SOME OLD HOUSES

(Not Indexed)

INSERT

Miss Lesley E. Voorhees, par excellent historian of Baldwinsville, has favored me by sending to me information which, by her diligence, she has acquired concerning the earlier settlers, their homes, and their families in Onondaga County. The accompanying offset print which we make by permission of the editors of The Messenger, Baldwinsville, New York, gives a very interesting account of the homes of Chester Molby* and some of his descendants.

It is my understanding from my father and from some of his cousins that the house, in which the Messina family live and where they opercte Carm's greenhouses, was built by Chester Molby. The home in which the Lincoln Kratzers live joined the home of Samuel Molby, oldest son of Chester Molby. Samuel married on his twenty-first birthday, 1836. Many of his children must have been born at that home. About 1852 he sold the farm to his cousin, Lyman Maltby (b. 1818), and moved to a home in the outskirts of Baldwinsville.

Samuel Molby's eldest son was named Chester Jonathan Molby. Chester J. Molby's elder son was named Frank Lewis Molby. Chester J. was the administrator of Samuel's estate and he had the original deed by which Chester acquired title to the farm. Chester J.'s son, Frank Lewis, had the original deed in his home in Washington, D.C., and showed it to me around the year 1935. If the same is in existence now, it is probably in the possession of Richard Van Dyke Molby, Jr., whose address is given in this book, along with his biographical sketch. Richard V., Jr., is Frank Lewis Molby's grandson.

I made the following notations from the original deed:

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: 101Vc  Camillus  11  p. 102         : of August, 1828, at 4 o'clock P.M.:
: William I. Vreedenbrugh to          :                 R. S. Hess, clerk :
: Chester Molby, Deed:                :                                   :
: Received and recorded in the clerk's: Contract made March 8, 1813       :
: office of Onondaga Co. in Liber N N :     Chester Molby  11  Camillus   :
: of deeds folio 101 86, the 25th day :                                   :
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It is well established by data in this book that Jonathan Maltby or Molby and his family as a whole came to Camillus in or about 1801. He and his wife ("a Culver," probably Lucy) were listed in the 1810 census. Culvers, too, were at Camillus. Family records were lost when Jacob's home burned while occupied by Sally Miner Molby and John Bowman, her second husband. I have tried to find the authentic name of wife, and data of death and burial place for these oldest Maltby-Molby settlers at Camillus. It seems to me that their remains may have been the first interred on Chester's farm, and the lot was used mainly as a family cemetery. See Mrs. Eleanor Nesbitt's statement, p. 16 of this book (Maltby-Molby Family). Might not the unearthing of grave stones buried there reveal some facts?

                                             Fred A Molby

* See p. 528

s-95

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