Justice W. Marshall
After years working under Austin W. Van Riper at the Empire Clock Works, John J. Stone and Justice W. Marshall stepped forward to continue the business after Austin Van Riper’s untimely illness and death. In 1858, they purchased all of Van Riper’s patterns, drafts, tools, and machinery, ensuring that the clock‑making trade stayed in Cazenovia.
Stone and Marshall kept the shop in the same location and carried on the full range of work Van Riper had offered. They made and repaired tower clocks, but also operated a general blacksmith and machine shop, providing turning and fitting in brass, iron, and wood, along with repair and jobbing services for the community.
Their operation represented a direct continuation of Van Riper’s methods and designs. It also kept alive the long lineage of the blacksmith operation, which had earlier been run by Whitman Cobb and later by J. L. Darling.
Stone and Marshall operated the Clock Works until 1875, after which they partnered with Milton E. Card and the business transitioned to making locks and smaller castings.
The McCabe Family
The McCabe family stands as one of the most enduring and influential blacksmithing lineages in Cazenovia’s history. Their story begins with John McCabe, who emigrated from Ireland in 1848, bringing with him the trade he had practiced in his native land. Soon after arriving, he went to work for Eber Peet in Peet’s Albany Street shop, becoming a partner in 1852 and taking full ownership in 1857.
Blacksmithing quickly became a family enterprise. Four of John’s sons—Patrick, John Jr., Martin and Michael—entered the trade, followed in time by John Jr.’s son’s Frank and J. Robert. Frank would become Cazenovia’s last working blacksmith, operating until 1947. Across three generations, a McCabe stood at the forge for an extraordinary 99 years.
The family operated the Albany Street shop until 1901, when it was sold to James Smith. By then, the business had already expanded: in 1899, John Jr. opened a second shop on Lunky Lane with son Frank, who were then joined by Martin in 1901, and J. Robert coming in later on. Together, they formed a network of forges that served the village through a period of immense technological and economic change.
This collective legacy frames each McCabe not only as an individual craftsman but as part of a long, interwoven tradition that shaped Cazenovia’s working life for nearly a century.
John McCabe Sr.
John McCabe was born in 1820 in County Westmeath, Ireland, and arrived in Cazenovia in 1848 with his wife Bridget McNally and several family members. Already a respected blacksmith in Ireland, he continued his trade here under the employ of Eber Peet. His skill and reputation quickly elevated him within the shop: he became Peet’s partner in 1852 and took full ownership of the Albany Street shop in 1857—the site known today as the Red Apple Food Mart.
Over time, blacksmithing became a true family enterprise. John was joined in the business by his sons Patrick, John Jr., Michael and Martin, establishing the foundation of what would become a three‑generation blacksmithing dynasty in Cazenovia.
In 1877, John handed the operation of the Albany Street shop to his sons, and he leased the Hotaling Blacksmith Shop in Manlius, continuing to work at the forge well into his later years.
John McCabe died on December 10, 1888, and rests in St. James Cemetery, surrounded by many members of the extended McCabe family. His life marks the beginning of nearly a century of McCabe blacksmithing in Cazenovia.
Patrick McCabe
Patrick McCabe was born in 1846 in Ireland and was just two years old when the McCabe family emigrated to Cazenovia in 1848. He grew up around the family’s Albany Street blacksmith shop, learning the trade under his father’s guidance.
As a young man, Patrick spent a period in Philadelphia, where he further developed his smithing skills before returning to Cazenovia. Beginning in 1875, he entered into a full partnership with his father, working alongside him in the well‑established shop.
After several years in the family business, Patrick took a new direction and went to work for O.M. Blanchard in his blacksmith shop in DeRuyter, carrying the skills he had developed in Cazenovia into another community forge.
Patrick McCabe died in April 1899, remembered as the first of John McCabe’s sons to carry the family craft forward and extend the McCabe blacksmithing tradition beyond Cazenovia.
John McCabe Jr.
