Without a doubt writing this book about the Wade family in Cleveland has led me down some unexpected and truly wonderful paths. Yesterday I had further proof of this when Sandra Gilliland, Historian Emerita of Scipio, NY, and Dodie Rowlands, the current Historian of Scipio, NY, met me for breakfast and and conversation. Here you see Dodie (l) and Sandra (r) and between them the Book of Records for the Town of Scipio — County of Cayuga (Onondaga is crossed out) and State of New York — 1794.
I’d run across Sandra’s Scipio History blog (http://scipiocenterny.blogspot.com/) just a week earlier, which included mentions of a James and John Fleming (related to Susan Maranda Fleming, Jeptha H. Wade’s 2nd wife). Even though Sandra’s last blog was dated 2015 I took a chance and wrote to her suggesting a coffee. I was going to be in the neighborhood on a what is now an annual trip to Cornell University where I am slowly going through Ezra Cornell’s papers.
Sandra and Dodie turned out to be a researcher’s best friend. Not only did they have helpful suggestions for further avenues to explore, their willingness to share personal family histories of the area has given me a better understanding of life on both sides of Cayuga Lake — and I feel like I am finally able to venture out from the narrow paths that led from Seneca Falls to Romulus, Romulus to Ovid and Farmerville (Interlake), and on down to Trumansburg. Upstate New York of the 1820s and 1830s becomes ever more real to me and here, for you, is a link to a Scipio story Sandra told me yesterday about Tracy and the Bear (http://scipiocenterny.blogspot.com/2008/03/tracy-and-bear.html).
