The Patrons' Fire Insurance Company of Orange and Ulster counties, has issued policies to the amount of $3,600,000, and it is said to have saved the policy holders $250,000 in the past four years.
[CHAPTER XXXVII.]
JOURNALISM IN ORANGE COUNTY
By W. T. Doty.
FIRST APPEARANCE.
From the accessible records it seems that the "art preservative" entered Orange County by way of Goshen in 1788. It appeared next in Newburgh in 1895, {sic} at New Windsor in 1799, at Montgomery in 1806, New Vernon in 1833, Slate Hill in 1834, Middletown, in 1840, Port Jervis in 1850, Warwick in 1845, Pine Bush in 1868, Walden in 1869, Cornwall 1871, Monroe 1882, Cornwall-on-Hudson in 1888, Chester 1888, Highland Falls 1891, Washingtonville 1899.
At first thought it appears more probable that Newburgh was the first port of entry, from the fact that the latter early felt the contact of the civilization advancing up the Hudson—practically the only highway into the great unknown interior prior to, during and immediately following the American Revolution; and also as, during the Revolution, Samuel Louden followed the retreating footsteps of the American forces from New York City to Fishkill, printing or issuing, at convenient times, the New York Packet. This was issued, it appears, at Fishkill. Why not in Newburgh, where so many great events in connection with the Revolutionary period occurred?
However, Goshen seems to have been a hamlet or village as early as 1714, while Newburgh's first settlement was about 1719, and the records accord to the old county seat the honor of housing the first printing office in Orange County.
In 1788 David Mandeville and David M. Wescott issued the Goshen Repository. That they were men of some literary ability is surmised from the fact that they were connected with the Goshen Academy—that ancient and honorable seat of learning—an institution of which, also, Goshen should feel a thrill of pride.