John McCabe Jr., born in 1856, was part of the second‑generation anchor of the McCabe blacksmithing dynasty in Cazenovia. Raised in the Albany Street shop founded by his father, John Sr., he learned the trade in the same forge where his father had built his reputation. By the 1870s, John Jr. had become a central figure in the daily operation of the business, working alongside his brothers Patrick, Martin, and Michael.
When his father stepped back from the Albany Street shop in 1877, the brothers assumed responsibility for its operation. They kept the business running through the final decades of the 19th century, maintaining the McCabe presence at one of the village’s most familiar work sites.
In 1899, John Jr. opened a new shop on Lunky Lane, marking a significant transition in the family’s history. The move reflected both the changing needs of the trade and the growth of the village itself. The Lunky Lane shop would become the center of McCabe blacksmithing for the next half‑century.
John Jr.’s sons, Frank and J. Robert, both entered the trade, forming the third generation of McCabe blacksmiths. Frank began apprenticing in the late 1890s at the Albany Street shop before moving with his father to Lunky Lane, while J. Robert joined him there in the early 1900’s. Their involvement confirms that the McCabe legacy was not carried by a single heir but by multiple members of the third generation, working together during a period of rapid technological change.
John Jr. died in 1930 and is buried in St. James Cemetery, surrounded by the extended McCabe family. His life represents the long middle chapter of a nearly century‑long blacksmithing tradition — the generation that sustained the trade through its busiest years and carried it forward into the modern era.
Michael McCabe
Michael McCabe was born in 1857, the third of the four McCabe sons trained by their father, John McCabe Sr., in the family’s Albany Street shop. He grew up within sight and sound of the forge, as the family home stood directly adjacent to the shop, facing Albany Street. By the 1870s—when Cazenovia’s agricultural and industrial activity remained strong—he had joined his brothers Patrick, John Jr., and Martin at the anvil.
Michael became the shop’s steady hand. Patrick and Martin spent periods working elsewhere, and John Jr. later opened a second shop on Lunky Lane (Allen St.), but Michael stayed rooted on Albany Street. His constancy anchored the original shop even as the family’s blacksmithing footprint shifted and expanded. Though never an owner, his labor supported some of the shop’s busiest times and sustained the multi‑worker capacity that defined the McCabe enterprise.
His father’s Will underscores his role: despite never being a partner, Michael was designated to inherit the Albany Street shop after his mother, Bridget McNally McCabe. His father clearly saw him as a dependable figure to carry the shop forward. That plan never materialized. Michael died in 1895, two years before his mother, and the succession outlined in the Will was never realized.
Michael is buried in St. James Cemetery. His life reflects the quiet, durable foundation of the family’s blacksmithing tradition—a craftsman whose steady presence carried the Albany Street shop through decades of daily work.
Martin McCabe
Martin McCabe, born in 1859 in Cazenovia, was the third son of John McCabe Sr. to learn the blacksmith’s trade under his father’s guiding hand. In 1887, he married Bridget Larkin, and together they raised four children.
Like his brother Patrick, Martin spent time working beyond Cazenovia. In 1894, he was plying his trade in Whitehall, New York, before returning home later in the decade. By the late 1890s, Martin and his wife had become the owners of the Albany Street shop, continuing the long McCabe association with that forge.
In 1901, Martin sold the Albany Street shop to James Smith and joined his brother John Jr. in operating the Lunky Lane shop, carrying the family’s blacksmithing tradition into its next location.
Martin also appears in the public record for an act of courage. A May 16, 1901 article in the Cazenovia Republican recounts how he and another citizen, Fred Marshall, rescued young Lizzie Stewart, who had fallen into the Chittenango Creek and nearly drowned.
Tragically, Martin’s life ended in 1908. After stepping off a train at the Walnut Street Crossing of the New York Central Railroad in Syracuse, he was struck by a passing train. He is buried in St. James Cemetery, part of the long line of McCabe's whose work shaped the daily life of Cazenovia for nearly a century.
