Facts and History of my State, please share yours.

Did the Martians ever leave NJ?

Washington did a lot of sleeping around. It is how he became the father of our country.

One,
Hadrosaurus foulkii, or the Haddonfield Dinosaur, the state dinosaur, can be viewed at the New Jersey State Museum. He is only a replica. the real Haddonfield dinosaur is on display at the Philadelphia academy of Sciences. I guess there wasn't a state museum back in victorian times when he was dug up.
Martha

Looking way back to Harper's counties and mrsj's addition - Onondaga was named after the Native American tribe that has a reservation located in the county. And also the Onondaga Lake is heavily polluted due to the dumping of waste from the Solvay Process that used to be located on it's shores. In fact the lake STINKS. Before the plant closed all of the village of Solvay used to stink. The smell was suffocating. I forgot what Solvay Process made but one of my brothers used to work for another company on the premisses and Solvay used one of their waste products in the manufacture of "whatever"! The New York State Fair grounds are located in that area and to get there we used to have to drive through Solvay and we always hated the smell. The Carousel Mall is also on the shores of the lake. That whole area in my opinion was nothing but a toxic dump site. The Mall is on land that used to be filled with oil and fuel tanks - they didn't smell very good either!! Camillus, where I grew up, was the home of the Camillus Cutlery company - they closed down last year. I didn't think i could remember any history until mrsj mentioned Onondaga Reservation and Onondaga lake. The Erie Canal goes through the Town of Camillus. There is a park at the site in Camillus now with a bike/walk way on the towpath. One more thing, Syracuse is known as the Salt City because of salt mines located there. Eleanor

ME used to be part of MA. WI state motto is Forward! So now you can buy colored margerine there.

Connecticut once had claims on Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa and points west:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut_Western_Reserve

I'm posting a scan of a map showing the area around Syracuse, NY that I was talking about in post # 4583736. I marked where the Erie Canal is in Camillus and The Carousel Mall at the end of Onondaga Lake. The Onondaga Nation Territory is located south of Syracuse just off the map and Solvay Process was located in the village of Solvay. I grew up in the town of Camillus on a farm located at the intersection of Monroe Road and Lyons Road. Eleanor

edit: Just noticed that Monroe road isn't marked - weird cause it's a bigger road than Lyons road. Monroe road is the road between Howlett Hill road and Camillus!!

This message was edited Feb 24, 2008 8:11 PM

This message was edited Feb 24, 2008 8:11 PM

This is the famous New Yorker's (city, that is) view of the world. I still feel this way.

http://www.cs.ru.nl/~freek/pics/steinberg.jpg

Nice Victor! This is the Hudson River up on my end of the world!! Eleanor

Works for me Victor!

Very pretty Eleanor!

And who can give me a little history on Central New York's famous LOOMIS GANG???

They were from the Syracuse area. I remember reading about them in a book on the history of Camillus. There is place called Loomis Hill named after them. I have a very bad memory and can't remember anything about them and I can't find the book. Gotta look it up on-line and I'll be back! Eleanor

David Paul, I remember hearing about CT having claim to those areas. As a matter of fact, as a kid I used to hear that residents of Ohio could attend CT state universities at a CT residential rate, but I couldn't find anything about it now, so maybe that was a myth.

In Bridgeport, there was a house on the Post Road that Washington supposedly slept in. They moved it to Fairfield to build a Chinese restaurant. Go figure...

However, there is a tree across the street on the green with a little wrought-iron fence around it. The tree was grown from an acorn that fell from a tree that Washington tied his horse to. Talk about a stretch, lol.

Sequee - I quickly skimmed some info on the Loomis Gang. They were a notorious crime family that ruled Central New York in the later half of the 1800's. They were theives and used revenge against anyone who tried to bring them to justice. I think I read there were six brothers. I don't know why Loomis Hill is named after them cause they were not in that particular area according to what I just read on-line. Eleanor

One of the places I hike in Harriman Park was the hideout of one of the legendary Revolutionary era bandits, Claudius Smith.

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history.do?action=Article&id=161

Interesting Victor! Never heard of him, but he sounds like a character - especially taking off his boots! I'm sure that didn't make his poor old mother feel any better, though.

Very interesting Victor! I guess New York does have an interesting history! Eleanor

Good job Eleanor! I just heard about them in passing - someone offered me a book anout them and I thought, hmmm! I'll bet I can get the nutshell version on DG! LOL! Ya done good!

Thanks Sequee! Glad to be of help! Eleanor

Eleanor:
If I remember my long ago chemistry class correctly, the Solvay Process is used to produce soda ash, mostly sodium carbonate. It is an important alkali used in making glass, soaps, paper, sodium bicarbonate and has many other industrial uses. I think we stayed in a motel near the tip of your lake once.

All their waste is what originally ruined Onondaga Lake....by the time anyone figured it out it was waaaay too late!

Dave:

Sounds like an admission to me...

i charge for admission.

Charge for admission into what?

Dis-charge.

Thanks Don! mrsj - are you from that area of New York State? Eleanor

Eleanor - born and raised in Baldwinsville (just outside of Syracuse)
graduated SU 1974, headed west in 1976 and have been trying to get back for years!!!!

You still have a ways to go!

Ha! Ha! Victor!

I keep coming home and they keep throwing me back!

I don't think it was just CT, but other colonies that were granted land as far west as the land went.

mrsj - I was born and grew up in the next town over, Camillus!! It's a small world after all! A lot of my relatives live in Baldwinsville - Crego, Hudson, Gates and Mattison. My parents grew up in Baldwinsville and then my father's family bought a farm in Camillus and that's where I grew up. Eleanor

Know 'em all Eleanor! There are a lot of Crego's --- I grow up right around the corner from one of their farms, corner of Tappan and Crego Road! and the Gates family - the funeral home family or another? I went to school with Crego's and Gates kids! Hudson - as in Hudson-Mowins?

small world........

I'm from Oneida, a little further east.

Bingo on all counts!! I don't know any Gates kids in our generation. My paternal grandmother was a Gates and I knew her sibling's children, but not the next generation of them (too many of them). The Cregos are all my cousins of some sort on my mother's side. We had a reunion every year so I know most of the Cregos. I know the farm you are talking about - Bill Crego. Hudson & Mowins was started by my Uncle Gates (father's brother) and a friend, then his two sons took over and now it is run by a grandson and his wife. I don't get back out there too much anymore - maybe once or twice a year since my parents died. Eleanor

Deb - I was thinking you were west of Syracuse because of the Fingerlakes region - Skaneateles , Cayuga and that area. I've been by Oneida many times on the Thruway!! Eleanor

what are Skaneateles? I always wanted to know
Martha

Martha - Skaneateles is one of the fingerlakes and is west of Syracuse. The village of Skaneateles is on the northern shore of the lake. Eleanor

I'm west of Syracuse now, a bit south of Rochester - most of my family are still east of Syracuse.

Victor - upon reading your link and finding that Mr Smith originated from Brookhaven, which is near me, I found this info. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ronkonkoma . I always find it interesting that I live 4 houses from the lake, yet my town is just Ronkonkoma - not Lake Ronkonkoma.

That is interesting, Anita.

Here ya go Eleanor!