The building referred to in Isaac Cooper's diary as "Morrell's and Prentiss' house" includes the two brick houses on Main Street which stand conjoined just east of the Village Club and Library. Judge Morrell went West, and his house, the more westerly of the two, became better known as the property of its later owner, William Holt Averell, whose descendants continued to occupy it a century after him. The adjoining house, built by Col. Prentiss, remained after his death in possession of his family, and his daughter, Mrs. Charlotte Prentiss Browning, lived to celebrate its centennial.
Col. John H. Prentiss, for more than half a century a resident, and for forty years editor of the Freeman's Journal, was a notable figure in Cooperstown. Under his editorial management the Freeman's Journal became a strong political organ, and exercised an influence that made Otsego one of the stanchest Democratic counties in the State of New York. Col. Prentiss represented his district in Congress during the four years of Van Buren's administration, having been reelected at the expiration of his first term. It was at this time that his next door neighbor, William Holt Averell, was a candidate for Congress on the Whig ticket. The first returns indicated that Averell had been elected, and there was a noisy demonstration by Averell's supporters in front of his residence, bringing him forth for a speech which was received with great enthusiasm. The returns came in slowly in those days, and a day or two had passed before it was learned that Prentiss had been elected, and his doorstep became the scene of another jubilation. According to the recollections of some this seesawing of returns occurred more than once, and the two neighbors, whose friendship was not interrupted by their political antagonisms, each joined in the demonstration in honor of the other.
A large part of the work of publishing his newspaper was done by Judge Prentiss himself. Besides being sole editor, he attended to the financial department, and for forty years, except while in Congress, he gave his personal attention in the printing office to the mechanical department. A later writer recalls often seeing Col. Prentiss in the press-room, with coat off, sleeves rolled up, either inking the type with two large soft balls, or pulling at the lever of the old Ramage press. He describes him as "an industrious, energetic man, a little inclined to aristocratic bearing, but open, frank and cordial with his friends."
The last appearance of Col. Prentiss in public life, from which he had previously kept aloof for several years, was as a delegate to the Democratic State convention which was held in Albany on February 1, 1861. In that body of distinguished and able men, of which he was one of the vice-presidents, he attracted much attention, and the question was frequently asked by those in attendance, referring to Col. Prentiss, "Who is that large, fine-looking old gentleman, with white, flowing hair?"[94]
Colonel Prentiss's next door neighbor, William Holt Averell, son of James Averell, Jr., was for more than half a century one of the most prominent citizens of the village, who did more perhaps than any other for its financial development. He was one of the first directors and for many years president of the Otsego County Bank, the original of the present First National Bank, and for which the building across the way from his house, now used as the Clark Estate office, was erected in 1831. As he issued every day from the doorway of this building with its portico of fluted columns, his figure was exactly such as the imagination might now devise as most in harmony with the surroundings; for in his youth Averell was extremely punctilious in his dress, being a very handsome man, and for many years it was his custom to wear a white beaver hat, and ruffled shirt, with ruffles at the cuffs that set off to good advantage his small and delicate hands. He did all his reading and work at night. Those who passed his windows at a late hour were sure to glimpse him bending over his desk, and nobody else in Cooperstown went to bed late enough to see his lamp extinguished, for the servants often found him still at work when they came to summon him to breakfast in the morning. He lived long enough to be regarded as a gentleman of the old school, positive and dogmatic in his opinions, which were usually those of a minority, but which he defended with the resourcefulness of a brilliant and well-trained mind.
In 1813 Henry Phinney, one of the two sons of Elihu Phinney, began the construction of the large brick house on Chestnut street now known as "Willowbrook," and completed it three years later. In Cooper's Chronicles of Cooperstown several houses "of respectable dimensions and of genteel finish" are mentioned as having been erected between the years of 1820 and 1835. Among these is the house of Elihu Phinney, the younger son of the pioneer, which still stands on Pioneer Street opposite to the Universalist church. It is of brick, partly surrounded by a veranda, and exquisite in many details of construction, much of the interior woodwork being notable in excellence of chaste design.
During this same general period several houses of stone were erected that still remain among the most solid and attractive in Cooperstown. William Nichols built Greystone, the fine old residence that stands at the southwest corner of Fair and Lake streets; Ellory Cory erected the house on the west side of Pioneer Street near Lake Street; John Hannay set a new standard for the western part of the village when he put up on the north side of Main Street, not far from Chestnut Street, the dignified residence now occupied by the Mohican Club. In 1827 the low structures of stone which stand on the east side of Pioneer Street, between Main and Church street, were erected; and in 1828 the three-story stone building on the north side of Main Street, midway between Pioneer and Chestnut streets, was an important addition to the business section of the village.
Forrest D. Coleman