Francis “Frank” McCabe
Frank McCabe was born in 1883, the son of John and Elizabeth McCabe, and represented the most visible figure of the third generation of McCabe blacksmiths.
He began apprenticing in the late 1890s at the Albany Street shop, learning the trade under his father and uncles. When John Jr. opened the new shop on Lunky Lane in 1899, Frank moved there with him, continuing his training and entering full‑time work in the early 1900s.
With the newly surfaced information about his brother J. Robert, it is now clear that Frank was not the sole representative of his generation in the trade. The two brothers worked together at the Lunky Lane shop, carrying the McCabe name into the 20th century.
Frank holds the distinction of being Cazenovia’s last working blacksmith, remaining at the forge until 1947. His career brought the McCabe family’s blacksmithing tenure to an extraordinary 99 years, beginning with his grandfather’s arrival from Ireland in 1848.
Frank died on February 16, 1952, and is buried in St. James Cemetery, leaving his sister Anne as the last surviving member of this branch of the family.
J. Robert McCabe
J. Robert McCabe was born in 1886, the son of John Jr. and part of the third generation of McCabe’s to enter the blacksmithing trade.
He worked at the Lunky Lane shop, the location opened by his father in 1899 as the family began transitioning from the Albany Street shop.
J. Robert’s involvement clarifies the later years of the McCabe lineage: the third generation was not represented by Frank alone, but by both brothers, working together during a period when blacksmithing was shifting toward repair and early mechanical work.
J. Robert died in 1926 and is buried in St. James Cemetery, continuing the long family presence there.
From John McCabe Sr.’s arrival in 1848 through Frank McCabe’s final year at the forge in 1947, the McCabe family shaped nearly a century of Cazenovia’s working life. Patrick, John Jr., Michael, Martin, Francis and J. Robert each carried the trade forward in their own way—shifting shops, forming partnerships, and adapting as the village changed around them. Across three generations and seven craftsmen, the sound of a McCabe hammer remained a familiar presence. Their story forms a single, unbroken line of work and place, a legacy that lasted 99 years and still echoes in the corners of the village where their shops once stood.
Martin McNally
Martin McNally was born in 1835 in Ireland, part of the extended McCabe–McNally family line that later settled in Cazenovia. He was the brother of Bridget McCabe, placing him directly within the same family that produced several of the village’s craftsmen.
By the 1860 Census, McNally was recorded as a blacksmith, almost certainly working in the McCabe shop on Albany Street, where family ties and shared trade made his presence both practical and expected. His early years in Cazenovia reflect the familiar pattern of immigrant labor: skilled work, close family networks, and a trade that provided stability.
In June 1863, McNally enlisted during the Civil War, joining the ranks of Irish‑born craftsmen who stepped forward during the conflict. After the war, he followed the westward movement common among veterans and tradesmen of his era, relocating to California, where he continued working as a blacksmith.
McNally married Rose Sloan, and together they had two daughters, establishing a new branch of the family far from his New York beginnings. He died in 1905, having carried his trade across states, decades, and the shifting landscapes of postwar America.
His life forms a distinct thread in the McCabe–McNally story — an Irish‑born craftsman whose work began in a family shop in Cazenovia and continued on the western frontier, shaped by war, migration, and the steady labor of a blacksmith.
William McNally
William McNally was born in 1837 in Ireland, part of the McNally–McCabe family that settled in Cazenovia in the mid‑19th century. He was the brother of Bridget McCabe placing him, like his brother Martin within the same family that produced several of the area’s blacksmiths.
By the 1860 Census, McNally was recorded as a blacksmith, and the family’s close ties make it likely that he worked in the McCabe shop on Albany Street, where relatives and in‑laws often shared labor and skill. His presence reflects the pattern of immigrant tradesmen who brought their craft from Ireland and found steady work in the village’s small industrial core.
William’s life was brief. He died in 1861, only a year after his census listing, and was buried in St. James Cemetery, where many members of the extended McCabe and McNally families are interred. Though the surviving record is limited, his name adds another thread to the working history of Cazenovia — a young Irish‑born blacksmith whose life ended early but whose presence helps complete the picture of the family’s craft tradition.
