The committee reported as follows and the Secretary was directed to cast a ballot for such officers : President-Wm. Hamilton, Caledonia. Secretary and Treasurer-Wm. A. Brodie, Geneseo. Councilmen-M. H. Mills, chairman; B. F. Angel, Charles Shepard, C. K. Sanders, David McNair, J. A. Dana, C. D. Bennett, Norman Seymour, J. A. Lake. The following resolution, presented by A. J. Abbott, (with two others.) was referred to the Board of Councilmen who reported favorably and was unanimously adopted: RESOLVED, That the proprietors of the several public newspapers of the County of Livingston, be and the same hereby are, respectfully requested to hereafter preserve annual volumes of their respective papers, and donate the same annually to this Livingston County Historical Society; that in all cases when such donations are made this Society will cause said volumes to be well and strongly bound and placed among the archives of the Society, to be preserved as volumes of reference, but not to be taken from the custody of the Society; that all such proprietors shall be received and enrolled as members of the Society from year to year without payment of fees or annual dues, so long as such gifts are made. In pursuance of notice given at the annual meeting in 1891, the question of changing the date of the annual meeting was taken up, discussed, and the third Tuesday in January substituted for the second Tuesday. The President elect announced the following Standing Committees: Publication-M. H. Mills, O. D. Lake, C. K. Sanders. Membership-A. D. Coe, E. W. Clark, H. V. Colt. Necrology Norman Seymour, A. O. Bunnell, E. H. Davis. A number of new members were elected whose names appear in the list of members published herewith. The business meeting, which was largely attended and full of interest, adjourned for the public meeting at 2 o'clock p. m. PUBLIC MEETING. The afternoon session was held at 2 o'clock at Seymour Opera House, President Lake presiding. The exercises were opened by some very choice music by local musical talent, and prayer was offered by Rev. E. B. Williams. The retiring President then made the following address : PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. O. D. LAKE. LADIES AND GENTLEMEN AND MEMBERS OF THE LIVINGSTON COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY:-In behalf of the citizens of Mt. Morris I extend to you a most cordial welcome to this 16th anniversary of our society, and trust your visit will be one of interest and profit. There was an error in the program of this meeting when I was put on for an address, as all know I never indulge in the pastime of speech making, but will most heartily congratulate the society upon the success that has attended its efforts in securing the past history of our county and having it securely deposited where it is accessible to all. But our duty is not yet done, as the years pass new history is made and through our agency to be recorded and transmitted to posterity. In the few words I now have to say allow me to refer to some changes that have occurred under my own observation in the town of Mt. Morris in the last seventy years. The southwestern portion of the town consisted of the Gardeau or White Woman's Reservation and was not in market till about 1823. Settlements were then rapidly made and roads were opened, but as late as 1830 there were not more than three or four apologies for frame houses between this village and Nunda, and the same may be said of the River road to Portage. To pass over these roads at the present time and see the comfortable and often elegant residences, with productive fields and fruitful orchards, would tax our credulity to believe that in so short a space of time those forests could be transformed into the abodes of civilization and refinement. In 1827 the first house erected for religious worship in this town, was built at the Ridge, on the State road, four miles south of this village, and was built of oak logs and finished with raised platform for pulpit and comfortable seats for audience, and was used as a house of worship until 1834 when it was removed to give place to the large and commodious church edifice that now occupies the same ground. I have often seen whole families coming through the woods with ox teams to meeting, as it was then called, to listen to two sermons, each one hour long. In contrast with this there are now nine churches in this town. Equally marked changes have occurred in the village of Mt. Morris, and in place of one grist mill, operated by water obtained from adjacent springs, there is now a dam in the river with a race nearly three miles in length, upon which are situated three flouring mills, a large foundry and manufactory for water wheels and all kinds of farming implements, a saw mill and salt block, with electric light plant, and other machinery giving employment to a large number of artisans and mechanics. I will not detain you to speak of the enthusiasm of the people of our county upon the opening of the Genesee Valley canal in 1840, by which we could reach Rochester in the short space of twelve hours, or of the facilities for travel and transportation afforded by the railroads that pass through our county, affording means for business and pleasure afforded by few other localities. In thus referring to the changes of the past I do not deem it improper to call to mind and mention the names of some of the hardy and heroic pioneers who were instrumental in establishing and perpetuating the religious, agricultural