Dutchess County Historical Society Yearbook Vol 063 1978

A LETTER FROM WILLIAM CASE WILLIAMS Ancestor of Charles Fraleigh, Belleville, Ontario, Canada Mr. Fraleigh is a direct descendant of Abraham Freligh and wife Charity (Gertrude Van Vliet) of Charlotte Precinct, who operated a min in Clinton until moving to Canada in 1785.

Pattens Hotel New York Oct. 31st 1854 My Dear Rachel: I arrived here today about 1 o'clock and as today is the last day the Crystal Palace is to remain open for visitors I immediately went to it and staid till almost 10 o'clock at night. It shows better in the evening than by daylight being lit up with perhaps two or three thousand gas lights. It is certainly a splendid affair; it is worth the trouble of coming one hundred miles or more to see the building alone which covers over five acres of land. The Band was there and made the Palace ring with music-- But I am told it has been a very poor speculation. They say it cost $700,000, and does not begin to pay expenses. I haven't a doubt but there is all of two million worth of property exhibited there. I saw 1 centre table, the price was $1200. I was told by a gentleman that there had been a carpet there for one room the price of which was $30,000. The statues of marble and the pictures attracted the most attention of anything especially our Savior and his Apostles, and the picture of Daniel in the lions den large enough to cover the side of a large room. There were a great many curiosities from China and Jerusalem and almost anything you can think of made in almost any part of the world. There was a great many in this evening to see it for the last time.

New York has grown beyond all conception since I saw it 19 years ago in size, but that part which was then built remains pretty near the same although very much improved. It looks very natural about the City Hall, the Park, the Astor House, the Museum, etc. Broadway is all astir as usual, sometimes almost blocked up.

I stopped at Irons Hotel in Kingston the first night.

Mr. Donnelly also just on his return from Montreal. Thursday came down to Albany by railroad. We came in sight of the Mohawk River for a great many miles and I couldn't but think of my mother's moving up the River in a batteau 60 years ago which took almost a month. Friday spent looking about Albany.

Visited the State House from the cupolo of which a person has an excellent view of the City, there is where the State of New York holds their State Legislature or Parliment. I visited the State Agricultural rooms which was worth as much to see as a museum. They have very extensive rooms filled with specimens of almost every kind of machinery that can be used in farming, of all the different kind of grain both in the straw and in a clean state, of all fruit grown in the U.S. represented in wax, of all the different kind of animals, birds, reptiles, insects, etc., fish, etc., a hog stuffed that weighed when alive 1600/1700 pounds, plows used 80 years ago.

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