A City Born of Water
The friendly, scenic city of Little Falls is a vibrant cultural gem that sparkles among the whitewater rapids of the Mohawk River. Indeed, Little Falls owes its very existence to the waters of the Mohawk River and the Erie Canal. The rugged gorge in which Little Falls is snuggled was carved nearly 13,000 years ago by an enormous waterfall draining the Glacial Lake Iroquois at the end of the last ice age. The earliest European settlers in Little Falls, who arrived in the early eighteenth century, were attracted by the need to portage river boats and their cargos around the rapids of the Mohawk River, which descends 40 feet in the vicinity of Little Falls. After the Revolutionary War, as the new nation sought to develop a waterway to bring the agricultural bounty of Western New York and Ohio to the cities of the Eastern seaboard, Little Falls became home to a number of important locks on the series of canals, to include the Erie Canal, that tamed the mighty Mohawk River. Today, the visitor to Little Falls can explore the ruins of the oldest extant lock in the United States (1795), as well as the tallest operating lock on the modern NYS Canal System (Lock 17).
Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the waters of the Mohawk River continued to give life to the economy of Little Falls, by powering the textile mills that sprang up along its banks during the Industrial Revolution. Thousands upon thousands of immigrants arrived to work in the mills and gave Little Falls a unique character asa culturally and ethnically diverse place. The mill workers, 70% of whom were women, played a major role in the development of the US labor movement when they went on strike in 1912, organized by the socialist nurse Helen Schloss, who ironically had been brought to the city by social progressives among the mill owners seeking to better the health of their workers. The strike lasted for three months and drew the attention of the nation with lurid newspaper stories of policemen on horseback battling strikers throughout the city, and of trainloads of prominent IWW organizers, anarchists and Schenectady Socialists arriving to support the workers. Although the strikers eventually prevailed after the State of New York stepped in to mediate, within years the beginning of an exodus of mills to North Carolina and other southern states rendered the victory a pyrrhic one.
Today, nearly all of the mills are gone, leaving the population of Little Falls but a third of what it was at the heyday, and the canal serves pleasure boats more often than cargo vessels. But the economy and culture of Little Falls are still tied closely to the waters of the Mohawk River. Several industrial facilities, such as Twin Rivers Paper Company and Redco Foods, still harness the Mohawk River. The Little Falls Marina and Rotary Park serve as a gathering place for the community and as a convenient mooring place for boaters seeking amenities as well as access to arts, culture, dining, and fun civic festivals throughout the season. Canal Place and Benton’s Landing are the epicenter of a bustling arts district that features a regional art center, galleries, shops, and some of the finest antiquing in Upstate New York. Main Street in Little Falls offers modern shopping opportunities and is the gateway to the sprawling Little Falls National Historic District, which encompasses nearly 350 historically significant buildings that preserve the heritage of the vibrant way of life that the Mohawk River and Erie Canal made possible in this scenic small city.
Historical Sketch of Little Falls
The land now comprising Little Falls was originally settled under two patents. The Burnetsfield Patent granted in 1725 to Johan Joost Petri, was an English confirmation of a grant from the Indians in 1722 for property north of the River. In 1752, Johan Joost Hercheimer obtained a patent for the lands south of the river and It was under these two well-known landowners that local history began. About 1785 John Porteus acquired land north of the river which – along with the two important Burnetsfield lots covering what is now the most intensely developed area of the City – came into the hands of Alexander Ellice in I801. His policy was to sell nothing, monopolize the water power of the falls, and allow only those enterprises which would contribute to his profits and monopoly.
Before the Revolution there was little permanent settlement at the falls. However, growth was rapid after the Revolution and in 1800 the Rev. Caleb Alexander, an itinerant preacher, wrote . . . “On the northern bank are seven locks and a canal for the conveyance of boats. Here is a village of forty houses, several merchant stores, mechanical shops and a new meeting house of octagonal construction. The people are primarily English, and they seldom have preaching”.
