Graying skies, skittering leaves, a creeping chill in the air, and Thanksgiving on the door-step, turn the mind back to the early days of what life in the old homes once was. How would Thanksgiving have been observed in the little creekside mill community of Fayette in the 1820’s?

It is a matter of record that until 1828 there was no building save the home of that original settler, John Howard (24 Howard Street), below the present home of Mrs. Daphne Wilde (53 Main Street). The homes, few in number, lay between the mill property and the Wilde home, all facing on the Erie Road, leading from Erie, Pennsylvania to Fayette’s Lake Erie boundary. John Howard’s house was about where the Bluebird Inn is today on that stretch of Erie Road which now bears his name, Howard Street.

These homes had certain characteristics in common; they were small and plain to the point of severity; low, story and a half structures with heavy cornices; smallpaned square, single-sashed windows; heavy Christian doors and small stoops. There was a complete absence of ornament in any form; these were those first, hand-hewn homes and their simplicity and substantiality mark them today as the pioneer homes of Fayette.

Of those homes, which ones remain to us today? There are the George Mohart home (1815) occupying the lot between the Forestville Road and Knight Street, and the Thomas home, also built in 1815, above the Main Street Bridge. Next in age is Daphne Wilde’s home, built in 1821, which in 1827 was to become the famous Blue Eagle Tavern. This was Fayette’s earliest post house where the stage coach would dramatically pull up with a flourish, the mail thrown off, the passengers disgorged, and the horses changed in the stable yard in the rear while the driver regaled his listeners over his pint of ale.

The rear of the Bennett-Kollig house (84 Main Street) was known to be built in 1824. If one studies this house, it can be readily seen that it is composed of two distinct buildings representing totally different periods, the back part having the unmistakable characteristics of the rudimentary buildings of the early twenties and the two-storied square front structure with its recessed front door presenting just as unmistakably the characteristics of the 1840’s. The front part was originally the home of S. Howes and was moved to its present location to make way for his modern brick mansion, the present home of Mrs. Louis E. Barbeau.

The original rear structure, better seen from Robinson Street, was built by Luther Heaton, a younger brother of the first mill owner, Nehemiah Heaton who lost his life by drowning while rowing to Buffalo to pay for his mill machinery that first December after his mill was operating. It is not improbable that Luther Heaton came here to claim his inheritance since his home was built on Heaton land. It was a combination dwelling and shop for that first winter, and in it he made the first plow irons ever known in the county, an important forward step in the progress of Chautauqua’s agricultural development.

The Ralph Erdle home (79 Main Street) was built in 1827 not as a private home but for an inn. It was not a tavern in the full sense of the word nor was it ever a post house; it was an inn and particularly catered to the “public travelling in private conveyances”. Luther Heaton built them both, but the inn was best known through the years as the Whitney House because of the long proprietorship of Asa Whitney, a most highly esteemed citizen.

The Cumming house next to that of Ralph Erdle lays claim to the distinction of beinq on the site of the first school house in the community -- the one Chalon Burgess (the first male child born in 1817) attended in 1823 and which was described in his “Memoirs”. It was later moved to the site of the Norman Hoffower home at the corner of Knight Street. This is best known as the “Patchen place” (88 Main Street) although no Patchen has been living there for many a year.

A second school house stood on this site, and whether the present house was the school converted or whether the school was moved and the house replaced it is a matter of conjecture. However, there are references in early historical articles to the “Patchen Schoolhouse”, which would influence one to believe they might be one and the same with additions and improvements, of course. This school seems have served many purposes, that of school meeting, meeting hall, and Meeting House. It had a very important place in the local life.

Two homes whose dates are unknown but which definitely belong to a very early period are the Robson house (52 Main Street) and the Clement house (87 Main Street). They have both been restored in recent years. In both cases the original appearance was considerably less pre-possessing than now.