Edmund and Manly Miles
Brothers Edmund and Manly Miles operated a blacksmith shop in Cazenovia under the name E. & M. Miles from at least 1828 to 1830 based on tax records. Their presence is confirmed by a newspaper-announcements regarding unclaimed mail in 1829 and 1832 as well as an advertisement dated May 11, 1830, in which they announced the sale of their operation to Thomas Coope, who would carry on the blacksmithing business in all its “various branches”.
Though their tenure at the forge appears to be brief, the Miles brothers contributed to the continuity of trade in the village during a period of steady growth and transition. Their shop became the steppingstone for Coope’s arrival, linking one generation of smiths to the next.
While Manly disappears from the record after the sale, Edmund Miles remained active in the community. A notice in the September 23, 1836 edition of the Cazenovia Democrat requested his presence at a Meeting for all Farmers and Mechanics in the Town of Cazenovia, to be held at the Cazenovia House the following evening at 6:00 p.m. This suggests that Edmund continued to engage with the local trades, even after stepping away from the forge.
John Henry O’Neil
Born in Morrisville in 1859, John Henry O’Neil came to Cazenovia in 1886, establishing himself in a blacksmith shop just off Albany Street (the former shop of J.L. Darling and at least two other smiths). He worked there until 1895, when he relocated a short distance to the site of the old Wool Mill, a building with a long and varied industrial history, including being the location for Austin Van Riper’s Empire Clock Works.
For a brief period, O’Neil partnered with W.A. Hayes and T.A. Hayes under the name O’Neil, Hayes & Co., but the arrangement ended in 1896. As noted above, the building he occupied had served many roles over the years—originally a wool mill, later a machine shop, a brass fitting and turning facility, a planing mill, and a carpentry shop—before being purchased by Col. A.D. Hayes of Syracuse, who leased it to O’Neil for use as a blacksmith and carriage and wagon shop.
According to a September 6, 1945 article in the Cazenovia Republican, O’Neil continued operating his shop until 1935, marking nearly fifty years of work in the village. He died in 1939, and the building he occupied holds a unique distinction: it is the only structure in Cazenovia that can be definitively documented as having housed a blacksmith shop.
Horace Paddock
Horace Paddock first appears in the 1800 Village Census listed as a blacksmith, likely working in someone else’s shop during the earliest years of settlement. His independent role becomes clearer a few years later: based on Tax Lists and supporting documentation, Paddock purchased the blacksmith shop formerly operated by Elnathan Andrews and Hiram Roberts in 1805.
Paddock ran this shop until 1807, when he sold the property. Shortly afterward, the Madison Hotel was constructed on the site, marking the end of the forge’s presence at that location and the beginning of a new chapter in the village’s building landscape.
By 1810, Paddock had left blacksmithing behind and was working as a tavern keeper in Dryden, a shift that reflects the mobility and adaptability common among early tradesmen on the frontier.
Eber Peet and son Eber D. Peet
Eber Peet stands out as one of the most influential blacksmiths in Cazenovia’s history—not only for his long career, but for the number of shops he built, operated, and ultimately passed on to others. His work shaped the physical and economic landscape of the eastern end of Albany Street for nearly four decades.
Around 1838, Peet built his first shop on Albany Street, at the southwest corner of the bridge over the Chittenango Creek. This shop would later be sold to John McCabe, but not before Peet used it to establish himself as a central figure in the village’s working trades. In the early to mid‑1840s, he turned over operation of this shop to Jabez Stokes and constructed a second shop nearby, on the southwest corner of the bridge and creek, in the vicinity of the former Allen Tannery. This second shop was eventually sold to Peter Bordwell, linking Peet to yet another major blacksmithing lineage in the village.
In 1847, Peet took back control of his original 1838 shop from Stokes and resumed operations there. The following year, John McCabe came to work for him, becoming a partner in 1852 and ultimately purchasing the shop in 1857, beginning the McCabe family’s long tenure at the forge.
