About the time the bill was signed by Gov. Charles Evans Hughes to make Oneonta a city in May 1908, the area we know today as the West End, or The Plains, was still a very quiet area.
The Table Rocks area overlooking the West End was a favorite place to go hiking for generations. One hundred years ago, the area was mostly farmland along Chestnut and Oneida streets. The D&H Railroad yards were busy with activities. Today, the opposite is true. The railroad yards are nearly silent, but West End has many streets, homes, businesses, a school, the National Soccer Hall of Fame and much more.
A century ago, there was a small settlement of homes stretching from the corner of Oneida Street to a little beyond Country Club Road, including the former Pond Lily Hotel. From the corner of Chestnut and Oneida streets to today's Kearney Street, there were only a few farmhouses and barns.
It was around 1915 that The Ceperley and Morgan Real Estate Co. got the area growing when it purchased a lot of land, put through streets and sold building lots.
Fred Becker, like so many others of the time, came to Oneonta in 1920 to work with the D&H Railroad. Becker was an entrepreneurial man, and also saw the opportunity to develop and sell land that Ceperley and Morgan hadn't taken on "" or just didn't want to.
When Becker arrived, he purchased a tract of land north of today's Butler Street from Jerome Spencer. The upper end of this tract, which had once been part of the Charles Murdock farm, bordered on Winney Hill Road.
Becker must have liked a challenge, because he got busy with developing land on the north side of Chestnut Street in an area now covered by the Greater Plains Elementary School and an area from Jefferson Avenue west and north to Winney Hill Road.
Look at this area today, and it appears well occupied. Back then it was drained by a small brook, which, for some reason, ended at the upper end of Becker's land. If there was a heavy rain or big year for snowmelt, the waters spilled over the ground between there and Chestnut Street, often leaving water a few inches deep. It was considered by most as unusable land.
Changing this water problem was the challenge facing Becker. He dug a watercourse down through his land almost to today's Butler Street, where the course then takes a hard right, proceeding parallel to Butler across Jefferson and Richards avenues, past Winney Hill Road and eventually emptying into Otego Creek. This is the small brook that is to the left if you're facing Greater Plains.
At one time there were four bridges over this waterway, which Becker built himself out of fieldstone. Only one remains today, near the school.
Becker was no absentee landlord to his tract of land. He built a residence, mostly of fieldstone, on Jefferson Avenue Extension, right along the waterway and visible today from the school grounds. That waterway was dubbed "Becker's Canal," and is listed as such on an early 20th century map of Oneonta. In an earlier time it was called Willow Brook.
On Monday: An organization formed to make farming less of a dangerous job.
City Historian Mark Simonson's column appears twice weekly. On Saturdays, his column focuses on the area during the Depression and before. His Monday columns address local history after the Depression. If you have feedback or ideas about the column, write to him at The Daily Star, or e-mail him at simmark@stny.rr.com.
His website is
www.oneontahistorian.com.
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