A never ending delight is the Robson home restored with such imagination. How the old John Mckee home, a veritable stronghold of Methodism in the old days, must revel in all the admiration it now attracts with its glistening white picket fence, its old-time stoop, green shutters, side-door pump, and low back part so typical of the early days and representing the original structure! However, it wasn’t John Mckee’s house originally; it belonged to his father-in-law, Mr. Eggleston, who with his ox-team drew all the timbers for the first Methodist Church built in 1848, and both of whose daughters in later life married John Mckee, the blacksmith.

The second home which affords so much pleasure and inspires genuine interest is that of Mrs. Harold Clement, the old Dawley house. In the restoration of this home the owner is to be congratulated for the integrity with which she preserved the character and period as well as the simplicity of actual lines and features. This is a very old house which, like most of the others mentioned, had its very modest, rude beginnings in a small, all-purpose building hardly more than a substantial shelter with a wide fireplace on the back wall.

The front part, added when time and circumstances permitted, like the two earliest homes, has the broad side facing Erie Road and the front door not in the center, with two windows on one side of it and one on the other. Unlike the earliest two, however, it never had its entrance violated by a verandah period; the stoop remained unchanged and unashamed right through the years. It doubtless had fire-wood stacked on one end in early days just as now on occasions. The verandah at the rear toward town detracts but little from the general authenticity of the appearance, for its age is of such long standing that it would seem to be an integral part of the whole.

Simple, low-lying, unassuming, with its ruffled curtained windows with their full length shutters; its heavy front door and very wide, heavy cornices; its stretch of lawn on all sides deliberately free from landscaping; and its white board fence separating it from the street; its very unobtrusiveness attracts attention and appreciation. Though this is known as the Dawley house, it goes back much farther. It was the home of Mrs. Dawley’s mother, Mrs. Wilson Andrus, who in turn had had it from tier family, the O’Donagheys.

These are the early homes left to us that would have been preparing for Thanksgiving in the 1820’s. There would have been few family reunions, for distances were too great in that day and families too widely separated, since most of these settlers were New Englanders. If friends or relatives were in neighboring pioneer communities, they would be arriving either in ox-cart or on horseback. There would be the Thanksgiving dinner, of course, but one very different from today’s version. Life was still too primitive, too limited and restricted by circumstances to permit anything other than the foods that came close to nature: wild game, Indian corn meal, and such dishes as could be prepared on an open fire in pots hanging from the crane and in iron kettles on little legs that could stand in the coals. But there would have been feasting and there would have been much warmth from the busy fireplace and genuine cheer.

The emphasis of the day without question would have been put upon the church service where these families could join together in their devout thanksgiving with a feeling of close unity. The Asa Gages from the Mohart house, the Abiathar Gates Sr. family from the Thomas home, the Lyman Howards from Daphne Wilde’s, the Luther Heatons from the Bennett-Kollig home, the Asa Whitneys from the Ralph Erdle place, the Lucius Cooks from the Cumming house, the O’Donagheys from the Harold Clement home, and the Egglestons from the Robson house would all have converged upon the Patchen School House at the appointed hour with the other families whose homes are no longer standing along the Erie Road. The Dr. Jacob Burgess family would have been there; and the Artemis Clothiers who first lived about where the Goodells do now, the Norman Spinks, and others who rounded out the number of the early settlers. John Howard would certainly have joined with them although he lived a little apart.

Who would have conducted the service is a question. It might have been the Reverend George Lane, the first Methodist Circuit Rider who formed the first Methodist “Class” in Fayette in 1812. It might have been the Reverend John Spencer, the first missionary sent in 1808 by the Connecticut Congregational Missionary Society to Sheridan and who won the devotion of the entire section during his nineteen years of service. He is said to have organized many churches and to have kept these little lights alive until they could have a regular pastor.

In any case, the sermon would have been long-and very earnest while the attention would have been rapt and unwavering. To these few families bound together by necessity in a comparative wilderness where newspapers, books, periodicals of any kind were not available, a preaching service was a privilege and above all others, an experience to be fed upon. It was an inspiration to be savored and treasured in mind and soul until another favored day should bring the longed-for Circuit Rider with his cape and saddle-bags, jogging down the stump road, or the beloved Sheridar Missionary on his rounds. These visits were always occasions of reunions, and the pioneers arranged their lives so that they would be at the Patchen Schoolhouse wit -a margin of time for renewing acquaintances and mingling with their friends.

