ScotchtownHighlander.com

Growing up in Scotchtown

By Sharon Martin Zankel

I grew up about three miles east of the Scotchtown Presbyterian Church on the Scotchtown Collabar Road. The Church was a big part of my life (I am still a member although I relocated to upstate New York over 30 years ago). The Scotchtown Church has long been referred to as “The Light Upon the Hill,” and is most significant to the history of the hamlet. I learned much of the history of the Church and community from an elderly Mr. Charles Comfort, now deceased. According to material Mr. Comfort had, the Erie Railroad was expected to come to Scotchtown in 1841, but moneys ran short when the line reached Goshen. A group of Middletown businessmen approached the railroad with an offer of financial assistance to bring the line instead to Middletown, a factor long felt to have inhibited the growth and development of Scotchtown. If only those old-timers could see it now!

The Scotchtown Collabar Road was a dirt road when I was a toddler. The road was widened, paved, and extended to Route 17K about 1950. My grandparents and great-grandparents lived on what we considered “backroads” – today known as Tamms and Brook Roads. The countryside consisted mostly of farmland, and the area surrounding the Church hosted apple orchards owned by the Mills family. Our family purchased milk at the Albert Norris Farm and eggs at the Sam Smith Farm. Later, we had milk delivered to our home by Beverly Milk; the King Cole ice cream truck came by on Wednesdays; for a while bread was delivered to the door. We had party line telephones – you’d have to count the number of consecutive rings to determine what household was being called. There were nine other parties on our line, and every once in awhile, you could tell one of the other parties was “listening in.” (You might call this a primitive form of the conference call!)

I attended school in Montgomery, but the family did most of its business in Middletown. I remember the early days of the recently closed Lloyd’s Supermarket; it was a real thrill for me when Ed Lloyd added dry goods and toys to his stock. The “Miracle Mile” hadn’t yet come about, and Route 211 was then Route 84. We also shopped in downtown Middletown at stores such as Woolworth’s, J. J. Newbury’s, Tompkins, and Sears. My mom considered it a convenience when Howard Mills Jr. opened Nature’s Produce (more recently Scotchtown Farms). I loved to go to the Thrall Library, then on Orchard Street.

As a teenager in the 1960s, I frequently walked a mile or two to meet others in the neighborhood my own age. Sometimes we’d play soccer in a backyard or take hikes. We liked to walk to Camp Orange and the ruins of what had been Camp Inwood, a place known to have seen some rousing times years previous. I belonged to a 4-H group, a youth group at the Church, and sang in the Church choir during my teen years. We looked forward to the coming of the Orange County Fair every August, and entered craft projects, homegrown produce, and baked goods. I can’t remember any of the kids getting into trouble since most of the families knew one another, and we knew we’d “catch it” if word ever reached home that we’d done something out-of-line. Most of us had to help out in some way at home – yard, work, household chores. We knew the driver of almost every car that passed by.

The acquisition of lands by the Park Commission for the Highlands Lakes State Park in the 1960s was a very disruptive period for many in the Scotchtown area. Many families were not pleased with the financial settlements for their properties. My grandmother was given less than $10,000 her home and eight acres of land. What had been my great-grandmother’s farmstead was also taken – a wonderful mid-19th century home. The houses stood vacant a number of years, most vandalized by scavengers, and finally used for fire drills. Today there is little indication that the park lands were once working farms and residential properties. On Tamms Road, at the bend at the top of the hill looking toward Scotchtown, was a once magnificant home. My dad, now age 85, attended neighborhood dances there as a youth. It is unfortunate that no effort was made to record the histories of the properties taken by the Park Commission.

As most of my family still resides in the Scotchtown area, I still feel a part of that community. The area has, inevitably, changed greatly, but memories of how it used to be linger in my heart.

Martin Farm, Brook Road, Scotchtown, circa 1955: My grandmother and grandfather lived here from 1935 to 1956. The property was once owned by an Irishman named Collins. Grandpa built the barn during World War II after an earlier one burned. For many years, Grandpa kept a small dairy herd and Grandma had a flock of chickens. The farm provided the grandchildren an endless playground. Had the development of the Highlands State Park not been stalled by a lack of funding, this property also would have eventually been added to the park!

Sledding on the Scotchtown Collabar Road, 1949: The road was a narrow dirt one back then, and there was little traffic so Mom hitched my sled to the rear bumper and off we went! Today a vehicle typically speeds along this same stretch of the road at more than 55 MPH!

Mowbray House, circa 1920 (left) and 1960s (below): My great-grandmother was the second wife of Lee Mowbray (1858-1935) whose parents, Ebenezer Mowbray (1827-1895) and Elizabeth Puff (1831-1904), established a farmstead of about 100 acres near The Highlands east of Scotchtown. Granny lived here alone after Lee died without the benefit of electricity or an automobile. Below you can see the house as it appeared about the time it was acquired by the Palisades Interstate Park Commission. The house, like many taken by the Park, was subsequently burned in a fire drill. The home featured a great center foyer and staircase, double parlors, and a summer kitchen in the cellar.

Sharon Martin Zankel is currently the historian of the Town of Brunswick, New York. She has created a web page featuring historic photographs of her town, and authored a book on Brunswick for the Images of America series.