Looking Back

Ann O’Hara
Posted 8/21/12

Philip Hone, later mayor of New York City, was elected president of the Delaware & Hudson Canal Company on March 1825 and was present four months later near Summitville, NY to turn the first …

This item is available in full to subscribers.

Please log in to continue

Log in

Looking Back

Posted

Philip Hone, later mayor of New York City, was elected president of the Delaware & Hudson Canal Company on March 1825 and was present four months later near Summitville, NY to turn the first shovelful of dirt to begin construction on the canal. The town that grew up around the terminus of the canal where it would meet the gravity railroad in Pennsylvania was originally called Dyberry Forks, but it is likely that it was renamed Honesdale around the time Philip Hone visited the area in 1827. A ledger from Jason Torrey’s store calls the town Dyberry Forks one day and Honesdale the next. In 1847, Hone walked with his friends Washington Irving and Henry Brevoort to a spring in what is now Glen Dyberry Cemetery and toasted (in spring water) the new town and the cliff that overlooked it, ever after called Irving Cliff. Philip Hone is most famous for the diary he kept between 1827 and his 1851 death, considered one of the most valuable accounts of New York history of the time.

From the collection of the Wayne County Historical Society 810 Main St., Honesdale, open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday. For more information, visit WayneHistoryPA.org or call 570/253-3240.

Comments

No comments on this item Please log in to comment by clicking here