In today’s History Bit, we shine a spotlight on the Webster Arboretum, and a beautiful little tree with the peevish name, the crabapple. 

Most people probably don’t realize that the flowering crabapple is the Town of Webster’s official tree. According to the Webster Arboretum website, that designation can be traced back to Elizabeth Sykes, a member of the Webster Country Gardeners Garden Club. Back around 1970, she urged the Town to adopt the tree as the Town Tree. (No one seems to know why she chose the crabapple).

Sykes then asked Jean Thompson and Carole Huther to approach the Town about establishing a crabapple arboretum. The perfect location seemed to be a parcel of land the Town had purchased several years earlier, two family farms on Schlegel Rd. owned by Herman Rieflin and Walter Wright. On June 21, 1971 the Town accepted the proposal and set aside 20 of the 80 acres for the arboretum. 

Of course the first plantings were crabapple trees.

In the years since it was established, the Webster Arboretum, now about 40 acres,  has seen many improvements and expansions, especially in anticipation of the Town’s sesquicentennial celebration in 1990. The beautiful results of those efforts and continuing support from the Town of Webster, Webster community members and a dedicated team of volunteers can be seen today in its bountiful gardens and along its peaceful, flower-filled paths.  

The Webster Arboretum is located at 1700 Schlegel Rd. To read more about this beautiful park, visit the Arboretum website at websterarboretum.org. 

Discover more interesting bits of local history at the Webster Museum, 18 Lapham Park in the Village of Webster. It’s open Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from 2 to 4:30 p.m. Visit the website at webstermuseum.org to learn more.

Missy Rosenberry
Webster Community Blogger

See my blog at: websterontheweb.com.
Check out my Facebook page and follow me on Twitter and Instagram.

You never know what fascinating nugget of Webster history you’ll discover when you visit the Webster Museum. 

For example, just inside the front door hangs one of Webster’s very first “telephones,” which was used from 1887 to 1901. It hung in what was most recently the Music Store on West Main St. in the village, when the old post office was located there. A second one was installed in the railroad station on North Ave. 

The two instruments were connected by two wires strung across poles and roofs of houses along North Ave. They operated in much the same way as the old tin-can telephones we used to use when we were kids. Remember them? Stretch a string between two tin cans and you could talk back and forth just by keeping the string taut.

When the postmaster wanted to know when to expect the mail trains, he would knock vigorously on the center of the disc. This would cause the wires to vibrate and ring the bell on the telephone at the other end. To communicate, you would talk and listen through the center of the disc.  

This particular telephone has been in the Webster Museum’s collection since the museum opened in 1976. It was donated by Peter and Jay Smith, whose father was the postmaster (although the bell is not original).

Learn more about this and other interesting bits of local history at the Webster Museum, 18 Lapham Park in the Village of Webster. It’s open Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from 2 to 4:30 p.m. Visit the website at webstermuseum.org to learn more.    

Missy Rosenberry
Webster Community Blogger

See my blog at: websterontheweb.com.
Check out my Facebook page and follow me on Twitter and Instagram.

The Town of Webster has several beautiful cemeteries, most very familiar to us. But the smallest of our town’s cemeteries is often forgotten, even though many of us pass by it almost every day.  

Robb Cemetery is an 8700-square foot parcel of land on East Main Street in the village of Webster, just west of Phillips Road. It is a true pioneer burial ground, with at least eight known burial sites dating back to 1823. 

The land was originally set aside from the farm of Andrew Rodd as a family burial ground – the only one in Webster – but other friends and relatives were also buried there.  

For many years there was no indication the land held a cemetery – no signage, not even any gravestones. In 2013, the Village of Webster officially took possession of the property, cleaned it up, and erected a handsome sign naming all of the pioneers known to have been buried there.  

A fascinating little piece of that cemetery’s history now resides at the Webster Museum. It’s the headstone for Nelly Wood, who died in 1838 at age 84. It was found many years ago in the basement of the house just west of the cemetery. No one really knows how long it was there, or Nelly’s connection with the Robb Family. But it is a nice reminder of the significance of Webster’s very own pioneer cemetery. 

