowed out basswood troughs and conducted the waters of Grannis Brook to the mill. It was a crude, hand-made affair of uncertain capacity. B1.1t it gave the settlement its first name-''Aldrich Mills''-by which it was known for the next.

Page Ten

twelve years. It was also sometimes called ''The Falls of the Cattaraugus."

Ahaz Allen came to Zoar about 1810 to buy land on the Cattaraugus for milling purposes. Finding the Aldrich family ahead of him, he bought 300 acres of land in Hidi and plan.ned to dam the creek and build a saw-mill. He was much impressed by the magnificent pines, oaks, black-walnuts, hemlocks and other timber that so densely covered the h:ills and valleys and the splendid facilities offered by unlimited water power.

In 1812 Ahaz Allen, with his wife and infant son, Norman, embarked in a canoe at the head of Zoar Flats and paddled down the Cattaraugus to Hidi, where JohnRussell of Concord had built a log house for them the previous year. 0 n September 1 5, 1813, a newcomer was announced by the Allen family as the first white child born in Perrysburg or Persia. She was christened Caroline Allen.

I,n 1814 Mr. Allen, employing help, dug the first mill-race at Hidi and built the first dam on the Cattara11gus. They were digging the millrace at the time of the bo1nbardment of Fort · Erie in 1814 and could hear the booming of the cannon each day. Not knowing the result.

of the battle, the local settlers were in suspense for more than a week. Then an Indian from the reservation, who had been at the scene of battle, gave them particulars of the fight and good news that the Americans had won.

Although the Indians were friendly and never molested the settlers, they were always to be seen loitering arbout, watching distrustfully the progressive work of the pioneers. As the giant trees were felled and the land cleared, they knew their best hunting grounds were vanishing.

In building the dam, Mr. Allen had no way of foreseeing the elements he had to combat, when the stream was swollen to full banks and surged down with irresistible force. Consequently, the worl<: of three 1nonths was swept away in the fall freshet. But the following year he built another dam, of his own designing, that stood up for many years. When he completed his saw-mill at Hidi, it was run day and night to supply the demand for lu1nber.

In 1814 Thomas and Edwin Farnsworth came from central New York and took up land between the Aldrich and Allen purchases,

Page Eleven