SKANEATELES — As far back as 1750s, crude wagons were used to carry passengers between cities, towns and villages. Later in the 18th century, wagons were carrying passengers and the mails, replacing the colorful “post” riders, sometimes called “the Pony Express.” These coachmen carried letters, packages and even money, transacting business and delivering messages and goods along their routes. These early coaches had iron or steel springs and were very uncomfortable with a short service life. Two men in Concord, New Hampshire, in 1827, built a coach suspended on long leather straps, which gave it it’s well-known swaying motion. Mark Twain described this new style stage’s ride as a “cradle on wheels.”
In 1794 the state legislature approved the construction of a road from Utica to the City of Canandaigua called the Genesee Road. In 1800 the road was renamed “Seneca Turnpike” when a law was passed to establish a maintenance company, The Seneca Turnpike Company. A turnpike is a toll road with a toll gate (pike) every 10 miles and a collection a fee of 25 cents for a four horse team. At 157 miles, this turnpike was the longest in the state at that time. Soon after, the establishment of the community of Skaneateles began. The Seneca Turnpike route which originally bypassed the growing community over a mile to the north, was relocated southward to go through this important settlement. This segment was called New Seneca Turnpike. The original portion was called Old Seneca Turnpike. Still, map makers in 1856 called this new route Old Seneca Turnpike, and the north route the Genesee Turnpike.
The arrival and departure of stages was a very important business and the highlight of the day when they arrived in town. As stages were entering into a town, the drivers would make the place reverberate with the sounds of their metal horns. The object of this was to alert the drivers at the stables to get ready to change the horses, and the tavern owner to have meals ready for the passengers.
Local historical author E.N. Leslie gives some background on Isaac Sherwood and his stagecoach business. Isaac Sherwood was born in Williamstown, Mass, Oct. 12, 1759. It is not known when he first came to this town. but he was here previous to 1804, and was over 30 years of age when he settled here. He was a great stagecoach proprietor…he was said to have weighed over 380 pounds. His first effort in the business was in carrying the mail on foot from Onondaga Hill to different settlements west of that place including Skaneateles. He advanced rapidly, first a horse, then a horse and wagon, and finally a stage coach with which to carry both mails and passengers. He owned the tavern (where the Inn is now located). He left the duties of landlord/Innkeeper to his son Milton.
Isaac Sherwood supervised stagecoach operations all over New York State. He supplied all the intermediate offices using four-horse post coaches. Routes from New York City to Albany, Utica to Sackett’s Harbor, Albany to Buffalo, Albany to Auburn, Elbridge to Rochester, Rochester to Lewiston and Buffalo to Youngstown, Ohio. The Postal Service paid Sherwood $60,000 per year for a four year period from January 1833 to January 1837. In today’s dollar value that is $1,900,922.
Sherwood did not own all the stages, but had an interest in nearly all of them. He had agents in all of the principal cities and villages where is mail runs were located. 1818, Sherwood moved from Skaneateles to Auburn turning the business over to his son John Milton Sherwood, “who was almost as ponderous as his father and as wonderful as a stage proprietor,” according to writer Leslie. John was commissioned a Colonel in the New York State Militia and on the staff of Governor Dewitt Clinton.
In 1821, Colonel Sherwood moved his family and stagecoach business headquarters to Auburn. The stage passenger business increased dramatically in the 1820s with daily coaches running day and night. The fare was five cents a mile. A trip from Skaneateles to New York City and back cost $30 (about $950 today). In 1824 Isaac Sherwood moved to Geneva for the purpose of attending to the mail and passenger lines.
Stages began to disappear as the railroads became more numerous. Sherwood had a short term contract with the Syracuse and Auburn Railroad Company. Around 1837, stagecoaches were fitted with wheels that ran on iron strap topped wooden rails of the early railroads. They were pulled along by a tandem hitch of horses much like the canal boats were pulled by mules on the Erie Canal. Dec. 25, 1837, 50 people boarded these coaches for a ride of 13 miles. Two of Col. Sherwood’s “best horses” were changed out at five miles east of Auburn. Another hybrid version was the placing of a stagecoach body on railroad platform car, again pulled by horsepower. The journey to Syracuse was made in a ‘marvelously’ short time of two hours and a half.
By the mid 1800s railroads took over the carrying of passengers and the mail. One of the shortcoming of these new railroads was the lack of cooperation between the companies, a situation remedied early in the stagecoach era. Sherwood sent a letter to Governor William Seward in 1839 suggesting legislation to regulate arrivals and departures of trains. Sherwood continued to operate stages until Nov. 4, 1841 with the opening of the Auburn and Rochester Railroad. The Colonel then turned to the agriculture business purchasing a farm just west of Auburn in the Town of Aurelius.
Isaac Sherwood died April 24, 1840 at age 70 and is buried in Section 7 of Skaneateles’ Lakeview Cemetery. The day of his burial rain fell hard. Yet stages came in a long procession, running up the steep hill of the cemetery, empty of passengers, symbolizing the end of the profession. Colonel John Milton Sherwood died May 16, 1871 at age 78 in Syracuse. His remains were taken by train to Auburn’s Fort Hill Cemetery.
Submitted By Jorge Batlle
Skaneateles Village Historian