Stop by the museum to see it for yourself any Tuesday, Thursday or Saturday from 2 to 4:30 p.m. The Webster Museum is located at 18 Lapham Park in the Village of Webster.

Missy Rosenberry
Webster Community Blogger

See my blog at: websterontheweb.com.
Check out my Facebook page and follow me on Twitter and Instagram.

Last month’s Bit of Webster History feature really struck a chord with many current and former Webster residents. Titled “What’s in a Name?”, it told the history behind several well-known Webster street names: Salt Rd., Basket Rd., Five Mile Line Rd., Shoecraft Rd. and Whiting Rd. 

Dozens of readers reached out, many wondering about other well-known road names. So here, drawing liberally once again from Webster History Through the Years, are answers for some of those wonders. 

Klem Rd., now known in part for its spacious shoulders, was only 49 feet wide when it was surveyed in 1816. Several families of Klems lived on or near the road, so it was named for them. It was originally built with logs because the bed was low and swampy. 

Woodhull Rd. was surveyed in 1816 across the original Robert Woodhull Farm and was named after him. 

It’s commonly believed that Vosburg Rd. was named after the forebears of George Vosburgh, who lived many years in the old brick house near the corner of Lake Rd. It was actually named after Freeman Vosburgh, a German blacksmith, who built that house.

Drumm Rd. was named after a colorful character called “Captain Drumms.” He was reputed to be a former canal boat captain who bought land on the west side of the road. 

Herman Rd. was named after Gustav Herman, who owned a farm on the south side of the road opposite Pellett Rd. The road had apparently been nameless for several years.

More information about these roads and many others can be found in Webster Through the Years, by Esther Dunn, published in 1971. You can check out a copy at the Webster Public Library, or page through one at the Webster Museum, 18 Lapham Park in the Village of Webster. The museum is open every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday from 2 to 4:30 p.m.

Missy Rosenberry
Webster Community Blogger

See my blog at: websterontheweb.com.
Check out my Facebook page and follow me on Twitter and Instagram.

The names are all very familiar to us: Plank Rd., Salt Rd., Basket Rd., Five Mile Line Rd., Shoecraft Rd., Whiting Rd. But what might not be so familiar is exactly how these well-known roadways got their names. 

Plank Rd. is pretty self-explanatory; it was originally constructed with planks. But how about the others? Their stories, recounted in Webster Through the Years by Esther Dunn, offer a glimpse into Webster’s history:

• Salt Rd. was named after salt springs located nearby
• Basket Rd. was originally known as Basket Street because many of the early settlers in the area made baskets out of branches from the willow trees that grew nearby.    
• Five Mile Line Rd. referred to the distance from Penfield Village to Ridge Rd. 
• Shoecraft Rd. bears the name of John Shoecraft, an early settler of Penfield who served in both the Revolutionary War and War of 1812.
• Whiting Rd. was named for John Whiting, a pioneer who settled on the lakeshore near the junction of Lake and Holt roads. You can still see the grand home he built near that intersection, in Webster Park, which we now know as the White House Lodge.

Webster history is all around us, even hidden in the streets on which we drive. Uncover more historical surprises at the Webster Museum, 18 Lapham Park in the Village of Webster. It’s open Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from 2 to 4:30 p.m.

Missy Rosenberry
Webster Community Blogger

See my blog at: websterontheweb.com.
Check out my Facebook page and follow me on Twitter and Instagram.

Now here’s something you might not have known: the first woman to run for President of the United States actually did so way back in 1872. Her name was Victoria Woodhull, the daughter-in-law of Byron Woodhull, the Town of Webster’s first supervisor.

Woodhull was a woman 100 years ahead of her time. She not only ran for president, but was also deeply involved in the suffrage movement, and advocated for social improvements like an eight-hour work day, a graduated income tax and social welfare programs. She and her sister Tennnessee published a weekly newspaper – among the first women ever to do so – and were the first women stockbrokers. By the late 1800s, Woodhull was one of the most famous women in the country.