A Thanksgiving service in Fayette in the 1820’s would have had a significance such as no one today could comprehend or imagine. The old homes still standing serve well to remind us of that heritage, for which let us add our thanks.

Published November 1960

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It is the old homes which enrich the Silver Creek streets giving character and stability to the ever changing scenes of village life and adding a touch of drama with their suggestion of a vanished way of life. It is heartwarming to consider the wealth of hospitality accrued to their century-seasoned, hand-hewn timbers, the Thanksgivings shared, the feasts prepared, the thanks devoutly given. It is a pleasure to let one’s imagination play around the thought of what the early Thanksgivings were like in the Dr. C. 5. Barresi home on Main Street. This fine old landmark was known and loved in earlier days as “The Mixer Place”.

Admired for well over a century for its architectural beauty and dignity, this fine old structure was Fayette’s “first mansion.” Although it has passed through many hands and suffered many changes and outrages known as “improvements,” it has remained structurally intact. Thanks to its present owner it has been magnificently restored to both its early beauty and position in life.

This early home with its Grecian columns, graceful hand carvings, hand-turned spindles, and hand wrought hardware bears a hint of romance, for it was built by a master shipbuilder in the picturesque days when the harbor life was at its peak with sailing vessels loading and unloading their cargoes at Lee’s Wharf.

The “mansion” was fashioned with pride and care by Holman Vail in 1835, for this was to be his home for all time and for his posterity. Alas, his years of happiness were brief. He invested heavily in “The Victory,” one of the most beautiful and swift ships on the lakes. This proved to be a most unsuccessful business venture, and he lost both the ship and his home, which had been mortgaged to finance “The Victory”.

Reluctantly, he sold his stately home in 1844 to Harrison Mixer of Buffalo, a wealthy lumber merchant, whose forebears were a distinguished pioneer family in Hanover Township. The home was purchased for his aging parents and his sister, Maria.

Maria was a famous hostess who established a standard of gracious living and lavish hospitality which became a tradition of the house. She often entertained for weeks at a time her niece and namesake, Maria Louise Mixer, only daughter of Harrison Mixer. A great beauty, Maria married a French count of a distinguished line and lived most of her life in a chateau well known in French history. As the Comtesse de Frise, she frequently visited Silver Creek and at her death in 1953 was brought here at her request for burial on the Mixer lot in Glenwood Cemetery.

Upon the death of Maria Mixer in 1889, the house passed into the ownership of Mr. and Mrs. Robins, an older couple who lived with their daughter, Ruby Bennett and her well-known husband, James Bennett.

The next owner was Myron Lawrence of Buffalo who was associated with the Montgomery Upholstering Factory. Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence were an attractive couple and in a short time were a part of the social life of the town. The house was refurbished; partitions were taken out and others put in; the dirt cellar was extended to accommodate a furnace to heat the first floor. Soon the house was again the scene of frequent entertaining.

This period was unfortunately terminated by the burning of the uphostery factory in 1914 or thereabouts. The Lawrences moved to Massachusetts under a somber cloud of misfortune.

Frank Porter, who owned the furniture store and was an undertaker, was the next owner. Being an industrious soul he set about to take out the new partitions and put back some of the old. In the meantime, he ripped out and removed to the barn five of the handmade white enameled mantels which were nothing but a nuisance to him. Being practical minded, he converted the old attached woodshed into a sun room of sorts and raised a section of the roof at the back to provide more height although at the same time sacrificing some of the intriguing, so called, “bellybutton” windows. His most conspicuous change was to convert the pillared front porch into a two storied veranda with a spindled railing around the upper one. He also extended the side stoop to reach the sitting room. This improvement provided ventilation for the middle section of the house besides affording more summer rocking space. Though a quiet living older couple, they were warm-hearted, and their home was always open to their friends. Their hospitality was of a very simple and homespun nature, but it was wholehearted and sincere and prized by those who shared it.

