The hamlet transitions to the automobile age and suburbia

Glassworks along the Hunger Kill led to the birth of Hamilton, which the postal service later named Guilderland. The rest of the hamlet’s history unfolds in this week’s column.

Facing a major setback with the departure of Newbury Foundry on the eve of the 20th century, Guilderland’s villagers had to readjust to an economic impact from the loss of the payroll and the social loss of so many inhabitants including members of extended families who relocated to Goshen with the company.

For many years after, there were visits between Goshen and Guilderland as friends and family members kept in touch.

Fortunately, a group of local men invested their money in shares to buy the foundry property from Jay Newbury, reopening as Guilderland Foundry. Immediately resuming operations, the new management began advertising for additional help in the machine shop and foundry. They expanded its capabilities to cast aluminum and brass as well as plating with nickel.

Wired for electricity in 1920, the foundry advertised grates and parts for stoves with castings of fraternal emblems for cemetery plots and metal doorstops in production. Continuing to provide some employment in the community, the Guilderland Foundry never had workers on the scale of Newbury’s.

With the coming of the Depression in 1929, production ceased. One last shareholders’ meeting was held in 1934 followed a year later with the property foreclosed and up for auction. The buildings were taken down, eliminating all traces of their existence.

Churches

One constant in the community were the two churches, the Methodist Church on Willow Street with its parsonage nearby and Hamilton Union Presbyterian with its parsonage in front of the church. Each had its own minister until 1920 when, probably due to financial constraints, the two churches federated sharing one minister alternating years, renting out its parsonage when it was the alternative church’s ministerial choice.

Especially during the Depression years, financially keeping up the two church buildings became increasingly difficult. Finally, in 1944, Methodist Church members discontinued their church with 72 members formally transferring to the Hamilton Union Church. After this, the Methodist Church building was removed.

Not only providing religious services, the churches had a variety of organizations such as Willing Workers, Christian Endeavor, or the Missionary Society that offered an opportunity to socialize as well as serve some purpose.

Very often some sort of social event went on in one church or the other, each with a minimal admission fee to support the sponsoring church, but also providing a night out, especially important in the years before automobiles made it easy to go to a nearby city for entertainment.

Each announcement, whether for an early century gramophone concert, a chicken dinner, clam bake, or some kind of performance, the whole community was included with the note “all are welcome.”

After World War II, with the rapid growth and suburbanization of that part of Guilderland, the numbers attending Hamilton Union Church increased so that a sizable addition was built with Sunday school rooms and additional space for meetings. The parsonage building that once stood in front of the church was taken down and the area paved to expand the parking lot with a parsonage purchased nearby.

To the east on Route 20 was a small Greek Revival style building originally built in the 1840s for a Baptist congregation, followed by a Catholic church, which also left, leaving the building standing empty for some time.

Social life

Then, in the 1880s, the Good Templars, a temperance group, moved in, being joined in 1896 by a council of The Improved Order of Red Men, a fraternal order that patterned its rituals and regalia on what they considered Indian customs.

In Guilderland, male members were part of the Iosco Tribe, No. 341 and would have come from all over town, not just the hamlet of Guilderland. There were titles such as sachem, prophet, senior sagamore, and keeper of wampum, with ceremonies and rituals to be followed. Women were members of the Order of Pocahontas, Natoma Council also with rituals and titles.

The Red Men’s members enjoyed socializing, sometimes providing a community social activity for a small admission. Both were in contact with other local councils and IORM state officials such as the Great Prophetess. This organization eventually faded away, going out of existence in Guilderland in the later 1950s.

The small building, often referred to as Temperance Hall or Red Man’s Hall, was also used for civic functions. During both world wars, Red Cross meetings were held there with women volunteering to sew or knit needed articles for the troops. It also served as a polling place for the Guilderland Election District.

Finally, after the disbanding of the local chapter of the Red Men, no one was left to pay taxes on the derelict building. Abandoned and condemned, one night in 1967 it burned. Today a New York state historic marker marks the site where it once stood.

Schools

Guilderland’s elementary school, built in 1891 on Willow Street, had a near disaster early in the century when a terrible November storm blew over the chimney, sending chunks of masonry through the roof, crashing through a classroom ceiling, destroying several student desks.But for a teachers’ institute giving the children a day off from school, there would have been serious loss of life.

