Mount Morris (village), New York
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Mount Morris is a
village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...
in the town of Mount Morris in Livingston County,
New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...
, United States. The village population was 2,986 at the 2010 census, out of 4,465 in the entire town. The village and town are named after Robert Morris. The village is at the northeastern entrance to
Letchworth State Park Letchworth State Park is a New York State Park located in Livingston and Wyoming Counties in western Upstate New York. The park is roughly long, following the course of the Genesee River as it flows north through a deep gorge and over several ...
, which contains a scenic gorge and triple
waterfall A waterfall is any point in a river or stream where water flows over a vertical drop or a series of steep drops. Waterfalls also occur where meltwater drops over the edge of a tabular iceberg or ice shelf. Waterfalls can be formed in seve ...
on the
Genesee River The Genesee River ( ) is a tributary of Lake Ontario flowing northward through the Twin Tiers of Pennsylvania and New York (state), New York in the United States. The river contains several waterfalls in New York at Letchworth State Park and Roch ...
.


History

The community was first called "Allen Hill" and "Richmond Hill" by early settler Ebenezer "Indian" Allen. The village of Mount Morris was incorporated in 1835. It was named after Robert Morris, a financier of the
American Revolution The American Revolution (1765–1783) was a colonial rebellion and war of independence in which the Thirteen Colonies broke from British America, British rule to form the United States of America. The revolution culminated in the American ...
, and later owner of the Morris Reserve, from which the lands around Mount Morris were sold to settlers. The main trade route in the town's early days was the Genesee Valley Canal which ran south from the
Erie Canal The Erie Canal is a historic canal in upstate New York that runs east–west between the Hudson River and Lake Erie. Completed in 1825, the canal was the first navigability, navigable waterway connecting the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes, ...
at Rochester to Olean. The canal was abandoned in the 1870s and later used as a
railroad Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in railway track, tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel railway track, rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of ...
right of way for a succession of railroads, which eventually consolidated into the
Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad ( reporting mark PRR), legal name as the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, also known as the "Pennsy," was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. At its ...
. The Friends of the Genesee Valley Greenway have built hiking trails along some of the
canal Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or engineered channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation) or for conveyancing water transport vehicles (e.g. water taxi). They carry free, calm surface ...
route. Mount Morris Academy was an important early school, but it closed in 1867. Just upstream (west) from the village on the Genesee River is the Mount Morris Dam ( long, high), which was built between 1948 and 1952 for
flood control Flood management or flood control are methods used to reduce or prevent the detrimental effects of flood waters. Flooding can be caused by a mix of both natural processes, such as extreme weather upstream, and human changes to waterbodies and ru ...
of the lower Genesee Valley. An earlier and much smaller dam, still extant in the village, was used for mills; now it is a small
hydroelectric Hydroelectricity, or hydroelectric power, is Electricity generation, electricity generated from hydropower (water power). Hydropower supplies 15% of the world's electricity, almost 4,210 TWh in 2023, which is more than all other Renewable energ ...
generating station. In the early 21st century, Greg O'Connell, a retired New York City detective and developer of properties in
Red Hook, Brooklyn Red Hook is a neighborhood in western Brooklyn, New York City, United States, within the area once known as South Brooklyn. It is located on a peninsula projecting into the Upper New York Bay and is bounded by the Gowanus Expressway and the Ca ...
, bought 19 buildings along the town's Main Street in an effort to revive the downtown area.


National Register of Historic Places

The following sites and historic districts are listed on the
National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...
.


Notable people

* Roscoe C. Barnes, who hit the first recorded home run in professional baseball and is credited with the title of the first batting champion of the
National League National League often refers to: *National League (baseball), one of the two baseball leagues constituting Major League Baseball in the United States and Canada *National League (division), the fifth division of the English football (soccer) system ...
*
Francis Bellamy Francis Julius Bellamy (May 18, 1855 – August 28, 1931) was an American Christian socialist Baptist minister and author. He is best known for writing the original version of the Pledge of Allegiance in 1892. Early life Francis Julius Bellamy ...
, author of the United States
Pledge of Allegiance The U.S Pledge of Allegiance is a patriotic recited verse that promises allegiance to the flag of the United States and the republic of the United States. The first version was written in 1885 by Captain George Thatcher Balch, a Union Army o ...
* Mary Seymour Howell, a native daughter, was a
suffragette A suffragette was a member of an activist women's organisation in the early 20th century who, under the banner "Votes for Women", fought for the right to vote in public elections in the United Kingdom. The term refers in particular to members ...
and associate of Susan B. Anthony. She died in 1913. * John Wesley Powell, the first white man to navigate and chart the
Colorado River The Colorado River () is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and in northern Mexico. The river, the List of longest rivers of the United States (by main stem), 5th longest in the United St ...
* Joseph Strauss, inventor, admiral in the United States Navy


