What’s in a name

May’s Mills by Wilmer Davis

Published May 23, 1929

First Grist Mill in State Located by Jemima Wilkinson Followers Near May’s Mill, is Claim, Also First Yates School House Community Received Present Name from Jabez may-Day of Jubilee When Miles Lewis Opened Drug Store.

This little village ahs borne several names in the course o fits career. As far as can be learned from any competent authority it was first called Wagner's Mill from the name of the builder and the owner of the first flour Mill located here. Later the mill was purchased by David Henderson and the place became known as Henders’s Mill. After the death of David Henderson in 1864, his sons, Samuel, Marsden and Allen, ran the mill for several years, but finally sold the property to Jabez may. This as a matter of course, May’s mill came into existence, and that name has ever since clung to it. When the post office came to us and effort was made to change the name to Mayville, but as there was another village of that name in the state, the effort was not successful.

A sawmill was probably the next industry started here and was in existence many years. James Daly was one of the early proprietors of this mill and was succeeded by Abel Rarrick. There is a rumor that a small store once stood upon the banks of the canal, but it is a well established fact that Miles Lewis, as one time Penn Yan druggist, opened a store here in 1884 with a great flourish of trumpets and popping of corks. Lest some of our friends of the Temperance legion should be shocked by this statement I will make hast e to say that these corks came from pop bottles and that the beverage therein was of the kind than cheers but does not inebriate. It was a gala night at May’s mills. All the leading citizens were present many others from a distance and the workmen from Seneca Mills, then in process of construction, overflowed the little building. Every body was happy, and we congratulated ourselves upon the fact that May’s Mill had now arrive. In after years we boasted of two stores, a blacksmith shop, a creamery and a community house, but all these never brought to us such a violent attack of civic pride as did the advent of Miles’s Lewis little store.

The creamery did not enjoy a very long life, as cows were not plentiful enough in this section at at that time. The blacksmith shop, after a much longer career under numbered knights of the anvil and forge, finally gave up the ghost on account of the scarcity of horses. The coming of the rural mail carrier abolished the post office, that forum where the wise once of the village and vicinity gravely discussed matters of state. The community house is no more but has left pleasant memories of jolly good times and beautiful suppers. The delicious aroma of that Belgian hare banquet will always remain wit us and we never cease to be grateful to Fred Newby whose kindness and generosity provided the feast. Religion services for a long time were held in this community house, the gift of Mr.. And Mrs. E R Taylor. Ministers from Dresden and Penn Yan came to us frequently among others the Rev. George Wink worth whose likable qualities as a man will be remembered as well as his ability as a clergyman. and the old grist mill is a shattered wreck now, but the memories of by gone days will ever cling to it. Memories of the days when farmers dame with their grist's from the far east corners of Yates county, more of a hearty greeting and good measure from good old Deacon May, friends of all the world. The sawmill is gone also, and the old spring underneath it. The ice-cold spring that furnished the finest water in all the land or so it seemed to many of us. Is choked up with weeds and rubbish. First Grist mill in NY. Just a short distance above May’s near the present site of Seneca Mills, was built, it is claimed the fist grist mill in Western NY by Richard smith, James Parker and Abraham Dayton, followers of Jemima Wilkinson in 1790. After the mill was built it was patronized by settlers for 70 miles around. After awhile when mills were built in other places as oil mill took its place, and still later, in 1884. The Seneca Paper Mills were built near the same site. The first school in Yates County of which there is any record was near where our present schoolhouse stands and was taught by R. Andrews. Just below Mays on the outlet a gristmill once stood; later this became a paper mill, owned and operated by Charles J. Cave. And known as the Cascade. Later still this became the Taylor Chemical Mills and as such furnishes employment for many men of the vicinity.

Crooked Lake Canal connecting the two lakes was built in 1830-1833. And must have put our little community in touch with the world. It was abandoned about 80 years later, but the towpath furnished a good highway to Penn Yan and Dresden. Finally came that bright, auspicious day in 1833 when the first train on the Penn Yan and Dresden Railway passed throughout village and put Mays’ Mill on the map. Well, ties have changed since those good old days, perhaps for the better, perhaps not. Who can say? No more candy pulls no more sleigh loads, no more straw rules, but the horseshoe games is coming back, perhaps the others will. Now we have electric light, automobiles and radios. We live faster, we spend more money, but it is difficult to say whether we live happier lives. Anyway, we dress better, we believe we are more like city folk, and we fondly imagine when we tread the streets of Penn Yan that the inhabitants of that sophisticated metropolis cannot tell us from natives of Geneva or Canandaigua.

[Remember this was written in 1929. Think what we have come to in our time]