Methodology

Methodology

The descriptions of the roadhouses featured in this paper contain the following elements: TIME LINE; PERSONALITIES; RELATED EVENTS.

TIME LINE

The TIME LINE is not to be considered complete as the majority of the information was gathered from newspaper accounts. Where possible these newspaper accounts were used to cross check each other and in some cases census and land records were used for further confirmation of the information. In some cases the owner of the property was also the person that operated the hotel and saloon. In other cases the property would be leased to another person who would operate the business. Working backwards, from the newspaper accounts, it wasn’t always possible to determine if the subject of the story was an owner, proprietor or an employee. All that could be said was that the particular person was associated with a particular roadhouse at a particular point in time. When all the articles were taken together it was sometimes possible to make a better determination of a persons’ association with a particular roadhouse and the length of that association.

The exact tenure of a person’s association with a particular roadhouse cannot always be determined since leases and changes of ownership were not always advertized in the paper. With the exception of the Rose Lawn property (Rural Inn) the deed records in the Onondaga County Clerk Office were not consulted. This paper is meant for entertainment purposes and makes no claim to be an official title search. It is always possible that, in the gap between any two individuals in a given TIMELINE, another person could be found who fits in that gap.

PERSONALITIES

Where possible, information on the individuals operating the roadhouses will be included in the TIMELINE itself. There are always persons that stand out from the crowd and the individuals associated with the roadhouses on the Plank Roads were no different. The story of these individuals is usually too broad to be included in the TIMELINE of a single roadhouse. These high profile characters will have their own section where their personal timeline can be followed.

RELATED EVENTS

Some of the more interesting events or activities that took place at a given roadhouse will be described in the individual TIMELINES. If the actual newspaper article can be cleaned up and made readable, then the article itself will be linked in. Otherwise the article will be transcribed.  

In a situation very similar to that found in the case of the roadhouse characters, EVENTS can be too broad to be included in the TIMELINE of a single roadhouse. These larger events will have links to their own pages.

SOURCES

The primary source for obtaining the story of these old roadhouses was the newspaper archive being created and maintained by Tom Tryniski of Fulton, NY [www.fultonhistory.com]. In some cases there were several lengthy, detailed filled, reports about the objects of this study. However, in most cases, the reports offered a few details and occasionally even raised new questions. For example, when the same name arose at two locations – was it the same person? Locations also proved problematic since it was a long time before there were numerical addresses assigned on the plank roads. Then there were the ever present mistakes and information that was just plain wrong.

The approach taken to resolve these problems was to bring as much information as possible together and overlay it to achieve as much consistency as possible. The newspaper obits and census records allowed the creation of the family genealogies for many of the characters found in connection with these roadhouses. This helped resolve some identity problems and also showed that several of the persons were related, which in turn would sometimes shed light on the motives behind a few of their activities. As a result of this methodology some of the characters will have a genealogy link. It was the byproduct of the process of discerning the differences between the roadhouses and their many owners and proprietors.

Location was a big problem when it came to determining if two roadhouse were actually the same or different. Had one replaced the other on the same location or at a nearby location or was this just a new proprietor at an old location? In these cases maps and aerial photographs were important. The roads leading from the village of Salina, which later became the First Ward of the City of Syracuse, changed over the years and have continued to change up to the present day. Spring Street had been extended to meet up with the Liverpool Plank Road as was Park Street and they merged together as they approached the plank road. When the Regional Market was built the Spring Street extension was removed and only the Park Street extension remained. 

Land records, where available on line, and in hard to read legal descriptions in foreclosure notices, when I got lucky, were helpful. In some cases these land descriptions could be drawn on town lot maps to determine boundaries and hence their actual location. In some cases this was necessary to determine that two roadhouses were different, but were located only a couple hundred feet apart. This problem arose because newspaper reports were usually vague on location. Typically they gave a road, such as Cicero Plank Road, a proprietor’s name, a position which could change rapidly, and then some details on whatever the event was that was reason for the article.