The 1860 Census lists Peet as a Master Blacksmith, age 43, with several children in the household, including Eber D. Peet, born in 1848, who would later join him in the trade.
Peet’s third major shop came in 1865, when he purchased a building on the north side of Albany Street, just west of the bridge, from John Lincklaen Darling. He raised and refitted the structure to house a blacksmith shop in the basement, continuing to expand his presence along the creek. By 1868, the firm was known as E. Peet & Son, but the partnership dissolved that same year due to the ill health of Eber D., with the elder Peet continuing the business alone.
On April 1, 1875, Peet sold the north‑side property to Barney Riley, closing out nearly forty years of continuous work on Albany Street.
It is also important to note that in between all of his blacksmith endeavors, Eber also owned and operated a Stagecoach Operation.
He owned two homes on Fenner Street, and both he and his son are buried in Evergreen Cemetery—Eber (1817–1877) and Eber D. (1848–1886).
What sets Eber Peet apart is not only the length of his career, but the three separate blacksmith shops he built, operated, and passed on.
Each became the foundation for another craftsman—McCabe, Bordwell, and Riley—making Peet a quiet but pivotal architect of Cazenovia’s blacksmithing lineage.
Riley Family – Barney & sons John and Edward
In 1875, Barney Riley took over a long‑established blacksmith shop on Albany Street, near the present‑day Fire Station and the entrance to Buyea’s. For the previous ten years, the shop had been owned and operated by Eber Peet, one of the village’s most prolific smiths. Before purchasing the property, Riley had worked for Peet as well as John McCabe, making him part of the same lineage of craftsmen who inherited and sustained Peet’s earlier shops. Riley lived on Nelson Street, placing him within easy reach of the forge he would operate for nearly a quarter century.
Riley ran the shop until 1899, after which his sons John and Ed Riley continued the business through 1924, when John passed away. Ed carried on alone until 1940, giving the family a remarkable 65‑year presence on Albany Street.
In April 1893, a fire broke out in the dwelling above Riley’s shop, spreading quickly into the attic and along the roof. Dense smoke forced firefighters to battle the blaze from the outside, cutting holes in the roof and directing water into the building until the fire was brought under control after more than an hour. The family living upstairs—Thomas Williams, his wife, and six children—escaped with most of their belongings, though many were damaged. The building suffered significant harm, but Riley’s financial loss was fully covered by insurance. The cause of the fire was never determined.
Despite the setback, the Riley family continued operating the shop for decades, becoming one of the longest‑running blacksmithing families in the village and carrying forward a line of work that stretched back through McCabe and Peet to the earliest forges on Albany Street.
Hiram Roberts
Sometime between 1795 and 1799, Elnathan Andrews, Cazenovia’s first blacksmith, entered into a partnership with Hiram Roberts, also one of the village’s early smiths. When Andrews disappears from the local record after 1800, it appears that Roberts continued operating the shop on his own. He remained at the forge until 1803, when the property reverted back to John Lincklaen. Two years later, in 1805, the land was sold to Horace Paddock, who carried the trade forward into the next chapter of Cazenovia’s blacksmithing history.
It is believed that this shop—likely the first permanent blacksmith shop in the village—stood on the eastern half of Lot 47, one of the Great Lots laid out by surveyors Weston and Guiteau during the original division of the settlement.
Village Census records from 1800 through 1803 depict Roberts as a blacksmith with a busy household and, in the final two years, as both blacksmith and tavern keeper, reflecting the dual roles common in the earliest years of the settlement. History articles published in 1928 & 1985, identifies his role in the village and the location of his Tavern.
Roberts lived a long life beyond his early Cazenovia years. He was born August 31, 1798, married February 8, 1825, and died in 1874 at the age of 76.
