Taken on 05/25/09
Remains of the
iron furnace in the Town of Diana, near old Lewisburg (on the military
reservation of Fort Drum, the town was absorbed by the military's expansion
many years ago) on the south side of the Indian River.
Also see "Flooded remains of old mine" on page 6. For
more info about the lost villages go to page five on
these pages.
*From douglas.paul95 (via
Flickr.com):
"I was stationed at Ft. Drum for almost 3 years, and never knew this
existed. Cool."
*Jack S. writes "Several years ago the Lewis County
Historical Society took a trip to Lewisburg. The slag from the furnace was like
glass beautiful colors. Several of us picked up pieces of the slag and took them
home. My wife has some in her flower garden." |
Taken on 05/25/09
The front of the
furnace.
Old photo that looks
like it was taken not too
long after it was last fired, but some stonework already gone, unknown date.
This photo was colorized, it seems. The photo says "Pub by Mrs. F.
Pierce". Photo submitted by Jack S. |
Taken on 05/25/09
Closer shot.
Old photo showing part
of the sawmill and wooden dam at Lewisburg, unknown date. The photo says
"Pub by Mrs. F.J. Pierce". Photo submitted
by Jack S. |
Taken on 05/25/09
Notice the trees
and bushes growing on top of the structure.
|
Taken on 05/25/09
Close-up of the
bottom section.
|
Taken on 05/25/09
Close-up of the
interior near the bottom.
|
Taken on 05/25/09
Close-up of the
interior looking upward.
|
Taken on 05/25/09
The side, many
stones have fallen and dislodged.
|
Click above for an
illustration of how blast furnaces worked.
This structure was
first built in 1831 and rebuilt later a few times. It was originally built
by four Frenchmen - Lewis Fennel and the brothers Nicholas, Constant, and
Charles Jomaine. Later James Sterling acquired it. By 1850 Sterling
operated a substantial ironworks business in the area and ran other iron
furnaces and works in the area (for awhile Lewisburg was named Sterlingbush).
At one time this iron furnace produced 1,500 tons of iron per year.
But it
soon became outdated when iron furnaces in other parts of the country began
using more efficient coal, which wasn't as readily available here. By 1881
a new owner, the Jefferson County Iron Company, had phased out the furnace in
favor of mining operations. And in 1941 Lewisburg was absorbed by the
expansion of Fort Drum.
The Lewisburg iron furnace was a "cold blast"
furnace, in which cartloads of charcoal, limestone, and iron ore are poured into
the furnace at the top (using ramps), the carts pulled by draft animals. A
water wheel ran an air pump which in turn pumped air into a pipe. The pipe led into the
bottom of the furnace, and a nozzle on the end of the pipe forced cool air into
the molten mass. The
limestone reacted as a chemical flux (like rosen does in modern solder) to
carry away impurities. The molten result was iron, which ran out vents in
the bottom of the furnace into channels in the floor where it could be cooled
and cut into bars or "pigs". Originally these furnaces were made to
process Limonite, Magnetite, and red ocher but local ores eventually ran out.
Much of the preceding was found in a PDF document called
"In The North Country; The
Archaeology and History of Twelve Thousand Years at Fort Drum" by Georgess
McHargue.
|
Date taken unknown,
photo taken by Earl M.
An older photo,
Mason M. in the foreground.
|
Taken by Grant J. on 07/17/09
CR-3,
Hammond
Added
here with his permission from his Flickr album.
|
Taken by Grant J. on 07/17/09
Closer view
Added here with his
permission from his Flickr album.
|
Taken on 07/08/09
The remains of the old
Oswego Canal System, now located in Onondaga Lake Park, Syracuse. Oswego
Canal Mud Lock.
<Wikipedia
entry>
*Grant J. writes: "How strange that I check the OABONNY site to show my photos
to my mother, to see these photos next to mine. I am actually writing my
master's thesis on the agency that was responsible for the construction and
restoration of this commemorative piece of infrastructure: the Onondaga County
Emergency Work Bureau. EWBs were formed at the county level as part of
then-Governor FDR's Temporary Emergency Relief Administration, his last major
initiative as governor, and an important program in the history of work relief
in New York State, and the country. In fact, virtually every feature of Onondaga
Lake Park and Parkway was constructed by the men of the OCEWB. The Parkway was
actually laid over the filled in Oswego Canal. The forgotten landscape features
of the Gale Salt Well, Jesuit Well and Danforth Salt Lake, as well as the
"wedding bridge", Salt Museum, Mud Lock, and original "Fort Ste. Marie de
Gannetaha" (later torn down and rebuilt as the current Ste. Marie Among the
Iroquois) were built using TERA funds and EWB labor. I could go on and on, but
will spare readers the boredom. It's an interesting story that the interpretive
signage on-site does not accurately tell, and that you cannot readily find out
without some heavy-duty digging." |
Taken on 07/08/09
Another view of the
locks.