Upon the death of the Porters the home was purchased by Mrs. Porter’s sister, Miss Minnie Shofner, who having always lived in town, was “one of the girls.” Her home now became the center for her old school friends, especially those on Main Street. Tea parties came into their own again as did all day quiltings with boiled dinners and impromptu Sunday night suppers.

Like the foregoing owners, upon taking possession Miss Shofner promptly set about making improvements. The old partitions were replaced which restored “Maria’s bedroom” with the bay window off the living room. The mantels were rescued from the barn and replaced where the Porter-made double doors between the parlor and sitting room would permit. The house took on much of the semblance of “The Mixer Place” once more. Minnie fairly revelled in her home in its central location, and she was very proud of her possessions. It was with sad hearts that her contemporaries saw Minnie’s treasured belongings auctioned off from the front veranda one summer day when her estate had to be settled.

The next owners were the Howard Parsons returned from their years in Garden City, Long Island, where Howard’s engineering had taken them. Again life, vitality, music, and fun prevailed, though muted by the depression years and the Second World War. Here young Howard grew up, his friends filled the house with young life. Here too the Garden Club was promoted by Abbey, its founder and first president. In this house also, the Women’s Trio, consisting of Abbey, the late Mabel Horton Plummer, and Helen Clothier with Mary Montgomery as accompanist was formed and practiced regularly.

The Parsons were content to limit their changes to redecorating and adding dining room corner cupboards, but for the most part they accepted the house as they found it and preserved “Maria’s bedroom”. With ruffled curtains at the smallpaned windows and the white enameled woodwork, the effect was very much that of an early New England home. It was not willingly that the Parsons left their home early in the war years when Howard Sr. was in government service.

A rental period followed. It was by no means the first for the occupancy of the owners had not been continued by any means. During the settling of estates or during long “For Sale” periods it became a tenant house. For one brief period it was a place of business, a funeral home. It had also been a tourist home, a headquarters for the state police stationed here; and at one time it was made into an upper and lower apartment so that two families were accomodated.

This house which was destined for a “mansion”, and in 1860 was described as “the largest and most impressive dwelling in the village” had its vicissitudes and knew the deterioration which comes with disregard or disinterested temporary occupants. There were times when creeping age and the rental pain and sagging timbers were only too apparent.

When Dr. C. S. Barresi returned from World War II, he bought the house in 1945. With the ownership of Dr. Barresi and his wife, Mabel, came the renewed beauty, dignity and prestige of the earliest years. Neither money nor pains were spared in the restoration of this fine old example of early Fayette building while adapting it to modern living, comfort and convenience.

While Holman Vail or Maria Mixer would never recognize the interior with its absence of the many little mantels and the parlor, sitting room and Maria’s bedroom ill as one spacious living room with a picture window, they would still find much unchanged.

The charm of this fine old home lies not only in its architectural beauty with its stately columns and proud bearings, but in its atmosphere redolent of the years and the lives of those who fashioned and preserved it through its one hundred forty years.

No, it is not hard to imagine the early Thanksgivings when Holman Vail was still the prosperous shipbuilder and mill owner (where the Excelco plant now is) and the following forty-five years of the Mixer’s privileged life.

And it isn’t hard to think of the Barresi home with added respect as the memorial to Holman Vail, master shipbuilder in the glorious Harbor Days of 1835. (For any who are interested, Vail recouped his losses at a later date and was once again a man of wealth.)

Published November 1958

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A house of age and interest that has been the scene of holiday festivities for many years is that of Mrs. F. E. Stewart, 155 Central Avenue. The age of the house is not known exactly, but it is safe to approximate the date as the early 1840’s because of the period of its builder and owner, George N. Tew.