Andrew Russel
Andrew Russel appears in the record as a blacksmith in Cazenovia as early as 1813, with evidence of his work continuing through 1827. His shop stood at the corner of what is now Forman Street and Carpenter Street, on a parcel of land whose boundaries were well defined even if the exact shop location within it is not.
Very specific details were found through an 1827 Mortgage Sale announcement: The property stretched 170 feet north from the Mill Pond, forming the western edge of the lot. It was bordered by the land of Samuel Forman to the north, John Lincklaen to the east, the Mill Pond to the south, and the Turnpike Road to the west. The shop itself sat twelve feet below the northern boundary line, though the precise point along that line where the forge stood is not documented.
His presence from 1813 to 1827 forms an early link in the chain of craftsmen who kept the trade alive in the village’s formative years, bridging the gap between the first frontier forges and the more established shops that followed.
J.A. Sawyer
J. A. Sawyer enters the historical record through a single advertisement in the Cazenovia Republican in 1894, where J. H. O’Neil announces that he has “secured the services” of Sawyer for the coming year. Even in that brief notice, Sawyer stands out. O’Neil names him directly — unusual for the time — and emphasizes his specialty: taking “particular pains with interfering horses and horses with bad feet.”
Corrective horseshoeing was demanding work, requiring a steady hand, a patient temperament, and a practiced understanding of equine movement. Interference — when a horse’s hooves strike each other in motion — could cripple a working animal if not addressed properly. A smith who could diagnose the cause, balance the hoof, and forge a shoe to correct the problem was a valuable asset to any shop.
Beyond the advertisement, nothing more is known about Sawyer’s life or career. But that single mention places him within the working world of late‑19th‑century Cazenovia: a time when blacksmiths were still essential to transportation and agriculture, and when a good horseshoer could make the difference between a sound horse and a sidelined one. For that year, Sawyer was the man O’Neil trusted to keep the village’s horses on their feet.
James Smith
James Smith emerged as a central figure in Cazenovia’s early twentieth‑century blacksmithing scene. He had previously partnered with Martin McCabe in 1899, and in 1900 he leased the blacksmith shop of W.J. Diefendorf in New Woodstock, gaining additional experience before returning to the village.
In 1901, Smith purchased the blacksmith shop, tools, and fixtures of Martin McCabe on Albany Street, taking possession of a forge with a long lineage. The Cazenovia Republican described him that September as “a first‑class workman…well known in this locality,” a reputation that helped anchor the shop during a period of transition in the trade. Among those who worked for him was John Cavanaugh, another village smith whose career is documented in the early twentieth century.
Smith remained at the Albany Street forge until 1935, the year he stepped back from full‑time smithing. The shop was torn down soon after, and the house on the lot was moved closer to the creek and became 1 Riverside Drive. A small shop was then established beside the relocated home, where Jim continued to work part‑time for a circle of long‑standing customers. Smith then leased the land fronting Albany Street to the Tydol Oil Company for use as a gas and service station. The site continues in that role today as the Red Apple Food Mart, still selling gasoline on the same ground where the forge once stood.
Although Ed Riley continued blacksmithing in the same cluster of blacksmiths until 1941, Smith’s retirement nearly marked the end of the creek‑side smithing along Albany Street and signaled the final transition of his section of the corridor from traditional forge work to modern commercial use.
Nathan Soult and son Frank
Nathan Soult, born in 1820, operated a blacksmith shop on the east side of the Chittenango Creek at the Albany Street split to Fenner and Nelson Streets—in the vicinity of the site now occupied by the Mirabito Convenience Store. The shop operated as early as 1853, and likely earlier. His forge added another working shop to the cluster that lined both sides of the creek, shaping a dependable pocket of trade in that part of the village.
From 1875 to 1882, the shop was operated by his son Frank, marking a brief second generation of the family’s work at the forge. While they carried out their own blacksmithing at the family shop, both Nathan and Frank also partnered with J.L. Darling on carriage repair and painting, linking their work to one of the more active tradesmen in the village.
