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Blenheim Covered Bridge
The Old Blenheim Bridge is located in the Town of Blenheim on State Route 30 in North Blenheim, Schoharie County, New York. It spans the Schoharie Creek and is "double-barreled" or has two separate lanes. At 232 feet in length between the stone abutments, this bridge has the unique distinction of being "the longest covered single span wooden bridge in the world" and one of only six remaining bridges in the world with two separated lanes. It is constructed of Long truss with a center arch. The bridge was built in 1854-5 by Nicholas M. Powers under contract for the Blenheim Bridge Company (inc. 1828) as a toll bridge and retired from use in 1931, and was listed as a National Historic Landmark on January 29, 1964; placed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966; and is now a National Historic Engineering Landmark, 1984.
It's interesting to note that the bridge was not originally built in place over the Schoharie Creek as most folks would imagine, but rather was assembled at a site nearby, to insure the pieces all fit together correctly. Afterwards it was disassembled and erected in its present location across the creek. Ninety-four thousand board feet (127 tons) of lumber, 3,600 pounds of bolts and 1,500 pounds of washers were used in its construction. Nicholas Powers was paid $7.00 a day ($2,000 total) and the workmen received $1.00 a day. When the bridge was completed in 1855 it cost $6,000. During construction scoffers said that the bridge would fall due to its own weight with the removal of the falsework (falsework being the temporary scaffolding, also called "bents", made of heavy logs, which were used to support the bridge during construction). When the day came, Powers climbed to the roof and said, "If the bridge goes down, I never want to see the sun rise again!" People then said that the bridge would sag so much as to be useless. Powers replied that if this happened he would jump off. When the falsework was taken away the bridge settled only slightly, even less than Powers had calculated.
Local lore has it that while the stone abutments were being built one of the masons was sent to fetch a jug of rye whiskey. Before they got a chance to open the jug and imbibe the president of the bridge company, J. Dickinson, who was a "teetotaller" (it's an archaic term by today’s standard, a tetotallar being someone who practices and promotes the complete abstinence from alcoholic beverages) arrived unannounced to inspect the progress of the bridge. The masons were forced to hastily hide the jug in the first available spot which happened to be a niche in the abutment. As work proceeded at a quicker pace under the eagle eye of the company president, who wouldn't leave, the masons were forced to build up the stonework around the jug before it was rescued, and supposedly, it remains there to this day.
"The picturesque old bridge has had many adventures. It has been afire three times and is now insured like any ordinary house. Twice the roof caught fire from windblown sparks and embers from burning buildings in the village. And once, many years ago, when traveling tinkers went about mending pots and pans, carrying a small charcoal stove to heat their soldering irons, one of these tinkers went so sleep in the bridge and tipped his stove over. The hot coals ignited the wooden bridge but someone happened along in time to put the fire out and to sober up the "tinker" in the nearby river." – Schenectady Union-Star: Feb. 26, 1930
Old Covered Bridge - North Blenheim, NY
(Click Photo Above For More Images of Bridge)
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Blenheim
Bridge
Schoharie
Creek
Covered
Bridge
Historic
Marker
Added: 8th September 2007
Views: 198
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Posted By: Ohlhous |
 
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During the American Revolutionary War, in 1777, Jane McCrea was a 17 year old Loyalist living at the farm of her older brother, Col. John McCrea at Fort Edward, NY to be close to her fiancé, Lt. David Jones, a loyalist serving with British General Burgoyne's army. On July 27th of that year, while she was visiting the home of Mrs. McNeil, the two women were captured by Indians allied to the British. Since both women were under the protection of General Burgoyne, they were reasonably sure nothing would happen to them. Their captors separated into two bands, each with one of the women. When Mrs. McNeil, a cousin of General Simon Fraser's, arrived with her captors at the British camp, she wondered where Jane was, since she had departed ahead of Mrs. McNeil. Shortly thereafter, the first party of Indians returned to the camp with a fresh scalp lock. It seems an argument had ensued over Jane McCrea, and to settle the argument, she had been killed. Other reports however state she was accidentally killed by friendly fire as the Indians made off with her. She was buried three miles south of Fort Edward. Though a Tory sympathizer, her death, and those of others in similar raids, inspired some of the resistance to Burgoyne's invasion leading to his defeat at the Battle of Saratoga. But the effect expanded later as reports of the incident were used, almost as propaganda, to excite rebel sympathies during the war, especially before the Sullivan Expedition in 1779. The story had become a part of American folklore when James Fennimore Cooper described some similar events in his novel "The Last of the Mohicans". Later on, 1852, McCrea's remains were removed and re-interred at the Union Cemetery in the Town of Fort Edward. McCrea's remains were exhumed in 2003 and researchers were surprised to find that McCrea's skull was missing, and her bones were commingled with those of another Revolutionary-era woman, Sara McNeil, a landowner and a cousin of British Gen. Simon Fraser. The bodies were exhumed again in 2005 in order to provide separate graves for both women.
This Marker is posted outside the Broadway (Route 4) entrance to the Union Cemetery in Fort Edward.
