Page:History of Delaware County (1856).djvu/179

 DELAWARE COUNTY. 155 colony sustained themselves, and were soon prepared to aid those who followed after. Among those who came before 1790, with their families, we may mention Alverson, from Nova Scotia; the Goslins, Storckten^s relatives of the Norths from Long Island, who settled over the river on the Hardenburgh patent, then Ulster county; next Beers, Bradley, and Wakeman, followed on down the river on the same patent ; Groodrich, Johnson, Hyde, Eells, Seymour and others, who settled on the Provost or Livingston patent ; accessions were annually made to the colony, chiefly from Connecticut. Nor must we omit to mention the induce- ment offered by Mr. Walton to the first settlers, for growth and increase of the colony. A lot of land was offered for the first-born male child, on condition that he should be named William Walton. The prize was won by Mrs. Robert North, but she had set her heart upon calling him Samuel, and in those days a lot of land could not alter a woman's wish. To pursue the history of Samuel : he was educated in Albany, and was elected clerk of the Assembly, in which capacity he acquitted himself with great efficiency, and we believe he was reelected under Grovernor Lewis ; he soon after died of con- sumption. We have no certain dates by which to mark the exact pro- gress of improvement made by the first settlers. Saw-mills were erected at a very early day, and the manufacture of pine lumber for the Philadelphia market, became the main business by which the inhabitants obtained their support and maintained credit abroad, while the raising of flax and manufacture of linen formed the chief occupation of the women. It is said to have been quite common to take the spinning-wheel with them on making an afternoon visit; and the amount of linen made by some of them seems almost incredible. Fish and game were plenty. Shad were, if reports were true, near Pine-hill, in quite large numbers ; and trout, those