Soon after Silver Creek’s first bank was established, Mr. Tew was imported as cashier. In 1844 he became president and continued in this position until 1865, when he accepted a similar position in a Jamestown bank.

The probabilities are that the house was built after Mr. Tew became bank president in 1844 and that he lived previously on the street named for him or owned the property through which it was laid out.

Mr. Tew was a fine gentleman of the highest principles and of cultural interest. He was a staunch supporter of the Presbyterian Church and a choir member. Prominent citizen that he was he used his position for the best possible influence in the community.

His wife, Lucia Whitney Tew, who had been educated in private schools was a gifted musician and a person of great refinement. She was a much beloved woman with her gentle nature, social charm, and her musical, literary and artistic taste and knowledge. Her beautiful voice made her a valuable asset to Silver Creek and where-ever she went.

It is not difficult to believe that the Tew home would have been one of graciousness, elegance, and charm in its furnishings. In it were born two children, Herbert Whitney Tew, who was to become a well-known baritone in the opera houses of Europe, and his sister, Georgia Tew.

There is no one to tell us of the Tews’ way of life here in Silver Creek which they left a hundred years ago. There is a beautiful four poster bed of tiger-tail maple in the possession of Mrs. Mabel Stewart Williams which was found in the barnloft when her father bought the Tew place, and there was the Negro coachman’s trunk which was left with the Babcocks next door (the David Goodell home) and kept in the attic until that house was sold to Carleton Livermore. What became of the trunk so faithfully kept the many years is not known nor why it was never called for. Buy there was a Negro coachman who was the first Negro man the town had ever know and there was a beautiful piece of furniture relegated to the barn which would indicate that it was replaced by something richer or more up-to-date.

It is easy to believe that the Tews’ way of life was one of great privilege and dignity, a way of life befitting a bank president in the 1800’s when gentlemen of such position went forth to work in high silk hats, tail coats and an expanse of watch chain with gold pencil suspended.

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When Frank P. Stewart bought the Tew home in 1887, it was from Willis Tew who had occupied it during the twenty-two year interim. What his relationship was to George Tew has become clouded with the years.

Mr. Stewart was by no means a newcomer. He was a prominent business man at this time, a member of the Stewart & Company Dry Goods firm. He had left his home in Conneaut Lake when he was fourteen years of age to come to Silver Creek to clerk in the Hawkins’store. All this was at the behest of his uncle, Theodore Stewart, who had been with the old Silver Creek State Bank since Mr. Tew’s departure.

It was in 1876 that the Stewart Company had been established by Theodore Stewart and his nephew, Frank, a partnership which was to endure amicably and prosperously for twenty-one years in the Stewart Block, the property now owned by Charles Ludeman. This period was to be succeeded by fifteen years in which Frank Stewart would be sole owner after buying out his uncle’s interests.

Mr. Stewart had been married in 1881 to Miss Nellie Ensign and when they took possession of their new home, they had their two small daughters, Mabel and Adelaide. Their son, Eugene, was born later in that same year, the only child to be born in the house.

The home the Stewarts moved into in 1887 was not too unlike its present self, basically speaking: a simple, dignified, clapboard, two-story house, an unbroken rectangle with a one story ell extending eastward toward town. Two tall windows with deeply recessed doorway encasing double black walnut doors were the main features of the front just as now. The small paned sash windows have given way to more modern panes and wrought iron railings have been added to the stoop leading to the front door but otherwise there has been no change.

The ell, which was once the servants’ quarters, woodshed and carriage house, has undergone many changes since the Stewart ownership emerging ultimately into a separate rental apartment.

The interior of the main structure has changed but little over the years, those changes being ones required by progress and convenience and in many cases being just a matter of windows. The west wall of the dining room alcove was given over entireIy to windows at some time adding to its light and cheeriness while a back-doored, windowless room of unknown use opening off the back wall of the dining room was converted into a solarium with west and south walls completely of glass. The side door solarium was always there with hinged windows and was known as the conservatory. These changes have come from time to time as have many others adding greatly to the comfort and enjoyment of the home.

