On this occasion the villagers gathered in Christ Church for a religious service and to hear an address delivered by Samuel Starkweather, after which they marched in procession to the Red Lion Inn. Here a public banquet was served, and "after the removal of the cloth," says the contemporary account, "toasts were drunk under the discharge of cannon, most of them being succeeded by hearty cheering and animated airs from the band." The hopes which gave importance to this celebration are expressed in two of the toasts proposed, one by Henry Phinney, "The contemplated Susquehanna River Canal"; the other by Elisha Foote, "A speedy union of the pure waters of Otsego Lake with the Erie Canal."
When the company had left the table the whole village marched to the river, and assembled on the shore near the site of Clinton's dam. Boat horns, (sometimes called canal horns) about six feet long, typical of the "long ditch," were then common, and furnished blasts of martial music amid the crowd. The multitude was mustered somewhat after the order of a brigade. One company, consisting of over forty men with wheelbarrows and shovels, known as "sappers, miners and excavators," commanded by Captain William Wilson, marched with their comrades boldly to the scene of action. Lawrence McNamee, president of the day, personating Governor Clinton, threw the first shovelful of dirt. When the last remaining log of the old dam had been removed the procession marched back to the village, while the air was "rent with the huzzas of those who witnessed the first practical essay toward rendering the waters of the Susquehanna navigable for the purposes of commerce," and a nine-pounder upon the top of Mount Vision, at regular intervals, told the hills and valleys around that Cooperstown was rejoicing.[54]
It is almost needless to say that the development of railway transportation put an end to this project for a canal.
On September 2, 1901, another generation of people assembled near the outlet of the lake to witness the unveiling of a marker placed by Otsego Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution, Mrs. Isabella Scott Ernst, regent, to indicate the site and to commemorate the fame of Clinton's dam.[55] The crowd approached the bank of the Susquehanna by descending from River Street, where an arch of bunting had been erected. A large float anchored near the western bank was trimmed with flags, bunting, and vines. Directly across the river, on the eastern point of the outlet, the newly erected marker was concealed beneath the folds of an American flag. While a band played "The Stars and Stripes Forever," the spectators who lined the shore saw approaching from beneath the green foliage down the river a canoe paddled by a young man who wore the gay dress and war-paint of a Mohawk brave. Seated with him in the canoe were two little girls, attired in patriotic colors. The three in the canoe were lineal descendants of Revolutionary stock. The young girls were Jennie Ordelia Mason and Fannie May Converse, both descendants of James Parshall, an orderly sergeant who was present at the building of the dam in 1779. The Indian was impersonated by F. Hamilton McGown, a descendant of John Parshall, private, a brother of James Parshall. The canoe was paddled close to the eastern shore, and the three occupants drew aside the flag which concealed the marker, amid the applause of the spectators assembled on the banks. The trio in the canoe then drifted back down the river, and were soon lost to view beyond the overhanging branches.
Site of Clinton's Dam
The marker is a large boulder placed a few feet from the eastern bank of the river at the very outlet of the lake. Surmounting the rock is a ten-inch siege mortar thirty inches in length and weighing 1971 pounds, which did service at Fort Foote, Maryland, during the Civil War. On the western side of the boulder is a bronze tablet marked by the insignia of the Daughters of the American Revolution, and bearing this inscription:
Here was built a Dam the summer
of 1779 by the Soldiers under Gen.
Clinton to enable them to join
the Forces of Gen. Sullivan
at Tioga.