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Jane
McCrea
Fort
Edward
Added: 9th September 2007
Views: 386
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Posted By: Ohlhous |
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The Consumers Union is the parent organization to the "Consumers Reports" magazine. This fifteen minute documentary moves slowly, but some of the testing equipment shown is worth the wait.
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consumers
union
reports
1960
Added: 14th September 2007
Views: 95
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Posted By: prelingerfan |
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Nikita Kruschev announces that U-2 pilot Gary Powers was alive and in the custody of the Soviet Union.
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kruschev
soviet
gary
powers
1960
u2
Added: 23rd November 2007
Views: 100
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Posted By: prelingerfan |
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West Troy Weigh Lock
Thumbnail Image Courtesy Canal Society of New York State, www.canalsnys.org
The West Troy Weighlock Building, 1850-1915, a Greek-revival structure, was one of several weigh stations along the Erie Canal used to levy tolls for barges carrying merchandise and farm goods.
Until 1850 most freight cargoes were measured by the displacement theory, but the West Troy hydraulic type worked with scales rather than displacement. After a boat entered the lock the lock doors were closed, and then the water was drained out allowing the boat to come to rest on a wooden cradle. Certain rods transferred the boat's weight along a series of levers to the beam of the scales inside the Weighlock building. The Weight Master moved a center balancing weight along the beam which determined the weight of the loaded boat. The weighlock became obsolete after in the late 1800's because the state abolished tolls in order to compete with the railroads.
The first West Troy Weighlock of the Clinton's Ditch era was one of the first three weighlocks built, being erected in 1824. In 1834 this lock was completely rebuilt and overhead a "frame building was erected, with proper offices for the collector, weight-master, and inspector: The old scales, however, were reused. Designed for vessels weight only thirty to forty tons, they were clearly soon inadequate. Amazingly, they continued in use until the Weighlock was once again rebuilt, this time on a site further to the north and away from the crowded Upper Watervliet Sidecut. The new Enlarged Erie West Troy Weighlock with its new Fairbanks scale was in operation by 1851. While improvements were made to the scales in the years ahead, most of the official mentions of the Weighlock refer to the Weighlock house. It was fitted with gas lights in 1854. A "suite of rooms has been fitted up in connection with the Weighmaster's office" in 1868. By the late 1870s settling of the foundation was causing sever structural stress. Walls cracked and crumbled. In 1881 the north and south ends were rebuilt. The Weighlock itself was reported in 1908 to be out of commission for a number of years. Since tolls had been abolished several decades earlier, in 1883, this report should have come as no surprise. In 1919 the Great Eastern Storage, Transfer and Wrecking Company purchased the building and probably removed it soon thereafter. Of the seven weighlocks that once operated on the Erie Canal, the Syracuse Weighlock is the only one remaining, now home of the Erie Canal Museam.
The remains of the West Troy Weigh lock are in the Maplewood Historic Park beside Route 32 in the Town of Colonie, New York.
Tags:
West
Troy
Weighlock
Weigh
Lock
Watervliet
Erie
Canal
Historic
Marker
Maplewood
Colonie
Added: 8th November 2007
Views: 327
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Posted By: Ohlhous |
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Produced by Union Pacific Railroad. This half zeroes in on the meat handling side of the beef business
Tags:
beef
slaughter
meat
butcher
Added: 25th November 2007
Views: 81
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Posted By: MarkHoward |
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Produced by the Union Pacific Railroad. This isnt a clip for vegetarians.
Admin note: For a first-rate example of auctioneering, slide the bar to about eleven-minute mark.
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beef
cattle
ranching
auction
Added: 25th November 2007
Views: 72
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Posted By: MarkHoward |
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President Eisenhower defends Americas use of surveillance aircraft over the Soviet Union in the wake of the Gary Powers U-2 incident.
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eisenhower
u2
spy
soviet
russia
Added: 1st December 2007
Views: 130
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Posted By: prelingerfan |
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Enlarged Erie Canal Lock 23 in Rotterdam, NY
History: Enlarged Double Lock No. 23, "Alexander's Lock", was constructed to replace nearby Lock 26, one of 83 "first generation" locks originally built as part of Clinton's Ditch. The overnight success of the Erie Canal proved a mixed blessing. By the end of the first decade of operation the heavy volume of canal traffic was taxing the original system beyond its designed capacity. Single chamber locks quickly proved inadequate as lines of boats waiting to pass formed in both directions. Beginning in 1836 the Canal Commissioners of the State of New York initiated a comprehensive program of system improvements, carried out in stages between 1836 and 1862, which reduced the number of lock from 83 to 72 and doubled their capacity by adding a second chamber at each site in order to allow two-way traffic.
Lock No. 23 was constructed in a double-chamber configuration during this period of the First Enlargement in 1840-1841 and opening to traffic in 1842. Rather than expand the existing Lock 26, as was done at several other locations, a completely new double-chambered lock was built immediately adjacent to the original lock and right-of-way. Lock chambers were built wider and longer, at 18 feet wide by 110 feet in length. Previously they were 15 feet wide by 90 feet long.