The building remained in use until after centralization and the 1953 opening of Westmere Elementary School. With the area’s rapid postwar population growth, the school building had gotten so crowded that additional space had to be rented for some classes so that by 1950 classes in that building only went up to the sixth grade.

The centralized school district sold the district’s redundant old school buildings with Guilderland’s being purchased by the town of Guilderland to be used as our town’s first real town hall. Instead of having town officials run the town from their own homes, there was now office space in a central location.

Eventually, when the current town hall opened in 1972, the building became a New York State Police substation; its side parking lot, decades before, had been the site of the Methodist Church.

The school bell that had called generations of Guilderland students to class had been taken down in 1953, and was sent to Greece to replace a bell in a church that had been destroyed in the war.

Fighting fire

People in the community became concerned that they had no nearby fire protection, having to depend on coverage from departments from other areas of town. Apparently by 1930, they began to make a serious attempt to form a fire company and by 1931 began holding meetings in Charles Bohl’s garage.

A year later, some equipment was purchased including hose, a hose cart, and three ladders. During the remainder of the decade, activity was limited, but by 1941, the department reorganized. Two years later, a used power and light truck was purchased and, in 1944, the company received additional equipment. Finally the department incorporated in 1948 and in 1950 the fire district was enlarged.

Hard work and a variety of fundraising activities began with street dances, card parties, and bingo games all raising money to purchase land for a new firehouse. Then volunteers began the job of erecting their new firehouse.

In the meantime, Guilderland’s firemen were able to purchase a new Dodge truck and body to finally have a real piece of firefighting equipment. At last, in 1958, the new firehouse was dedicated.

Over the years, additional land has been acquired with the much expanded current firehouse on the site today.

Business

A business district had begun along the old Western Turnpike in the early 1800s, continuing into the 20th century along Route 20. The general store that served several generations in Guilderland operated under several owners over the years, but was best known as Ward’s Store.

The post office was located in Ward’s Store, leading to much foot traffic during the years until a new post office was opened in 1961 on the opposite side of Route 20. At the time the new post office opened, T.B. Ward had been postmaster 46 years.

In 1928, the Tompkins and Hoe garage opened, expanding in 1932 to not only sell and repair cars, but also sell farm equipment under the name Hamilton Garage.

In 1927, the Bohl Brothers began their bus company and erected a large garage to store and maintain buses. The bus business operated there until 1949.

A large frame building on what long ago had been the site of Sloan’s Hotel was home over the years to a gas station, laundromat, luncheonette, a very early home of the Guilderland Library from 1959 to 1961, and the town assessor’s office. Finally, in 1968, a laundromat fire spread, resulting in the building being taken down.

In this section of Route 20 also stood the Guilderland Gift House and the dry cleaners that opened in the 1950s. The old Ward’s Store, ending its days as a costume shop, was taken down for firehouse expansion.

Once Star Plaza and Twenty Mall went up at the far eastern edge of Guilderland, business within the confines of the hamlet slowly disappeared.

Service

Over the years a variety of activities were available for the hamlet’s residents. Early in the 20th century, several women belonged to the Suffrage Club while others were active in the Women’s Christian Temperance Union.

By the 1920s, a Parent Teacher Association had been formed at the elementary school. Men were involved in playing baseball, especially in early years when the Iosco team had a loyal following.

Generations of all ages informally skated on the mill pond once it was frozen. Boy Scout and Girl Scout troops and Sunday schools were available for children.

During both World War I and World War II, community members pitched in with Red Cross volunteers meeting regularly at Temperance Hall to sew articles needed by the troops. Volunteers served as air-raid wardens during World War II.

Many young community members served in these wars. During World War II, an honor roll was erected on the Route 20 corner of the Schoolcraft House, with the permission of the Magill sisters, owners at that time.

During the post-war period, the Guilderland Fire Department played an active role in village life. Women could join the Home Bureau. A few became involved in the early establishment of the Guilderland Library, which for a short time was located in a commercial building on Route 20.

Similar to the experience of other hamlets in the town with the coming of suburbia and population growth, especially with large numbers of outsiders moving in, the Guilderland hamlet was no longer a homey little place where everyone knew everyone and was served by small, locally owned businesses.

In addition, Guilderland faced the challenge of being located on Route 20, the most heavily traveled highway in the town. But in spite of this, the hamlet of Guilderland remains a very nice place to live with its fire department and historic church helping to preserve its individual identity.