North Country At Work

Horse drawn grain binder in transport position. Binders would be moved from farm to farm and used to bind grain, so that each individual farmer need not own one. Dump rake on fence. Circa 1880s. Heuvelton, NY.

View of Heuvelton’s State Street, which includes a carriage maker’s shop and the town’s covered bridge, built in the early 1860s. Circa late 1860s. Heuvelton, NY.

Unidentified workers in front of a Heuvelton sawmill, which was river-powered. Circa 1870s. Heuvelton, NY.

View of State Street covered in snow on April 21, 1904. Heuvelton, NY.

Fred Baxter and Bert Crowe loading hay by hand onto a horse drawn wagon.  Circa 1900. Heuvelton, NY.

Fred Baxter, Bert Crowe, and William Henry Boyd putting corn into a silo using an elevator-type ensilage cutter, which is a machine that chops up green fodder for feed. Circa 1910. Heuvelton, NY.

N.F. Giffin’s Steam Grist Mill, which later became a butter factory, and later still a cheese plant. Circa 1880s. Heuvelton, NY.

Thomas Harmer parked in front of the Heuvelton Post Office. In 1911, he was the oldest stage driver in the United States with 285,000 miles to his credit. He spent 40 years driving one route, from Heuvelton to Macomb and back again. Photo from a postcard postmarked 1911. Heuvelton, NY.

The end of Christmas “Turkey Day” in 1915. One sees turkey farmers and their wagons headed away from the train tracks, where they would have brought their slaughtered and dressed turkeys to be appraised and purchased by buyers from large cities such as New York, Boston, and Montreal, right before Thanksgiving and Christmas. St. Lawrence […]

An early “turkey day” in Heuvelton—the largest and usually best market for local turkey farmers. Farmers waiting with their turkeys–for appraisal and purchase–in a line towards the railroad station. A car load of knocked down boxes would arrive to be distributed to the different buyers. These boxes were large enough to hold eighteen medium sized […]