The Village of Little Falls officially came into being when a charter was granted in 1811. However, the Ellice hold was so strong that little was done under this charter. If he opposed rights guaranteed by the charter, he had only to dispossess the objector, as all property in the village belonged to him. In 1821, the Erie Canal was built through Little Falls on the south side of the river and an aqueduct was built over the river to utilize the old inland Navigation Canal as a boat basin. By 1831, a group of residents succeeded in releasing Little Fails from the stagnating influence at the Ellices, and the passage of the second charter by the legislature paved the way for an efficient municipal government.
In 1834, the railroad was extended from Schenectady to Utica and with it came a telegraph relay station. By this time, Little Falls had become a strategic point in the transportation system of upstate New York. It was served by the Erie Canal and was the location of the highest lift lock on the canal. The new railroad passed through Little Falls and the village was still an important stagecoach stop. These factors, coupled with the availability of ready water power, were significant in establishing the village as an industrial center.
Little Falls has been a dairy farming and industrial center from its beginning. The terminal facilities of the river made it a marketing place for the dairy products of the region. Dairy-farming was responsible for one of the City’s largest industries — Cherry-Burrell Corporation (now Feldmeir Equipment, Inc.), manufacturer of dairy equipment. During the second half of the 19th century, Little Falls served as the home of the most important interior cheese market in the USA and garnered a reputation as the “Cheese Capital of the World”, owing in large part to the tireless promotional efforts of local journalist and dairy spokesman Xerxes Willard. Additionally, grist mills, paper mills, sawmills, flour mills, a woolen mill, a plaster mill, a carding mill, a distillery and several breweries all sprang up along the banks of the Mohawk River.
Little Falls became a city in 1885 as the population and economic activity continued to increase. The new Barge Canal, completed in 1916, included the construction of Lock 17, which replaced the four locks of the old canal. At the time, “The Big Lock” was the highest lift lock in the world, and one of the great engineering works of the many created during the new Barge Canal construction. Over one mile of solid rock had to be removed from the route of the old canal bed to facilitate construction of the Barge Canal in Little Falls. Today, Lock 17 remains the highest lock in the New York State Canal System and one of the highest in the world.
With the advent of textile mills, Little Falls boomed as cotton, woolen and knitting mills were built along the River. Machinery and tool plants were necessary in conjunction with the knitting mills, so that the H. P. Snyder Machine Works, Stafford and Holt, Howard Lyke Machine Works and Reddy’s Sons Foundry and Machine Shop became important. The paper industry has been important in Little Falls during the past century with the making of toilet, tissue, and building papers.
In conclusion, the founding and growth of Little Falls have been due to the water resources of the falls in the Mohawk River; the site characteristics which channel all land and water transportation through a narrow corridor adjacent to the River; and the natural resources of the countryside for agricultural production.
Little Falls Vision Statement
Little Falls, New York combines the charms of a small town with the conveniences of a much larger city. We are a remarkably well-preserved canal-side small city located at the very geographic center of New York State, and for two hundred years our community has served as the setting for historically important and progressive innovations in numerous manufacturing, marketing and technological enterprises. Even today Little Falls shines as a vibrant, friendly and innovative community that seeks to leverage its rich traditions, its diverse cultural heritage, and its high levels of civic engagement to emerge as the cultural and commercial center of the rural Mohawk Valley. We intend to establish Little Falls as the preferred destination for Mohawk Valley individuals and families that seek quality homes and better schools in safe neighborhoods, with convenient access to high-quality shopping, dining, entertainment and cultural enrichment. We further intend to position Little Falls as the preferred destination for innovators and entrepreneurs that seek to establish or expand in a distinctively low-cost and business-friendly environment with access to excellent transportation networks, with convenient adjacency to the increasingly competitive markets of the Utica-Rome and Albany MSAs, and with an outstanding and motivated regional workforce.