Question: The image seen in this photo was an important part of the commerce of our early village. What do you know about it? Where was it located and on what body of water?
Last week’s answer: The photo from last week shows the area on the south side of East Genesee Street opposite Byrne Dairy and Northside Collision. The building on the left was a freight house that was built in 1890. It played a significant role in the prosperity of the Baldwinsville area. It was there that freight trains shipped out the many products that were produced here.
Remember, Baldwinsville had five flour mills — at one time it was the largest flour producer in the U.S. That was before grain was grown out west. Morris Machine Works kept the freight trains busy with their many centrifugal pumps that were shipped all over the world.
B’ville’s many farmers shipped their produce and for quite a number of years their lucrative cash crop: tobacco. As automobiles came into popularity, that commodity arrived from Detroit to be sold here. Of course there were other products that were shipped in as well.
This freight house was still running, although in a diminished capacity, in 1968. On October 25, 1998, a fire of suspicious origin damaged it beyond repair. It was demolished shortly after. To those that look carefully, the ramp is still visible.
The next building is the coal business owned by Burton I. Crego and John Kelly. They bought out the previous owner, George Peck, in 1915. In 1920, Grant Mount bought out Burt Crego and the firm became Kelly and Mount. In the ‘40s William Waldron took it over and started Wm. Waldron and Son.
Contact Editor Sarah Hall at [email protected] or leave a message at 434-8889 ext. 310 with your guess by 5 p.m. Friday (please leave the information in the message; we are not generally able to return calls regarding History Mystery responses). If you are the first person to correctly identify an element in the photo before the deadline, your name and guess will appear in next week’s Messenger, along with another History Mystery feature. History Mystery is a joint project of the Museum at the Shacksboro Schoolhouse and the Baldwinsville Public Library.