|
Taken by Grant J. on 07/17/09
Dodd's House,
Hammond NY; built 1820, first stone house in Hammond (according to the sign
along the road); currently empty, R-3,
Hammond
Added
here with his permission from his Flickr album.
|
Taken by Grant J. on 07/17/09
Old Farm,
Hammond, NY
Added here with his permission from his Flickr album.
|
Taken on 09/09/09
One of the
original Victorian-style buildings that were part of the 1890's "St. Lawrence
State Hospital" mental hospital complex in Ogdensburg, built on
the "cottage plan" - groups of two-story buildings. Later some were linked
together to create larger buildings. After the facility was down-sized the entire complex
has expanded with a mixture of regular industry with new commercial buildings nearby, a
prison, and more new structures for substance abuse counseling, etc. But many
of these old buildings still sit, seemingly still partially-maintained but
unused and with their lower windows boarded up, surrounded by well-mown and groomed lawns
with the neighboring modern buildings in full use.
Some of the above information was
found on
this website, which has
more of the history of the mental hospital. Many old photos of the complex
can be found at this site.
*Don A. writes: "The current (Volume 56, Number 14 · September 24, 2009) issue
of the New York Review of Books contains an essay by Oliver Sacks entitled "The
Lost Virtues of the Asylum." which is illustrated with this photo by Ian Ference
of a hallway in an abandoned building at the Ogdensburg State Hospital:
http://assets.nydailynews.com/img/2009/03/03/gal_lost_11.jpg" |
Taken on 09/09/09
Some more of
the buildings, unused, the entire complex is built on former farmland at a place
right on the edge of the city of Ogdensburg called Point Airy. The Ogdensburg Bridge (built many years after the
facility opened of course) is right beside Point Airy. In 1890 when this
hospital opened it was originally going to be
called the "Ogdensburg State Asylum for the Insane" but the name was changed to
the "St. Lawrence State Hospital". In the 1970's the name was changed to
the "St. Lawrence Psychiatric Center". A nursing school was also
run here, as there were very few in the United States at the time. This
was a co-ed nursing school, the first state institution co-ed nursing school at
the time.
|
Taken on 09/09/09
Another of
the similar buildings. Nearby is a cemetery for the psychiatric patients
who died here over the many years that it was open; the graves are marked with only numbers, family members could
look up their deceased and find the corresponding number of the grave. The
hospital worked on the principle of protecting patients from the pressure and
stress of the outside world (drug therapy hadn't been invented yet), as well as
using recreation and employment on the grounds as therapy. A large farm on
the grounds, manned by patients, produced the food needed by the facility (as
well as their tobacco), but it was forced to close in the 60's with changes in
New York State patient labor laws, the farm land is now used by the Ogdensburg
Port Authority.
*Susan P. writes: "I think having the mental patients work on the farm and raise
their own food is a good idea. Seeing things grow is supposed to be therapeutic,
isn't it? I know it is for me. Surely one gains a sense of satisfaction and
worth from growing one's own food. Being outside in the fresh air is healthy.
Exercise is healthy. I am assuming that it wasn't a chain gang and whip sort of
situation, and also that the mental competence of the individual patient to do
this was taken into account. Also, I think there are a number of patients for
whom these long term mental institutions were really a good thing. The ones for
whom the alternative winds up being living on the street, in and out of short
term psych hospitalizations. I had my psych nursing rotation at Willard before
it closed, a similar facility to this one. They gave us rooms in the old student
dorms because it was so far from our college and even farther from where many of
us lived, and we could go over to the ward and see our patients even outside of
classroom hours. There were people there with chronic delusional systems not
touched by psychiatric medications. They obviously had a relationship with the
long term staff there, who understood them and even were fond of them. They had
a place in the world there. They were safe, warm, clean, fed, and had friends
there. Their liberty was restricted, but they did get to go outside and get
taken on carefully selected outings. When they got old, there was a nursing home
type facility among people they had long known. Sure, the first goal should be
returning people to normality and reintegrating them into society. But for those
for whom that just doesn't work, I think these places were a good thing and it
is a shame they were all closed."
Angela C. writes "I work at this facility. I wish I had an opportunity to
work in the original buildings. I was hired after they closed. There is a rich
history here, with these building and the people who occupied them. I am
fortunate to work here."
|
Taken on 09/09/09
Another of
the buildings, note the massive ventilators on the top. Before it was
planned the state architect, Isaac Perry, consulted with well-known psychiatric
experts to plan the complex, which was built with three different groups of
buildings to correspond with three levels of psychiatric disorder. When
the hospital opened on December 9th, 1980 one of the doctors who were consulted
before it was built,
Dr. Peter Wise, became the superintendant of the hospital. He also
had been on the state commission which had decided on a location for a new
psychiatric hospital to cover he northern part of the state.
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