Old & New Industries in Little Falls, New York

Entering Little Falls from the west

This week we return to the Mohawk Valley, once the industrial heartland of the United States, and visit my hometown, Little Falls, New York. The village, still officially a city, has lost about half its population since the 1950s, and many of its manufacturing industries. But the longtime residents of Little Falls, as well newcomers, have a strong love for their picturesque community and have done much to promote its revival. In 2008 the city sought a $650,000 grant to continue the revitalization of its old mill district, according the Utica Observer Dispatch:

Little Falls also boasts its own daily newspaper, the Little Falls Evening Times and maintains a website that provides an overview of community life. Of special interest is the annual Canal Days festival, which attracts thousands of visitors each August.

Entering Little Falls from the west on Route 5, the first sign of local industry we encountered were buildings belonging to the Burrows Paper Corporation, founded in Little Falls by Charles and Andrew Burrows in 1913. Although Burrows has thrived in the global economy, the corporation is still an important presence in the community and now occupies a number of buildings that formerly housed other industries.

At the intersection of West Main and Furnace Streets, we stopped to take a look at the abandoned Gilbert Knitting Mill buildings across the railroad tracks. Long ago, workmen walked down Furnace Street and crossed under the tracks via the city’s pedestrian subway.

Abandoned Gilbert Mill, pedestrian subway on left

As early as 1831 there was a water-powered paper mill on this site. After a series of other mills came and went, the Gilbert company began with J.J. Gilbert as a principal owner in 1872. The Gilbert family were prominent in the city for many years and their mansion on a nearby hill is now an attractive bed and breakfast known as the Gansevoort House. Like many early industrialists, the Gilberts built their mansion in a spot that overlooked the source of their wealth.

We headed for Mill Street, the old industrial area along the Mohawk River. The settlement began here before the American Revolution due to the rapids in the river, which necessitated a cumbersome portage of the canoes and small boats of that era. During the Revolution, the Tories and their Iroquois allies waged a fierce guerrilla war against the patriots in the Mohawk Valley. In 1782 they attacked and burned the grist mill at "the little falls."

Remains of the 1795 Little Falls Canal

It was George Washington who first recommended the building of a canal around the rapids at Little Falls, and work was begun in 1793. Opened to traffic in 1795, the Western Inland Navigation Canal was the first true canal in the nation. The lock pictured here was a guard lock that prevented flood stage river water from rushing into the canal and helped control water levels when the canal was in use. In 1883 the state legislature declared the lock to be a heritage site to be forever preserved, but expansion of the railroad right-of-way and generations of neglect have taken their toll. The remaining limestone walls of the old canal can be found just beyond the parking lot beside Hansens Island. Although the ruins may not seem impressive, the New York State Museum has a very thorough description of this early canal, including a series of maps and images.

From the canal site we looked across to Hansens Island, famous as the place where Junket custard was made for many years. Christian Hansen founded his company in Denmark in 1874 and in 1890 bought the small island as the site for his American factory. Junket desserts are now a brand offered by Redco Foods, whose better known products include Red Rose and Salada tea. The island was recently the scene for a protracted dispute between Redco and the employee labor union, and feelings are evidently still bruised.

Hansen's Island and the Mohawk River rapids

Walking down Mill Street past the Hansens Island parking lot, we soon came to the renovated Power House, where hydroelectric power was generated. I can recall when the limestone dam was dynamited, reportedly for a tax advantage by Niagara Mohawk, thus putting to an end to the generation of power at this location. The Power House has been significantly remodeled by its current owners, who replaced one deteriorated stone wall with brick. I believe there was a plan to provide cultural events at the building, but there was no sign of any current activity. This may require an update when we learn more.

The Power House and broken dam

The Power House adjoins a set of ruined stone walls that may be the remains of the old Henry Cheeney Hammer Company. According to the 1911 Centennial history, the Cheeney company "does an extensive business in all kinds of high grade hammers, its product being sold all over the United States and in foreign countries."

Probable ruins of the Henry Cheeney Hammer Company

Only a little further east, across from what was once the Andrew Little Lumberyard, is another stone foundation, which has been partially excavated. This was the location, according to my father, of the “old stone mill,” built at some point early in the 19th century on the site of the wooden gristmill burned by Tory raiders in 1782.

Foundation of the old stone mill and site of 1782 massacre

A little farther west on Mill Street is an impressively renovated set of old stone mills, which now houses a variety of shops. The Little Falls Antique Center and the adjoining Shops at 25 West Mill Street are well worth a visit. For a fine dinner, I recommend Canalside Inn. And the adjacent Ann Street Lunch is always good for lighter meals.

Canalside Inn on left, Stone Mills of Little Falls shops on right

Turning right on South Ann Street, we came to the Mohawk River bridge and took a look at the ruins of the Erie Canal Aqueduct, which was opened in 1822 and collapsed only a few years ago.

The Erie Canal Aqueduct, present and past

Crossing the bridge brought us to Moss Island, and a walk along the canal to its highest lift lock, Lock 17, is a very enjoyable experience. Moss Island is home to many “potholes” created by the tremendous rush of water that came through this gorge at the end of the last ice age. With the outlet to the St Lawrence River still blocked by glaciers, all of the waters of the Great Lakes once poured through this narrow valley. We looked across to the south side of the river and the rocky cliffs of Lovers Leap where, according to legend, doomed Mohawk lovers embraced the fate of Romeo & Juliet.

All that remains on Moss Island of the Adirondack Woolen Company, where my grandmother worked long ago, is a single brick storage building, now used by Burrows Paper Corporation.

