Caneteo Vally hairatage

Today isn't a day to do much or go anywhere.  It is a day of pervasive cold, damp and dreary.  Instead of doing much I have spent a couple hrs. dong some basic genealogy of my mother's lineage.  I once had a fair amount of information, but lost it all when my computer crashed about three years ago.

My mother's maiden name was Collins, a common Irish name.  Her mother's name...or perhaps it was her great-grandmother's name was Baker.  The Bakers and the Stevens man came up from places like Connecticut  and Goshen, NY, to settle the Canesteo Valley in upstate NY.  I am not sure of their mode of transportation until it is recorded that they polled a raft up the Canesteo River until they found a place that they settled and then sent for their wives.  There is a lot of history that is not recorded, but they were of the first into, and to settle the valley.

I know that the Bakers came from England and assume that the Steven's did as well.   There are two areas named after them: Baker's Gulch and Steven's Gulch.  Those were really wild and rough lands and remain so to this day 'though more populated than when I was a kid.  It was and is, rattlesnake country as my brother Pete can well attest to.  He killed a  46 inch rattlesnake with 7 "buttons" by running up behind it and hitting it in the head with a tire iron when he was about 12.  I saw the Rattler myself because we got into the car to go see it.  Pete was daring in those days.

Anyway, my Grandmother's name was Minnie Mable Collins and my Grandfather was Raymond Collins.  Somewhere in the mix is the name Beebe, but my memory fails me.  As you can guess, they were mostly English and Irish with possibly a small amount of Indian tossed into the mixing pot.  My aunt had a great aunt that was said to be part Indian and smoked a corncob pipe.  I remember seeing her when I was small and she looked the part.  I don't know if she was a direct ancestor or whether she married into the the stew.  It would be interesting to have a more complete knowledge.

Anna Baker, who may have been a Dean or a Stevens, was kidnapped by Indians in 1826.  She was rescued by her husband and she died at age 78.  Also, kidnapped by the Indians was a Mary Jameson who chose to stay with the Indians and live out her life.  It would be interesting to know more, but I don't.

There is a cemetery for the Bakers in Baker's Gulch with many unmarked or unreadable stones.  There is also a Cemetery for the Stevens' somewhere in Stevens' Gulch.  I don't remember seeing either one of them, but I was fairly young when we lived there.  What I remember best it that it was cold...cold...cold, in the winter.

At one time I had a few pictures and more information, but as I said, it went off into the cyber void, never to be retrieved.

I cooked some of that boneless chuck roast and potatoes in the pressure cooker and it turned out well.  I do love that little digital electric pressure cooker.

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LET THEM THAT DWELL

ABOUT SION COME

AND REMEMBER

THE CAPTIVITY OF MY

SONS AND DAUGHTERS;

WHICH THE ETERNAL

HATH BROUGHT

UPON THEM.

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BARUCH 4: 14

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END