and educational institutions of our county, such as James and William Wadsworth, John R. Murray, Benj. W. Rogers, Gen. Wm. A. Mills, Gen. Micha Brooks, Chas. H. Carroll, D. H. Fitzhugh, Jerediah Hosford, Philo C. Fuller, Allen Ayrault, Chas. Colt, Geo. W. Patterson, D. H. Bissel, Jotham Clark, James Faulkner, Jesse Stanley, Riley Scoville, Reuben Sleeper, Geo. Smith, of Livonia, one of the builders of the first Mt. Morris dam. and many others equally worthy and efficient, all of whom have passed away and are entitled to the remembrance and gratitude of posterity. I will not detain you longer, but again welcome you in our midst, trusting this meeting will further the interests of our society. Owing to severe illness the orator of the day, Rev. J. W. Sanborn, was not present and the Secretary read the following synopsis of the excellent address which had been prepared: THE ORIGIN OF THE PREHISTORIC AMERICAN RACES. REV. J. W. SANBORN. The genius of investigation, whose steps may be traced almost everywhere, is bringing light to bear upon the antiquities of the American continent, which until now, has been regarded as the youngest of continents, because discovered last by white races, but now is considered the equal, if not superior in age, to the oldest of them all. The castle and cathedrial ruins of the old world are the waymarks of a civilization centuries old. They afford the wandering tourist tangible evidence of the marvels of a remote past, which, but for the massive and majestic ruins, might easily glide into the realm of the mythological. The American continent is not lacking in monumental records of a misty past. The distinguished Englishman who visited the late Henry W. Longfellow, had he sought diligently for the evidences of our antiquity as a continent, had never accosted the poet with the doubtful compliment: "You have no ruins in America, and so I came to see you, Mr. Longfellow.' Mounds, fortifications, skulls, pottery, utensils of stone and metal, formidable weapons of war and ruins of curious structures, and on the most extensive scale, have been discovered in various localities in America, indicating without a doubt, prehistoric existence of a powerful people, so long extinct that the most ancient tradition of their successors, the Indian race, fails to afford one ray of light to illuminate the subject, which, but for the mounds and their contents, the ruins of cities and other fragmentary hints of the "great past," must have ever been shrouded in impenetrable gloom. The lecturer went on to give from history and from his own personal discoveries in mounds in New York and Pennsylvania, proofs of the existence of a race or races antedating the Indian as we know him. At the base of one mound examined by him and located in Pennsylvania, he found a stone waterway, which had been constructed for the evident purpose of conveying water from a hill-side spring to a settlement. His conclusion was that a race, other than the Indian, constructed the waterway. Indians have not been in the habit of building either houses or waterways of stone. Other evidences as furnished by discoveries in other parts of the country, point to and prove the existence of older races than the Indian. The next question discussed was: "Whence originated these prehistoric races whom the Europeans found on this continent ?`` Ask the Indian whence he came, and he replies: "Whites came; Indian always been here." Press him for a more definite answer, and he says: "We sprung out of the earth like the trees, the grass. the flowers." We turn from the Indian in despair. He simply cannot tell how he came here. The speaker then set forth and discussed the theory that these prehistoric races came from Asia, across Behring's straits. But we find that there was an indigenous American population in the Quaternary age, and this refutes the Behring's straits hypothesis, or at least reduces it to the position of a secondary fact, and then again, the languages of the native American are utterly distinct from all Asiatic tongues. If they are related ever so remotely, there should be some indications at least of similarity. The theory that the aborigines came from Polynesia was also examined and refuted. Another theory, more plausible than any mentioned thus far, is that the Indians and their predecessors crossed the Atlantic from the British Isles. The objections to such a theory were presented. The speaker next considered the Indian tradition that the native races of the American continent came from the far north, the land of the "fir trees." And this he thought most worthy of credence. The continents are divided into three principal groups, and at the extreme north these groups are separated by very narrow passages. A civilization wholly independent of all others was in course of radiation when the Europeans came to America. The fact is that nobody knows whether the human race was born in the east or in the north. Emigration may have been from north to south, in three directions. In that event we could easily see some reasons for the perfect autonomy of the American races. The climate of the Arctic regions was, at the close of the Jurassic period, as warm as in the present temperate zone. The writer declared it as his opinion that the solution of the problem of the origin of the prehistoric and all native races of America, is to be sought in this direction, and energetic investigation will yet discover evidences in the far north region of the origin of our native Americans. |