The five fireplaces have long since been converted to gas but their mantels and
supports are as beautiful as ever, and the warped, wide floor boards of the dining room have long ago been covered by an interesting parquet floor. Certain odd spotts and unnamed quarters have been converted into lavoratories, cloak rooms, and passages while the large utility room into which the large kitchen opens was once the “up-cellar” of the Tew’s day with its dirt floor and open well in the center on the ledges of which were kept butter, cream and foods that required refrigeration. The lamp shelves in the kitchen with their twenty-seven lamps were removed with the advent of gas.

Verandas have come, undergone changes, and gone their way again leaving the house proper very much as it originally was. Perhaps the most striking change is at the rear where a covered porch extends the entire width of the house and ell, affording respite of a summer day from the ever passing traffic, and a delightful outlook on a wide stretch of lawn and carefully tended rose garden. The garden parties that have been given as benefits are without number, Nellie’s for the church and Ruby’s for different worthy causes.

The front rooms of the main structure are very formal in effect although they have known much gay life in the days of the Stewart girls and been romped through unmercifully by Eugene Stewart’s four boys. The window and door frames extend to the very ceiling giving the impression of additional height. Their width is so unusual, they would seem almost to be panels.

There is one departure from simplicity in the hall: raised carved scrolls ornament each step of the stairway which gently winds as it nears the top. Its cherry spindle rails and slender newel post again reveal the perfection of early hand workmanship and make a dramatic contrast to the white enamel.

The kitchen is a huge room by today’s standards. However, when it was added to the house, it was none too large with cumbersome wooden sink, cistern pump mounted on one end and open iron drain just outside the other; cooking range with hot water reservoir, warming oven, and lengths of stove pipe; bulky built-in cupboards, lamp shelves on open wall space, work tables, and water pail stand. There was little enough room to spare for wooden wash tubs, clothes boiler, clumsy ironing board, and all the commodities that came into play before a week was over. Six bedrooms, and a bathroom of amazing proportions being the converted seventh, comprise the second story.

This house has known the good life from the beginning with the Tews, foIlowed by Frank Stewart with his steadily increasing prosperity, and Eugene Stewart, higF ly successful in his insurance business.

Frank Stewart was very fond of horses and always had his carriage house and for many years a spanking black team. With these, he and his wife, Nellie, used to take carriage trips and be gone a week at a time. Conneaut Lake was often their destination but Watkins Glen and other beauty spots attracted them too. The girls and Gene had their pony so the stables were never empty. And, better yet, Mr. Stewart had his own cow, which was something of a status symbol for someone living in town. The horse and cow went out when the car came in, and Gene had one of the earliest.

Mr. Stewart continued to manage his dry goods store, the leading store in town, until 1912. He sold it in that year to three enterprising young townsmen, William Mack, Charles Ludeman, and Clyde Elliott, who took the firm name of Silver Creek Dry Goods Company. This firm and the entire Stewart Block were bought later by Charles Ludeman.

No longer could Huntley Hose hold its Thanksgiving dances in “Stewart’s Hall” or travelling shows give performances there with flickering kerosene footlights. Stewart’s Hall was no more.

Frank Stewart devoted his time to real estate in this vicinity and Florida. He promoted the opening of Hanford Bay, East Lake, and the lake front stretch of land in the Light House Point area on Route 5. His death occurred in his home in 1932 after a lengthy illness.

Mr. Stewart bequeathed the home to Eugene, who had been married in 1912 to Ruby Swartzman. As soon as the change could be comfortably made, Mrs. Frank Stewart was established in the commodious wing and Eugene and his family took possession of the house proper.

Eugene and his wife, Ruby, have carried on the hospitality that is the tradition of the house. Both Frank and Nellie and Eugene and Ruby celebrated their golden weddings in the house. These were delightful occasions long remembered.

Plenty of life has flowed through this house and will continue to do so. It is far from being a house of memories only. It has a very animated present as well as a colorful past -- this Tew-Stewart House of 1840.

Published November 1964