Livingston County is a county in the U.S. state of New York. As of the 2020 census, the population was 61,834. Its county seat is Geneseo. The county is named after Robert R. Livingston, who helped draft the Declaration of Independence and negotiated the Louisiana Purchase. The county is part of the Finger Lakes region of the state.
Livingston County is part of the Rochester, New York metropolitan area.
History On February 23, 1821, Livingston County, New York was formed from Ontario and Genesee Counties. The twelve original towns were: Avon, Caledonia, Conesus, Geneseo (county seat), Groveland, Leicester, Lima, Livonia, Mount Morris, Sparta, Springwater, and York.
Part of North Dansville was annexed from Steuben County in 1822 and became a separate town when Sparta was divided in 1846. At the same time, the town of West Sparta was also formed from Sparta. The towns of Nunda and Portage were annexed in 1846 and the town of Ossian was annexed in 1857 from Allegany County.
Avon, Williamsburgh, and the hamlet of Lakeville competed for the honor of becoming the Livingston County seat, but the distinction was bestowed upon Geneseo, the principal village and center of commerce. The Wadsworths donated a suitable lot, beautifully situated at the north end of the village. The brick courthouse faced Main Street, the jail of wood construction was built directly west, and a one-story cobblestone building for the County Clerk's office was built east of the courthouse. Until construction was completed in 1823, court was held in the upper story of the district school on Center Street (east of the present-day Livingston County Museum) and prisoners were housed in Canandaigua. In 1829 the county opened a poor house farm just outside the village.
Livingston County Flag
The County Flag was adopted in 1971 for the county's 150th anniversary. The significance of the colors and design relates to features and history of the county:
Yellow – the golden grain of the northern towns;
Blue – the Genesee River;
Green – the forests in the southern towns;
White – salt and limestone, prominent minerals in the county;
Balance and crossed quills – in honor of New York's first Chancellor Robert R. Livingston, for whom the county was named.
Senecas and Pioneer history The Seneca Nation of Indians, once the most numerous and powerful of the Six Nations of the Iroquois, were called the "Keepers of the Western Door" because they guarded the western boundaries of the Haudenosaunee territory, which included the lands around Seneca Lake west to Lake Erie. Many of the principal towns were in the fertile Genesee Valley, part of what is now Livingston County. Little Beard's Town, or Genesee Castle, located near present-day Cuylerville in the Town of Leicester, was one of the largest.
Sullivan Campaign of the Revolutionary War In 1779, General George Washington ordered General John Sullivan to organize the largest American offensive movement of the Revolutionary War to displace the Iroquois and gain control of New York's western frontier. Sullivan's army of approximately 5000 men trekked into the heart of the Seneca territory with orders to destroy all settlements.
On September 13, 1779, hundreds of Indians and Loyalists ambushed roughly 25 of Sullivan's scouts on a hill overlooking Conesus Lake at a site now known as the Ambuscade in the town of Groveland. At least 16 Americans were massacred including an Oneida guide. Scout leader Lt. Thomas Boyd and Sgt. Michael Parker were captured and their mutilated remains were discovered a day later when the army reached Little Beard's Town in Cuylerville, a hamlet in the town of Leicester. This site was the largest Indian settlement in western New York and the western limit of the Sullivan Campaign. Sullivan's army found the village deserted as most of the Indians and Loyalists had retreated west to Fort Niagara to avoid confrontation.
The army buried Boyd and Parker then burned the village and thousands of surrounding acres of crops. Upon retreat, the army discovered the bodies of the soldiers of Lt. Boyd's scouting party at the Ambuscade and buried them with military honors.
After fulfilling General Washington's instructions to destroy more than 40 Indian settlements and food supplies throughout the Finger Lakes, Sullivan's army returned to Easton, Pennsylvania. The mission was considered successful and helped to lessen the threat to white settlers across the state.
The enthusiasm generated by soldiers of General Sullivan's army prompted the rapid development of the Genesee Valley and the area that now comprises Livingston County. Within five years following the Treaty of Paris in 1783, ending the Revolutionary War, colonists branched out from well-established settlements in New England and the Mid-Atlantic states, with visions of reaping the benefits this vast wilderness land had to offer. News of the beauty and fertility of the area spread as far as Western Europe.
Seneca treaties The destruction of the Iroquois villages during the Sullivan Campaign greatly impoverished the Senecas but did not deprive them of title to the land. This led to the creation of a series of treaties in order to facilitate westward expansion of white settlers. These treaties were not all supported by the Iroquois and consequently forever altered their culture.
After the Treaty of Paris, Messrs. Phelps and Gorham purchased from Massachusetts the rights to approximately eight million acres west of what is referred to as the old Pre-emption Line. The two men negotiated a treaty with the Seneca which was intended to extinguish Indian claims to this land. Approximately two-thirds of present-day Livingston County was covered by this treaty.