A note in the Cazenovia Republican on November 15, 1872, records that Frank Soult rented space in the rear of McCabe’s forge for use as a paint shop, suggesting an independent expansion of his skills and a connection to the larger network of smiths and carriage workers in the village.
The Soult family lived on Farnham Street, close to their place of work. Nathan died in 1875 and is buried in Evergreen Cemetery. Beyond his years at the forge, little is known about Frank, and the record grows quiet after the shop closed in 1882.
Albert Stedman
Born in 1837, Albert Stedman appears in the 1870 Federal Census as one of the blacksmiths living in the Village of Cazenovia. With no surviving advertisements, shop notices, or property records tied to his name, he was almost certainly a working smith rather than a shop owner, part of the hired labor force that moved among the village’s established forges.
Although we do not know which shop Albert may have been working at, we do know that five shops were active at the time – those operated by John McCabe, Nathan Soult, Peter Bordwell, Eber Peet and John Darling, making it highly probable he was working at one of these locations.
Stedman represents the many tradesmen whose names surface briefly in census records—skilled workers who kept up the steady flow of repairs, toolmaking, and horse‑related work during a period when Cazenovia’s shops were supporting a busy, post‑Civil War village economy.
Though the record is brief, Stedman stands among the essential hands whose day‑to‑day labor sustained the village’s blacksmithing trade.
Jabez Stokes
In 1843, Jabez Stokes purchased Eber Peet’s first Albany Street blacksmith shop, becoming the first craftsmen that Peet ushered into ownership at this important creek‑side property. His tenure was relatively short, but it sits at a pivotal moment in the shop’s lineage, bridging Peet’s early operations and the later return of the property to him. This is the same shop that would be operated by the McCabe Family for half a century and another 34 years by Jim Smith.
An 1845 advertisement in the Madison County Whig for J.D. Stratton, seller of Sanford’s Perfect Straw Cutter, notes that the machines could be viewed “in a shop adjoining Jabez Stokes’ Blacksmith Shop.” This small detail places Stokes firmly in the commercial life of the village and that his forge sat within a cluster of tradesmen whose work supported the surrounding farms and businesses.
In 1847, Stokes sold the shop back to Eber Peet, closing out his brief but clearly documented role in the evolving chain of blacksmiths along Albany Street.
John J. Stone
After years working under Austin W. Van Riper at the Empire Clock Works, John J. Stone and Justice W. Marshall stepped forward to continue the business after Austin Van Riper’s untimely illness and death. In 1858, they purchased all of Van Riper’s patterns, drafts, tools, and machinery, ensuring that the clock‑making trade stayed in Cazenovia.
Stone and Marshall kept the shop in the same location and carried on the full range of work Van Riper had offered. They made and repaired tower clocks, but also operated a general blacksmith and machine shop, providing turning and fitting in brass, iron, and wood, along with repair and jobbing services for the community.
Their operation represented a direct continuation of Van Riper’s methods and designs. It also kept alive the long lineage of the blacksmith operation, which had earlier been run by Whitman Cobb and later by J. L. Darling.
Stone and Marshall operated the Clock Works until 1875, after which they partnered with Milton E. Card and the business transitioned to making locks and smaller castings.
Austin Van Riper
Austin W. Van Riper was born in Cazenovia in 1822, part of a generation that carried the village’s early industrial energy into mid‑century. He lived at 1 Nickerson Street, just a short distance from the east‑end corridor where metalworking, foundry work, and manufacturing had been clustering since the early 1800s. From this neighborhood he built a reputation that reached well beyond Madison County: Van Riper became one of the region’s best‑known tower clock designers and builders, a craftsman whose work combined mechanical and architectural precision.
By 1852, Van Riper had established his own enterprise, the Empire Clock Works. In 1855, he partnered with Timothy Buel and relocated to the former wool mill. It appears that Buel remained a partner for only one to two years.
This site had a long lineage. The blacksmith shop portion was first associated with Whitman Cobb, one of Cazenovia’s earliest metalworkers, and later with J. L. Darling, whose blacksmith shop operated there into the late nineteenth century. Van Riper’s tenure sits squarely in the middle of this sequence, representing the period when the site shifted from general blacksmithing toward specialized mechanical manufacture before returning to its roots.
