Location of Reynoldston

Reynoldston is a former settlement in Upstate New York

Upstate New York

Upstate New York is the region of the U.S. state of New York that is located north of the core of the New York metropolitan area.-Definition:There is no clear or official boundary between Upstate New York and Downstate New York...

 or sometimes referred to as Northern New York . Located in the Township of Brandon

Brandon, New York

Brandon is a town in Franklin County, New York, United States. It is centrally located in the county, southwest of the village of Malone. The town population was 542 at the 2000 census. It was named after Brandon, Vermont by early settlers.-History:...

 in Franklin County

Franklin County, New York

Franklin County is a county located in the U.S. state of New York. As of the 2010 census, the population was 51,599. It is named in honor of American Founding Father Benjamin Franklin...

, Reynoldston was about 1400 feet above the St. Lawrence River Valley. It is in the northern foothills of the Adirondacks. At its peak around 1920 Reynoldston had fewer than 350 inhabitants.

Early Settlers

After the Civil War

Civil war

A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same nation state or republic, or, less commonly, between two countries created from a formerly-united nation state....

 men and women looking for land moved along the Eddy Road to what would become Reynoldston. Families such as Allen Boardeaux, Joseph Campbell, who served in the Civil War and Nelson Trushaw,. They cleared their lands, and they make hard cash by selling potash

Potash

Potash is the common name for various mined and manufactured salts that contain potassium in water-soluble form. In some rare cases, potash can be formed with traces of organic materials such as plant remains, and this was the major historical source for it before the industrial era...

 or "blacksalts" that they made as they burned the hardwood trees to build their farms. The first farms grew hops

Hops

Hops are the female flower clusters , of a hop species, Humulus lupulus. They are used primarily as a flavoring and stability agent in beer, to which they impart a bitter, tangy flavor, though hops are also used for various purposes in other beverages and herbal medicine...

, raised sheep both for the wool and food and some had a few cows and oxen to plow their land. It was at best a kind of subsistence farming. The land was too rocky, the summers to short and the winters were too cold to sustain extensive agriculture which existed only a few miles away in the St. Lawrence Valley.

Reynolds Bros. Mill and Logging

What Reynoldston did have was extensive mixed forests with both hardwood and softwood, the Deer River for water power to drive saws in a lumber mill and excellent conditions for logging in the winter. Orson and Phoebe Reynolds bought extensive land holdings and established the "Reynolds Mill" in the later 1870's. Initially the mill located on the banks of the Deer River(a tributary of Black River

Black River (New York)

The Black River is a blackwater river that empties into the eastern end of Lake Ontario on the shore of Jefferson County, New York in the United States of America...

), logged the immediate area and processed the wood in their mill. The bounty of the hardwoods and of cedar for shakes kept the mill going. When Orson Reynolds died in 1887, his four sons took over the mill and soon expanded it under the new name Reynolds Brothers Mill and Logging.

Forest History and the Conservation Movement

Reynolston is an example in the forest history of the Adirondack Mountains

Adirondack Mountains

The Adirondack Mountains are a mountain range located in the northeastern part of New York, that runs through Clinton, Essex, Franklin, Fulton, Hamilton, Herkimer, Lewis, Saint Lawrence, Saratoga, Warren, and Washington counties....

 and the rush to cut and process the forest wealth of this forestry

Forestry

Forestry is the interdisciplinary profession embracing the science, art, and craft of creating, managing, using, and conserving forests and associated resources in a sustainable manner to meet desired goals, needs, and values for human benefit. Forestry is practiced in plantations and natural stands...

 rich region in the late 1800’s, when logging

Logging

Logging is the cutting, skidding, on-site processing, and loading of trees or logs onto trucks.In forestry, the term logging is sometimes used in a narrow sense concerning the logistics of moving wood from the stump to somewhere outside the forest, usually a sawmill or a lumber yard...

 was accelerating in the Adirondacks, At the same time there was an increasing public awareness of forest conservation in New York State. Cornell University

Cornell University

Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...

 attempted to establish a school of forestry, and pamphlets on reforestation first began to be distributed. Also in 1892 the New York State Legislature established the Adirondack State Park

Adirondack State Park

The Adirondack Park is a publicly protected area in northeast New York. It is the largest park and the largest state-level protected area in the contiguous United States, and the largest National Historic Landmark....

 and Catskill State Park

Catskill State Park

The Catskill Park is in the Catskill Mountains in New York in the United States. It consists of 700,000 acres of land inside a Blue Line in four counties: Delaware, Greene, Sullivan, and Ulster...