In 1790, Phelps and Gorham sold about 1,200,000 acres to Robert Morris, known as the "financier of the American Revolution." Morris then sold the land to a company of English capitalists, with Sir William Pulteney obtaining the majority interest. Charles Williamson, agent for Pulteney, took an absolute conveyance of the "Genesee Tract." The first permanent white settlement he established was the small village Williamburgh in Groveland at the confluence of the Genesee River and the Canaserega Creek. The village prospered until 1806 before it was abandoned.
The remainder of the original purchase was bought by Samuel Ogden in 1791 for Robert Morris, who then sold most of it to the Holland Land Company, reserving 500,000 acres, known as the Morris Reserve. By the terms of the sale, Morris obligated himself to extinguish the Indian title to the land sold. However, his involvement in land speculation left him penniless and imprisoned for debt for several years.
The 1794 Treaty of Canandaigua recognized the sovereignty of the Six Nations and restored their title to lands in western New York. But as pressure by western developers increased, the Treaty of Big Tree in 1797 was negotiated in the Wadsworth brothers' log cabin in Geneseo. This treaty included the western one-third of Livingston County and extinguished Indian title to practically all the lands west to the Niagara Frontier, excepting a handful of Indian reservations.
The Pioneer Wadsworths Col. Jeremiah Wadsworth of Hartford, Connecticut, one of the wealthiest and most influential men in the post-Revolutionary War era, invested heavily in land speculation in this region. In 1788, he made the arduous trip to the Genesee country to judge its worth and finding it unimaginably rich. After purchasing more than 200,000 acres (50 square miles) along the Genesee River, Col. Wadsworth offered his young cousins, brothers James and William Wadsworth, 2000 acres of prime farmland in and around what is now Geneseo. In return, they represented the Colonel's interests by establishing a home farm (known as the Homestead) and promoting settlement and progress.
The Wadsworth brothers acquired thousands more acres, becoming the largest single landowners in western New York. They leased the majority of the land to tenant farmers with generous lease agreements. James and William were known far and wide for their philanthropy and innovative farming methods. The legacy of James and William Wadsworth and their vast land holdings has been carried forward generation after generation and the prominent family still remains synonymous with the Genesee Valley to present day.
Genesee Valley Canal The opening of the Erie Canal in 1825 brought prosperity across the state and realization of the benefits of internal navigation. The Genesee Valley lacked access to broader markets other than via the Genesee River, often too dangerous to navigate. Planners envisioned a lateral canal, cutting through the core of Livingston County, as the means of uniting the Erie Canal with the Allegany River, thereby connecting the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, allowing freight and passenger transportation all the way to New Orleans.
Construction of the Genesee Valley Canal started in Rochester in 1837, reaching Mount Morris by 1840. A junction to Sonyea opened in 1841 and then a branch was built to Dansville, completing 52 miles. Extending the canal through to Nunda and Portage was most challenging, as workers battled the area's most rugged terrain along the Genesee River gorge. After years of delays, 17 locks between Nunda and Portageville were completed in 1851.
By the time that the last segment connecting to the Allegany River was finally finished in 1862, however, railroad technology had outpaced canals. This forced the Genesee Valley Canal to close by 1878; the towpath became the bed of the Genesee Valley Canal Railroad. Railroads rapidly became the primary mode of transportation as they criss-crossed the entire county. Although the Genesee Valley Canal was short-lived, the lasting effect expanded job opportunities for thousands of new immigrants, opened markets for the area's abundant goods, and overall enriched the quality of life for residents.
Today, the old Genesee Valley Canal Railroad bed has become part of the Genesee Valley Greenway Trail.
Important sites and events
Genesee Wesleyan Seminary, Lima One of the first coeducational schools in the country, incorporated 1834, founded by the Genesee Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church and operated until 1941. Genesee College, founded on the same site in the 1840s, eventually relocated and became Syracuse University. Presently the site is occupied by Elim Bible Institute.
Water Therapy: Avon Springs and the Jackson Sanitarium
The area around present-day Avon and eastern Caledonia was known by the Seneca as "Canawaugus", or "the place of stinking waters" due to the prevalence of sulfur in the springs on the west side of town. The Seneca believed the water's mineral characteristics had health benefits long before the white settlers arrived. In 1821, Richard Wadsworth was the first white man in Avon to build a showering box and promote the curative properties of the sulfur water. The reputation of Avon Springs grew throughout the 19th century, peaking just before the Civil War era. Guests sought health cures as well as relaxation and recreation opportunities in the Genesee Valley. By about 1900, most of the numerous hotels and spas were gone.