Our Towne Bethlehem October 2020: The 1898 Assessment Roll

 

As you might have guessed, I am a total history nerd.  I actually transcribed this whole book into a spreadsheet.  My kind of fun!  This article explores just of few of the interesting bits that were revealed, especially when you can play around with sorting the data.  More to come in November, if not before!

Exploring Bethlehem’s 1898 Assessment Roll Book

October 2020

 William Selkirk, Usher Ottman and William Bullock were very busy in the spring of 1898 as they surveyed Bethlehem properties for the annual assessment. Every bit of real property, including classifications of farm, house & lot, tavern stand, vacant lot, wood lot, and island, were assessed as was personal property. That assessment roll has recently come to light and studying it turns up some interesting historical data. Let’s explore.

One of the first items that catches the eye, are the descriptions of the property. Many are designated as “house & lot” and the more occasional “house, lot & shop”. A few of these can be exactly identified with homes still standing today. For example, in the assessment roll, South Side Avenue Lot No.1 is owned by Jessie W. Sprong, South Side Avenue Lots No 2 thru 5 are owned by “Leah Haswell Administrator” and South Side Avenue Lot No.6 is owned William Coughtry.  These homes are the stately Victorians that line Kenwood Avenue opposite the rail trail parking lot in Slingerlands. We know that Albert I. Slingerland, who died in 1896, developed this row of houses and that Leah Haswell was his daughter. We know that the Sprongs lived at 698 Kenwood Avenue and that the last in the line of houses, it would have been at the corner with Union Avenue, burned down, making the row of five that are there today. And, in case you are curious, the Sprong house was valued $2,500, lots 2-5 at $1,500, and the Coughtry place at $1,200.

J. White and Sarah Sprong lived in their home on Kenwood Avenue, formerly known as South Side Avenue, from 1886 until they died just two days apart in January 1930.

Speaking of values, you also might be curious to know that the highest value of a house & lot is George N. Best’s property which still stands on Barrent Winne Road. Its value was $8,000. The lowest? There are three places valued at $50: David Winne’s, John Rarick’s and George Snyder’s. The average assessment of a house and lot is about $900.

George and Ursula Best built their dramatic Second Empire style home in the late 1870s or early 80s. It is located on Barrent Winne Road.  Best's ice house was just down the hill on the Hudson River. 

It’s when you get to the farms that the values really climb. The average farm in the 1898 assessment is about 80 acres with an average value of about $4,000. While Phillip Wendell Parks had the largest individual farm at 317 acres (valued at $13,500), Parker Corning had one 215-acre spread valued at $38,700. Add in the three other Parker Corning properties and the total comes to $48,300. Corning of course is connected the famous Erastus Corning family of Albany. His property was located along modern-day Corning Hill Road down to River Road in Glenmont. Other high totals include the aforementioned George N. Best whose house & lot, personal property, ice house, and store total $33,000, and Albert I. Slingerland whose estate is spread out over 29 different properties with a total value of $28,650.

When scanning the roll for those five figure numbers, Sarah Mallary’s name* jumps out. She is listed as having $29,700 of personal property and no real estate.  What is up with that? It turns out that Sarah McNab Mallary is the widow Henry A. Mallary, a prosperous Bethlehem farmer. They married sometime after 1880, when both were older and widowed. Henry’s first wife, with whom he had six children, was Ellen Bullock. She died in 1878.

The old-fashioned word administratrix is clear on this page of the assessment roll book. Note that Henry Mallary has a listing for farm and personal. He must have appealed that assessment because the personal property has been crossed out and the total assessed is only for the farm. There are several places in the journal where values have been reduced.

Sarah was the eldest daughter of Jasper and Maria McNab of Berne. Her first husband was Durham Nelson with whom she had two children, Celestia and Jasper. Her second was Hezekiah Van Buren (a carpenter who was said to be a cousin of President Van Buren) with whom she had two daughters, Anna and Hattie. After her third husband Henry died in 1897, Sarah lived with her daughter Anna Van Buren Haswell in Delmar until her death in 1914.

When Henry died just a year before the assessment roll was taken, his widow Sarah was appointed his “administratrix” to settle the estate. By 1898 it appears that the real estate had already been divided. Indeed, the farms of his sons Henry and Hiram are listed right next to Sarah on the roll. Henry had 88 acres, Henry 108, both valued at $5,400 each. One can assume that the $28,650 in personal property was part of the estate and had not yet been divided.

But what was that personal property?

Conveniently, in September 1890, the American Economic Association published an article called the History of the New York Property Tax. The article defines real estate as including “the land itself, buildings, trees, underwood, mines, minerals, quarries and fossils.” Personal property included “household furniture, monies, goods, chattels, debts due from solvent debtors, public stocks and stocks in moneyed corporations.” Further research to find Henry’s will and probate record might answer the question what exactly that personal property was and how much Sarah managed to keep.

Next month we’ll take a look at some of the businesses listed. Tavern stands and ice houses were singled out under individual names, as well as other intriguing items like John Gaitley’s nickel plate works and P. G. McArdle’s blast furnace. Not to mention the incorporated businesses like the Delaware & Hudson Canal Company and the Hudson River Telephone Company.

A section of the 1950 U.S.G.S. map showing Mallory's Corners.  Henry A. Mallary (or Mallory or Malary) lived near the intersection of Elm Avenue and Jericho Road.  For a landmark, Meyers Corners is where the Jericho Drive-In is located. 

*In primary source documents, Sarah’s last name is spelled variously as Mallary, Mallory, and Malary. For consistency, this article uses Mallary, as is engraved on her marker at Bethlehem Cemetery. 

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And my apologies yet again for the wonky font and line spacing issues.  Blogger doesn't like when I cut and paste but I don't want to retype everything.