Built entirely of large cut limestone blocks laid in a regular ashlar pattern and mortared using hydraulic cement, Lock No.23 raised or lowered boats by 7.89 feet; from a level of 231 feet at the south end to 239 feet at the north end. This lock was of importance to the Erie Canal, and Schenectady, N.Y. in particular, because it was the first lock west of Schenectady, a.k.a., "Gateway to the West", a major transfer point at the west end of the 17-mile portage from Albany around the Cohoes Falls. Many passengers left the Erie Canal to travel overland between Albany and Schenectady; goods stayed on barges for the trip which could take more than a day. During its busiest seasons, the lock was operating with a lockage every 5 minutes. (Approximately 47,000 lockages per season).
By the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the Canal Commissioners recognized that the Erie Canal would require substantial further modification if it was to remain competitive with expanding rail transportation. During the early 1880s steam motive power introduced on the Eric Canal led to the introduction of larger vessels that could be towed or pushed in combination along the waterway. To accommodate this traffic, a program to lengthen the locks was begun in 1884. Lock No 23 was one of six locks lengthened during 1889. The southwest chamber was extended south to a total of 220 feet along the berm side; the width of the added portion of the lock chamber was 20 feet. With its southwest chamber nearly doubled in size, Lock No. 23 could raise or lower "double-header" vessels towed by steam barges without interrupting though traffic.
With the opening of the current Barge Canal the Enlarged Canal was abandoned in 1918, and this section of the canal was purchased by the General Electric Company (GE). GE kept water in the canal from their main plant in Schenectady to Lock 23 until the late 1950's. It functioned as a test bed for GE products including the Electric Mules used to pull ships through the locks in the Panama Canal. In the 1950s the lock property was donated to the Town of Rotterdam which was in the midst of building its new water pumping station on the nearby well field; the town ran its new main directly through the lock chambers. Portions of the limestone walls were partially collapsed to make way for the pipe. In the north chamber the pipe was covered with debris and dirt blocking off that chamber. In the south chamber the cement replaced the removed limestone blocks and a concrete walkway was installed above the waterway crossing the chamber, however the water main is no longer in use.
After a long period of neglect the lock had become completely overgrown. Beginning in 1999, students and staff of the Department of Civil Engineering at Union College had undertaken an effort to keep the lock free from small trees and brush and at one time had an ambitious plan to rehabilitate the lock and bring it back to working condition. Between 2000 and 2003 they built a replica board-and-batten Lock Tender's Hut and a Wooden Pier. Volunteers from Union College History Department were joined by volunteers from the Schenectady County Historical Society, the Rotterdam Sunrise Rotary Club and Friends of the Mohawk-Hudson Bike-Hike Trail in subsequent years to maintain the lock and continue promoting its preservation and sought official recognition as a historic site.
On December 28, 2007 the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation listed the Lock No. 23 property on New York’s registry as an important engineering landmark in Schenectady County. On March 6, 2008 Lock No. 23 had been listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Plans are in the works to apply for grant monies and the installation of permanent interpretive signs about the lock.
Lock No. 23 remains the focus of continuing preservation efforts and a distinguished example of masonry engineering design and construction associated with the transportation history of the Old Erie Canal.
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Lock 23 in 1941
Lock 23 in 1941 showing the east end of the south chamber. In this photo the water is still in the canal as it is being used by Schenectady's General Electric for testing. The wooden pier is still quite evident in the water at the foot of the lock.
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Lock 23 in 2007
Same view as first photo; East end of South lock chamber which had been lengthened.
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Lock 23 in 2007
Detail of the locks stonework under a blanket of fresh snow.
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Clean Up Day at Lock 23
Professor Andrew Morris of the Union College Department of History organized the Clean Up Day on May 27, 2006. Here we see Union College students as well as other volenteers cutting back brush and removing debries from the lock. At this location the Mohawk-Hudson Bike-Hike Trail is built on the old tow path and passes right beside the lock, on the left, in this view.
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Lock 23 After Clean Up
After clean up Saturday, May 12, 2007.
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Lock Tender's Hut
Closer view of the Lock Tender's Hut which sits on the pier between the two lock chambers on April 2, 2005
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Lock 23 in 2007
Winter Time Again, February 17, 2007.
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Lock 23 in 2008 - Interpretive Sign Added!
This interpretive sign was installed on the side of the Locktender's hut in the late spring of 2008. The text on the sign points out that the Lock 23 site
has been recognized by its listing on the New York State and National Historic Registers in 2008.
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Old Lock 23 is located beside the Mohawk-Hudson Bike-Hike Trail, near the intersection of Rice Road and Schermerhorn Road in Rotterdam, New York.
Google Maps Satellite image of Lock 23, Here.
(Other Old Erie Canal Lock Photos Here)
Tags:
Erie
Canal
Lock
23
Locktender
Pier
Rotterdam
GE
Added: 9th December 2007
Views: 850
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Posted By: Ohlhous |
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