Empire Clock Works was more than a clock shop. Advertisements from the 1850s show that Van Riper maintained a blacksmith operation on site, used both for producing clock components and for serving the general public. The shop offered turning and fitting in iron, brass, or wood; machinery repair; and jobbing of every description—services that positioned Van Riper as both a precision mechanic and a traditional village smith. His tower clocks, however, were the centerpiece. They required careful drafting, pattern‑making, and metalwork, and they placed Cazenovia on the map as a producer of reliable public timepieces during a period when towns and institutions increasingly sought them.
Van Riper’s business operated until 1859, the year of his death on September 19. Prior to his passing, his patterns, tools, and drafts were purchased by his longtime employees, who continued the clock‑making trade under the same name. Their advertisements emphasize that they had worked under Van Riper for years and were thoroughly trained in his methods—a testament to the skill and discipline he brought to the craft.
Though his life was brief, Austin W. Van Riper left a distinct imprint on Cazenovia’s industrial story. He stands at the intersection of blacksmithing, mechanical innovation, and architectural timekeeping, carrying forward a site first shaped by Cobb and later sustained by Darling. His clocks, his shop, and the craftsmen he trained form a clear chapter in the village’s long tradition of metalwork and machinery.
Elisha Williams
Revolutionary Soldier • Early Cazenovia Blacksmith • Landholder • Justice of the Peace • School Shareholder
Born in 1770 in Connecticut, Elisha Williams belonged to the generation whose early adulthood intersected with the final years of the American Revolution. His service in that conflict was remembered locally: an article in the Cazenovia Republican (April 23, 1931) records that the Daughters of the American Revolution placed a plaque honoring thirty Revolutionary War soldiers from the Town of Cazenovia, including Williams.
By the late 1790s, Williams was working as a blacksmith in the Cazenovia area. A surviving receipt dated December 6, 1796, preserved at Lorenzo House, documents blacksmithing work performed for John Lincklaen. The note—signed by Frederick de Clorëcq—confirms Williams as one of the earliest tradesmen supporting the Holland Land Company’s efforts to establish the settlement’s infrastructure. His blacksmithing may have been carried out on his own farm, a common practice in rural districts of the period. The note reads:
“Mr. Lincklaen Plaise (please) to Pay to E. Williams for Blacksmith work twenty Dollar one and eight and Charge the same to the account of.”
— Your Humble Servant, Frederick de Clorëcq
Williams’ residence is firmly established in the rural district south of the village of Cazenovia, the area later served by School District No. 9. An 1883 historical account (reprinted in 1974) lists him as one of the original shareholders of the No. 9 School. Shareholders were local landowners responsible for funding, maintaining, and governing the one‑room schoolhouse. This role confirms both his landholding and his standing within the community during his prime years.
His civic responsibilities extended beyond his farm and school district. A public notice dated April 20, 1811, printed in the Pilot, lists Williams among those commissioned as Justices of the Peace of Cazenovia. His commission reflects Madison County’s trust in his judgment and character, aligning perfectly with his residence and community involvement.
Later documentation further anchors his location. An advertisement in the Madison County Whig (August 27, 1851) offered for sale the “former farm” of Elisha Williams, Esq., describing it as 86 acres just south of the village. This confirms both his landholding and his long-term residence in the No. 9 corridor. He died on April 27, 1846 and his burial in South Cemetery on Number Nine Road places him permanently within the same landscape he helped shape.
Taken together, these records form a coherent portrait: Elisha Williams was a Revolutionary War veteran, an early blacksmith serving Cazenovia’s founding generation, a landowner in the rural district south of the village, a shareholder in its school, and a county-recognized civic authority trusted to serve as Justice of the Peace. His life reflects the intertwined roles of tradesman, farmer, educator, and magistrate that defined leadership in early Madison County.