. It was the beginning of the conservation movement that would in time see much of the Adirondacks and Catskill Mountains reforested and protected. The history of the Adirondacks is well documented at the Adirondack Museum

Adirondack Museum

The Adirondack Museum, located on NY-30 in the hamlet of Blue Mountain Lake in Hamilton County, New York, is a museum dedicated to preserving the history of the Adirondacks...

 in Blue Mountain Lake, NY.

Reynolds Telegraph and Telephone

One interesting side-bar to the Reynolds Brothers is That Frank Reynolds starting in the early 1880's, established first a telegraph line that soon served communities as far away as Owl's Head and St. Regis Falls. Then in 1887, he pioneered the establishment of the telephone for Brandon and several surrounding towns and soon Reynoldston was "central" for many of the nearby communities. In 1918 the phone company was sold the New York Telephone Co. In 1894, the name Reynoldston was born when he was able to establish a post office for the community.

Population Peaks at 350 residents

Reynoldston reached it peak from 1908-1918 when the Brooklyn Cooperage Company contracted the Reynolds Brothers to provide hardwood logs for making staves and barrel tops in St. Regis Falls. A logging railroad

Logging railroad

A logging railroad describes railroads, pole roads, tram roads, or similar infrastructure used to transport harvested timber from a logging site to a sawmill...

 spur was built just south of Reynoldston near Mutton Ridge to allow the Reynolds Brothers to move the logs by train to St. Regis Falls. At is peak the Reynolds Bros. operated up to four logging camps with between 30 and 40 men working in each one. The community boomed providing work for more loggers and for many of the neighboring farms in the St Lawrence Valley, who provided teams for hauling logs. During this time, The Reynold's mill was only used on a limited basis. By 1918 the Reynolds Brothers had cut almost all the hardwood they owned on their more than 10,000 acres. Following this, the Reynolds Brothers were contracted to cut softwood for the Malone Paper Company and then proceeded to cut the remaining trees on their lands.

Family Demographics of Reynoldston

The families of Reynoldston represented a cross-section of the population of Northern New York State and included Franch–Canadians, Irish, Scottish, from New England

New England

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

 backgrounds. Most of the residents were Roman Catholics although a number of them were of Protestant backgrounds. Some to the family names were -the Allen Bordeaux, Joseph Bombard, Alfred French, Jondro, Duso, William LaHares, Nelson Duso, Joseph Meno’ and Philias and Henry Moquin, Oliver Trushaw- and had very large families of 10 or more children and as such probably made up a majority of the community early in the 20th century. In addition most of these families intermarried in subsequent generations – Campbells married Bordeauxs married Frenches married Bombards and LaHares. Living among them at various times throughout the community’s history, however, were a significant number of English, Irish, or Scottish people, - often settlers from New England – William Collins, John Cox, Henry Clark, Danford Whitcomb, Arthur Berry, Joseph Campbells, James McGovern, Patterson, Samuel Trims, and of course Orson L. Reynolds. Again many of these families also married into other families in the community regardless of religious affiliation.

Logging Resources Exhausted

By 1925, the Reynolds Brothers had cut most of the trees on their land holding , they started the process of closing the mill and shutting down their operations. Almost immediately families began to leave for work in other parts of Northern New York. Many of them including the Reynolds family kept some of the mill owned homes for summer camps. Members of a few of the larger families, the Bordeaux's and Campbell's remained in Reynoldston to farm, make maple syrup and work as guides and the State of New York. The one room school house closed in 1940/41. The history of Reynoldston was brief, but due to the very large extended families of more than a dozen children, many of whom were Roman Catholic, a large number people can trace their ancestry back to this small short lived community.

Oral History Project documents community

In 1969-1971, W. J. Langlois and Robert H. McGowan conducted oral history

Oral history

Oral history is the collection and study of historical information about individuals, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews...

interviews with more than 20 individuals and created over sixty tapes on the history of the community. In addition more than 300 historical photographs were collected. Since then Mr. Langlois and Mr. McGowan have continued their research and collected additional photos and historical documentation on the community. A great deal of information about the community including the social life and customs and details of the Reynolds Mill operations can be found at http://www.reynoldstonnewyork.com

External links

• http://www.reynoldstonnewyork.org