New Hartford was settled in March 1788 when
Jedediah Sanger, who was bankrupted in 1784 by a fire at his farm in
Jaffrey, New Hampshire and afterwards moved to the area.
Sanger land purchase Common history According to the earliest recorded history (
Annals and Recollections of Oneida County, Jones, 1851), Sanger bought , the land was sold at a price of fifty cents an acre. This land, thought to be separated into two equal parts by the
Sauquoit Creek, was part of the
Town of Whitestown at the time. Within a year, Sanger sold the area east of the creek to Joseph Higbee, the area's second resident, for one dollar per acre. A subsequent survey found this area was .
Possible inaccuracy This narrative of a 1000-acre purchase by Sanger for $500 and the ensuing resale to Higbee of half the land for $500 (a 100% profit) is repeated in
The History of Oneida County, New York by Samuel W. Durant, 1878 which used the ''Jones' Annals
of 1851 as a primary reference. The story was expressed in an address at the 1888 New Hartford Centennial by Henry Hurlburt, again citing Jones' Annals
as his source. It is again repeated in Our County and Its People: A Descriptive Work on Oneida County, New York, Wager, 1896''. However, a footnote in
Transactions of the Oneida Historical Society at Utica, New Hartford Centennial, 1889, which documented the 1888 centennial, questions the validity of the story through research of property deed records. The footnote cites one deed for the sale of four 492 acre lots from John G. Leake to Sanger in November 1790 for approximately $1.16 per acre (US dollars were not the currency in use at the time), and another deed shows the sale of one of the four lots to Higbee in December 1791 for approximately $1.06 per acre. Also listed is a deed conveying to Sanger from George Washington and George Clinton for $1.27 per acre in 1790.
Other land Present-day New Hartford covers over in area, considerably more than that contained in Sanger's original purchases. Sanger's purchase had been part of the Coxe
Patent, land purchased directly from the
colonial government of New York. Other portions of New Hartford is made up of land from the following Patents: • Cosby's Manor, deeded on January 2, 1734, to Joseph Worrell and 10 others. • Sadaqueda (Sauquoit) Patent, deeded on June 25, 1736, to Fredrick Morris, Lendert Gasenvoort and others. • Coxe Patent, deeded on May 30, 1770, to William Coxe, Daniel Coxe, Rebecca Coxe, John Tabor Kempe and his wife Grace (Coxe). Daniel, William, and Rebecca were the children of
Daniel Coxe, Jr. and grandchildren of
Daniel Coxe. Kempe was
Attorney General of New York at the time and remained loyal to England during the Revolution. As a
loyalist, his property was confiscated after the war and the Coxe patent was divided with General
George Washington, General
DeWitt Clinton, and Colonel
Marinus Willett owning large parts of the patent. • Bayard Patent, deeded on June 12, 1771, to William Bayard, Alexander Ellis, and fifty-three others
Early settlers In 1789, Sanger relocated his family to the settlement and erected a sawmill. A gristmill was added in 1790. Both mills utilized the water of the Sauquoit for power. Other settlers included Nathan Seward, Ashbel Beach, Amos Ives, Solomon Blodget, Salmon Butler, Joel Blair, Agift Hill, Stephen Bushnell, Joseph Jennings. •
Nails: The first cut nails made in the state were produced by Jonathan Richardson, who purchased wine and liquor casks and made cut nails from the iron hoops of the casks. •
Tanneries were established by Thomas and Ezekiel Williams, and another by Stephen Childs. •
Paper and
textiles: Factories were established for the production of paper,
batting,
cotton cloth, and
knitted fabric. The earliest manufacturing operations were concentrated along the Sauquoit Creek and utilized
water as the primary power source. The power of the creek was the reason that New Hartford had such extensive manufacturing operations for a town of its size. Business in New Hartford exceeded that of
Utica due to the water power of the creek. Most factories later transitioned to
steam power. Another boon to the economy of New Hartford was the
Seneca Turnpike, a
toll road connecting Utica to the western part of the state. The
Seneca Road Company was formed in 1800 to improve the main road running west from Utica, NY and operate it as a toll road or turnpike. The original road ran north of New Hartford, but Jedediah Sanger purchased stock in the company and through his influence, the turnpike was routed through New Hartford. The turnpike traffic made New Hartford prosper, outstripping other towns in the area and rivaling neighboring Utica until the
Erie Canal was constructed through Utica, removing most cross-state traffic from New Hartford. Utica then grew into a large city and New Hartford continues to this day to be a suburb. ==Education==