When Woodhull ran for the presidency in 1872, she was a candidate of the Equal Rights Party. She didn’t garner even one electoral vote, but it’s interesting to note that she spent election day in jail. The U.S government had arrested her for sending “obscene” literature through the mail. Her offense was publishing articles in her newspaper about an adulterous affair between Elizabeth Tilton and Reverend Henry Ward Beecher, a prominent Protestant minister. 

Victoria Woodhull, portrayed by Gwen Hoffman, was one of several notable Webster women, past and present, who “visited” the Webster Public Library on Thursday March 30 for a Women’s History Month program. Also on hand to tell their historical stories were Monroe County politician Erva Wright (portrayed by Eileen Brookins), former Webster Historian Esther Dunn (Lisa McNamara), farm wife Agnes Semmler (Sharon Pratt) and present-day Town of Webster Councilwoman Ginny Nguyen. Learn more about lots of interesting historical Webster women (and men) at the Webster Museum, 18 Lapham Park in the Village of Webster. It’s open Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from 2 to 4:30 p.m. Visit the website at webstermuseum.org to learn more.

Missy Rosenberry
Webster Community Blogger

See my blog at: websterontheweb.com.
Check out my Facebook page and follow me on Twitter and Instagram.

In honor of the month of March, when we celebrate all things Irish, here’s an amusing – and historical – look back at a vegetable that’s central to Irish heritage: the potato.

Back in the days when Webster was more a farming community than anything else, the Webster Herald would commonly publish reports on the bounty of the year’s harvest. But the following two items, pulled from a column called “Who Can Beat This?”, published on Oct. 23, 1942 at the height of WWII, focused specifically on two very unusual potatoes. 

The author began, “We are told that food will win the war. And it will. When you get a combination of fighting Irish and Irish potatoes, you just can’t beat it. … Of course we all know that there are no fighting men like the Irish… Now about the potatoes….” 

The article continued, “In the fall of 1941, Martin Hosenfeld, who farms over on the State Road, harvested several acres of potatoes. In sorting them he came across one that weighed 3 pounds and 4 ounces, which goes to prove that you can’t beat the Irish potatoes.” 

Apparently the potato had some even more unusual qualities.

This particular potato was not going to be caught napping, so it was born with eighteen eyes. In the spring of 1942 Mr. Hosenfeld cut the potato into eighteen pieces, one eye in a piece, and planted them one in a hill. From that nineteen forty-one potato that weighed a little more than three pounds, he this year harvested twenty-three pounds of potatoes, practically all of them being of marketable size.

These reports typically also included specifics about the farmer’s methods, perhaps in case others might want to try to grow an even bigger potato. In Farmer Hosenfeld’s case, the author wrote, 

“The soil in which he planted was a heavy loam. He fertilized with twenty ton manure to the acre and half a ton of fertilizer.”

Later in the column, the author reported on yet another monstrous potato, which he theorized might actually help the war effort. 

He wrote, “Fruits and vegetables are certainly going to town this year in size. They realize we are in the war all right and they sure are producing. The latest on the list is a potato that grew in a patch on Ovid Fry’s farm on the Nine Mile Point Road. This little Irish potato weighed three pounds. Not a bad weight for a small potato.” 

“We are going to have this potato baked and while it is good and hot come in and pick it up and you will better realize what Hitler has got a hold of.” 

And in case you’re wondering, “Ovid had four and one-half acres of Katahdins and they produced three hundred bushels to the acre. The soil is a sandy loam and he used 1100 pounds of fertilizer to the acre.”

The Webster Museum has an entire exhibit highlighting Webster’s rich farming history. Stop by for a visit and learn more about, well, maybe not potatoes, but certainly all sorts of fruits and vegetables, cereal grains and more. The museum is located at 18 Lapham Park in the Village of Webster. It’s open Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from 2 to 4:30 p.m. Visit the website at webstermuseum.org to learn more. 

Missy Rosenberry
Webster Community Blogger

See my blog at: websterontheweb.com.
Check out my Facebook page and follow me on Twitter and Instagram.