Question: The gentlemen and boys in the photo were the workers in a factory that made items used in the homes of the time. Do you know its name and where it was located? Also do you recognize any of the people?
Last week’s answer: The photo from last week is another of the wonderful photos that were taken by the state when the Barge Canal was being constructed through the village on the south side of the river. The main part of the picture is the construction of the lock chamber, now known as Lock 24. The expanse from left to right was once Water Street. Remember two-thirds of Water Street was removed when the Barge Canal was dug. The building in the background with the windows was the Mack-Miller Candle Company, which had to move to Syracuse when their land was removed for the canal. Just to the right of that building, barely visible in the distance, is the eastern end of Riverview Cemetery, known as the Old Yard and Riverside. In the middle of the photo is the coffer dam that held the river water back so that the workman could dig on dry ground. The building on the right is the paper mill (ever wonder where Paper Mill Island got its name?).
Don’t get confused by the name of our canal — the Erie Barge Canal. We never were a part of the original Erie Canal. If you look at a map from that era, you will see that the Erie Canal ran south of here. Several minor enlargements were done to accommodate larger vessels. By 1908, the state decided to construct a major enlargement of our waterways using the natural rivers and other bodies of water to allow still larger vessels to navigate through the state. On June 8, 1908, the first shovelful of dirt was taken out of what was to become Lock 24. All the buildings in the area were either demolished or moved. The D.L. & W. RR that crossed the river had to cease operation in that area. The pillars that are still in the river east of the main bridge are remnants of their bridge. The vast quantity of soil that was removed from the area was used to fill in the swampy shoreline along Meadow Street as far as the mouth of Crooked Brook.
Ours was the very first lock to open on the new Barge Canal. On May 9, 1910, the lock was used to pass the state dredge, with its accompanying houseboat and scows.
If you want to know more visit the Baldwinsville Public Library. Also check out the PAC-B videos. A recent collaboration between Joe Loffredo and Bonnie Kisselstein, “Then and Now/Water Street/Lock 24,” is available for your viewing pleasure on their website, and periodically it will be shown on the PAC-B TV channels.
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.
