Rockland, New York One Place Study

Date: 10 Apr 2023
Location: Rockland, Sullivan, New York, United States
Surnames/tags: One_Place_Studies New_York United_States

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Contents 1 Rockland, Sullivan County, New York One Place Study 2 How to Join the Study 3 Participants 4 Resources & Reference Pages 5 This Study 6 Tasks 7 Background 7.1 History 7.2 First Settlers 7.3 Geography 7.4 Population 8 Sources

Rockland, Sullivan County, New York One Place Study

How to Join the Study

Just visit the G2G question and answer that you want to join the Study, or, send me a private message above.

Participants

Lorraine O'Dell
Keith Cook
Jodie Pillius

Resources & Reference Pages

• Official Town Website
• Wikidata: Item Q3708370, en:Wikipedia
• WikiTree Profiles that link here
• Profiles of People Included in the Study appear on our Category Page -- currently 77
• The Study's companion blog site.
• Quinlan's History of Sullivan County @ archive.org.
• The Study's page at the Society for One Place Studies

This Study

This Study is of the Town of Rockland, Sullivan County, New York, not Rockland County, New York.

It is the purpose of this Study to profile the individuals who have been born, lived and died in Rockland, Sullivan County, New York, from the earliest settlers. Where did they come from? If they left, where did they go? What were their occupations? Were there famous people from Rockland?

In addition, the Study will follow the history of the town and it's residents. How were the various communities within the town settled? What historic events took place in Rockland? How have things changed over the years.? What should people see when they visit the town?

The Study will also add profiles of those buried in the several cemeteries located in Rockland; many of them formerly family cemeteries. We will begin with cemeteries that were originally family cemeteries. A list of those cemeteries will be added shortly.

Tasks

• Familiarize yourself with the history of the town and the various hamlets, etc.
• Add profiles of individuals as they're encountered in the historic research.
• Be sure profiles included in the Study have basic information with good sources.
• Be sure to add the Study's sticker and the Rockland, New York category to related profiles.
• Take photos of important points of interest around the town.
• Add free space profiles of the various hamlets, cemeteries and other reference points of the town and this Study.
• Regularly solicit new members for the Study.
• Regularly promote the Study on social media.

Background

It might be useful to understand New York's Administrative Divisions ^[1]. The State of New York divides the state into 62 counties each of which has a county government which provides services to residents. Within each county, the state designates a number of incorporated cities, towns or townships which have municipal governments that provide services to residents. Towns may have a number of incorporated villages, some named the same as the town they are part of. Villages also have their own village government that provides services to residents. Also within towns, there may be a number of hamlets which are unincorporated areas without a governing body. Hamlets do not have governing bodies and do not provide services to residents.

Understanding this administrative structure makes it easier to find local information useful to historic and genealogical research. Records of various kinds may be held in any of the governing administrative units. All of these units operate under state laws and regulations but, on a practical basis, there is considerable independence among the various units. What a village, town or county clerk can provide depends on the history, size and economics of any of these units. The services and record keeping of any of these units can change over time. Making contact with each level of local government may be useful in research.

Many towns in the state of New York have villages of the same name; for instance, the Towns of Delhi and Walton, NY, each have villages of the same names. This is not true of Rockland; there is only one incorporated village in the Town of Rockland; that is Roscoe; there is no village of Rockland. The municipal offices of the Town of Rockland sit in the hamlet of Livingston Manor.

For the purposes of this One-Place Study of Rockland, New York, in Sullivan County, there are a number of hamlets and one village within the Town of Rockland that will be important:

Livingston Manor,

Roscoe,

Rockland,

[Anderson],

Craigie Clair

Deckertown,

Jocelyn,

Debruce,

Grooville,

[Beaverkill],

Deckertown,

Hazel,

Lew Beach,

Morsston, and

[Parkston].

Some are little more than a crossroad but may have had historic significance in the past.

History

This, like all early colonies, was home to a number of Native tribes and clans. The Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) ranged from Canada down the Mid-Atlantic. The Lenape ranged from what is now mid-New York State, overlapping Iroquois territory. The Minisink region which is just south of Rockland was home to Lenape bands. Indian trails later became roads and railroads, now highways, making it possible for settlers to move into the area.

In 1706, what became known as the Hardenbergh Patent was purchased by Johannes Hardenberg from sachem of the Esopus. It was a land tract of over 1 million acres. Later much of this was purchased by Robert Livingston and it was part of Great Lot #4 that became parts of Rockland. What is now the town was first settled about 1789.

"In 1683, when the colony that is now New York State established its first twelve counties, the present-day Sullivan County was a part of Ulster County. However, in 1809, Sullivan County was separated from Ulster County." ^[2]

The Town of Rockland was established in 1910 from the western part of the Town of Neversink.

It may be best to begin to cover the history of Rockland with links to historical treatment already in existence.^[3]

First Settlers

"The first settlers in the Town of Rockland were the Jehiel Stewart family and his brother Luther, who came from Middletown, Connecticut."^[4] They arrived, around 1789, in what was then part of the Town of Rochester, Ulster County, New York.

Geography

Continent: North America

Country: United States of America

State/Province: New York

County: Sullivan

GPS Coordinates: 41.945278, -74.913056

Elevation: 394.0 m or 1292.7 feet

Rockland is the northern most town in Sullivan County, New York.

The boundaries that divide us are rarely neat and tidy. To the east of Rockland is the Town of Neversink; to the south are The Towns of Liberty, Callicoon and Fremont; to the west is the County line for Delaware County and the Town of Colchester; to the north is the Ulster County border and the Town of Hardenbergh.

The Town of Rockland is enhanced by the topography, flora and fauna of the lower Catskill Mountains and the basins of Willowemoc and Beaver Kill Creeks. You can see from the map that many of the roads are alongside brooks and streams and that the landscape is dotted with ponds of varying sizes.

It's a hilly, rocky, forested, rural landscape colored in hues of green in Spring and Summer and reds, oranges and yellows in Autumn and blanketed with snow in the Winter. The woodlands are mixed deciduous and evergreen forests.

Population

The 2020 population was 3,290.

Sources

1. ↑ New York's Administrative Divisions
2. ↑ Vintage Sullivan County
3. ↑ History of the Town of Rockland, Sullivan County Historical Society, accessed April 11, 2023.
4. ↑ History of Rockland @ The Sullivan County Historical Society

• Rockland, New York @ Wikipedia