Old Adirondack Woolen Co. shed on Moss Island

Lovers Leap from Moss Island

Across a rusted and long-closed bridge we glimpsed the Cherry Burrell Buildings and headed in that direction, thinking that this once-dynamic manufacturing firm was still in operation. Alas, Cherry Burrell, long a mainstay of the town’s prosperity, no longer has a presence here. The company survives elsewhere as Waukesha Cherry Burrell, a subsidiary of the multinational, SPX Corporation.

Empty Cherry-Burrell buildings on Mill Street

The Burrell Office Building on Main Street

Overlook Mansion, present and past

D. H. Burrell, the founder of the dairy equipment manufacturing company that bore his name, was a major contributor to the prosperity of Little Falls. He financed the Burrell Office Building in a time when elevators were still a novelty, and he also donated to the building of the YMCA and a new city hall in 1916. The Burrell mansion, Overlook, still looms over the town, but in a sad state of abandonment and ruin.



We never leave town without visiting the Little Falls Historical Society Museum at 319 North Ann Street, where the history of this picturesque and productive little city is carefully maintained by a staff of dedicated volunteers. Those interested in the history of Little Falls could find no better place to begin their inquiries.

The museum offers for sale a number of works on the town's history, including Unique Place, Diverse People; The Social and Political History of Little Falls by Richard Buckley (2008), not to mention my own historical novel of the American Revolution in this area, Neither Rebel Nor Tory; Hanyost Schuyler & the Siege of Fort Stanwix. The Cooney scrapbook collection contains newspaper articles from the mid 1800s to mid 1900s, and a wealth of genealogical material, primary sources and maps, are available for reference.

For those interested in doing their research via the internet, the volunteers at the Three Rivers website have posted a huge collection of public domain books on the history of the Mohawk, Hudson and Schoharie Valleys, including my father Edward Cooney's 1961 history of Little Falls.

The Mohawk Valley near Little Falls in the 1870s

from "Picturesque America"

Philmont and its High Falls

On a beautiful morning in May we set out for High Falls Conservation Area, which is owned and managed by the Columbia Land Conservancy. We drove east from state route 9-h on SR 23, then took 217 into the old mill town of Philmont. Access to the area is from Roxbury Road near the Claverack Town garage. The village, once known as Factory Hill, was home to a flourishing knitting industry, powered by water power from the 150 foot High Falls.

Thanks to the Conservancy, there are three well-maintained trails. We took the Green Trail up a slight incline for about twenty minutes to reach an observation point opposite the Falls.

The High Falls from the Green Trail

We then followed the Blue Trail down to Agawamuck Creek, which is said to offer good opportunities trout and bass. We threw the line in a few times and saw many minnows but no larger fish. Along the creek we saw some trash, evidently thrown down from the hill on the village side, the most interesting of which was a circa 1968 Volkswagen Beetle.

Agawamuck Creek

Relic of the 1960s

The blue trail ends in a jumble of rocks, over which it is necessary to climb in order to reach a truly magical place at the base of the Falls. Enclosed by high cliffs of shale is a round pool about a hundred feet in diameter. The pool looked inviting, but considering the slipperiness of the rocks, we resisted the temptation to jump in.

The High Falls from Below

The Pool Below the Falls

The red trail has its own appeal, following a highland ridge through patches of ferns and woodland flowers. Coming back down the Blue Trail, we saw stone fences, evidence that farmers once struggled to wrest a living from this rocky soil. Doubtless, the unrewarding nature of agriculture in this region made factory work desirable when the first mills were built in Philmont.

Community Activism in Philmont

The town is quite an active place, with many people on the street even on a weekday. Residents are currently united in a fight to keep Pinehaven, a public nursing and rehabilitation facility, from moving to Kinderhook about fifteen miles away. In an era when care of the aged and disabled has become one of the few reliable industries, opposition to the move is evident in a forest of signs on almost every lawn and shop window. The history of this institution, which began as a tuberculosis sanitarium, is an interesting one and well documented by local citizens. Some of the land on which it stands was purchased from George Harder, a descendant of the family that owned and ran the village’s largest employer for a century.

Last Remaining Building from High Rock Mills

The only remaining building from the High Rock Mill of the Harder family, according to Peter Stotts’ Looking for Work, is a small two story structure on Rock Street, now home to a daycare center. Originally the site for an earlier mill, built in 1845, the Harders acquired the property in 1868 and ran it until 1963. The mill reached its height in 1913, when it employed 870, a larger number than any other employer in the county.

Aken Mill Building, Now Home to Vita Nova Woodworking

We then strolled a couple blocks to Canal Street, where one of the few remaining structures from the Aken Knitting Mill is still in use by Vita Nova Woodworking. Peter Stott reports that the Aken Mill, built around 1878, employed 250 persons, mostly women, in finishing the knit goods made in the company’s other mill on Main Street. The High Rock Company later bought the mill and used it for storage until was demolished in the 1940s.

Summit Knitting Mill

The Courtyard of the Summit Knitting Mill

Fortunately, the Summit Knitting Mill, the grandest of the old factories, is still standing and in good repair. Evidently the present owners are preparing it for new uses, and after some further research we will report on their progress and plans. There is a courtyard at the back of the mill, along the creek, which could be a very attractive outdoor space for a restaurant. The walls of the courtyard, probably part of a older mill structure, are composed of piled shale, which seems quite unusual, given the friable nature of that kind of stone. Even so, the walls appear quite sturdy.

The Summit Mill is built at the top of the High Falls and just below the dam which creates the very scenic Summit Lake in the village’s center. According to Peter Stott, this was the site for the village’s first textile mill in 1796 when George Philip dammed the creek and built a fulling mill.

Summit Lake

We resolved to return soon to this beautiful village and get to know the lively people who still call it home. Perhaps in a time when our nation is struggling to overcome dependence on fossil fuels, the power of the High Falls will once again be a source of prosperity on the Agawamuck Creek.