Geography

Mount Morris is located in western Livingston County at (42.722996, -77.877001), in the northern part of the town of Mount Morris. According to the
United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...
, the village has a total area of , all land. The
Genesee River The Genesee River ( ) is a tributary of Lake Ontario flowing northward through the Twin Tiers of Pennsylvania and New York (state), New York in the United States. The river contains several waterfalls in New York at Letchworth State Park and Roch ...
forms the northern border of the village (and the town), while Allens Creek and Damonsville Creek flow through the village. New York State Route 36 and New York State Route 408 intersect in the village. Geneseo, the
county seat A county seat is an administrative center, seat of government, or capital city of a county or parish (administrative division), civil parish. The term is in use in five countries: Canada, China, Hungary, Romania, and the United States. An equiva ...
, is to the northeast.
Interstate 390 Interstate 390 (I-390) is a north–south auxiliary Interstate Highway located entirely within New York (state), New York in the United States. The southern terminus of the route is at the Southern Tier Expressway (Interstate 86 in New Yor ...
passes east of the village, leading north to Rochester and southeast to Corning.


Climate

Compared to the rest of
Upstate New York Upstate New York is a geographic region of New York (state), New York that lies north and northwest of the New York metropolitan area, New York City metropolitan area of downstate New York. Upstate includes the middle and upper Hudson Valley, ...
(and all of the northeastern United States), Mount Morris receives relatively little precipitation. A 1910 study reported an average annual total of of precipitation, making Mount Morris the driest place in New York. More recent data puts the annual precipitation at .


Transport

Mount Morris is on the Rochester-to- Dansville line of the Rochester & Southern Railroad. The R&S Rochester-to-Dansville line through Mount Morris was originally part of the New York ( Hoboken) to Buffalo Main Line of the
Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad The Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad, also known as the DL&W or Lackawanna Railroad, was a U.S. Class 1 railroad that connected Buffalo, New York, and Hoboken, New Jersey, and by ferry with New York City, a distance of . The railroad was ...
(DL&W). This through route, made redundant by the 1960 Erie Lackawanna merger, was downgraded in 1963 with the abandonment of a portion of the line between nearby Groveland and Wayland, over torturous Dansville Hill. The Erie Lackawanna Railway thereafter operated over the far easier grades of the former Erie Railroad, via Hornell, to Binghamton and Hoboken. In addition to the DL&W, Mount Morris was served by three other railroads: 1) It was served by the Rochester-Avon-Mount Morris line of the
Erie Railroad The Erie Railroad was a railroad that operated in the Northeastern United States, originally connecting Pavonia Terminal in Jersey City, New Jersey, with Lake Erie at Dunkirk, New York. The railroad expanded west to Chicago following its 1865 ...
from c. 1860 to 1940. From 1907 to 1934 this offered frequent
electric railway Railway electrification is the use of electric power for the propulsion of rail transport. Electric railways use either electric locomotives (hauling passengers or freight in separate cars), electric multiple units ( passenger cars with their own ...
service from Mount Morris to Rochester. The Erie line to Mount Morris was abandoned in 1940. 2) The Dansville and Mount Morris Railroad (and predecessor Erie & Genesee Valley RR) linked its namesake communities from c. 1871 to 1940. The Mount Morris segment of the railroad was abandoned with the loss of its connection to the Erie in 1940. 3) The
Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad ( reporting mark PRR), legal name as the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, also known as the "Pennsy," was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. At its ...
(and predecessors) served Mount Morris from c. 1882 to c. 1963 on its Olean-Hinsdale-Rochester branch line. The PRR through Mount Morris was abandoned in 1963, and the right-of-way now forms the basis of the Genesee Valley Greenway. Mount Morris is now the location of the junction with the R&S's branch to the Hampton Corners salt mine. The Hampton Corners line was built in the 1990s and is one of the newest railroad lines in New York state.


Demographics

As of the
census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...
of 2000, there were 3,266 people, 1,307 households, and 794 families residing in the village. The population density was . There were 1,412 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the village was 94.18%
White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...
, 1.13%
Black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...
or
African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...
, 0.28% Native American, 0.67% Asian, 2.51% from other races, and 1.22% from two or more races.
Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...
or Latino of any race were 5.79% of the population. There were 1,307 households, out of which 29.2% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 39.6% were
married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...
living together, 16.1% had a female householder with no husband present, and 39.2% were non-families. 31.0% of all households were made up of individuals, and 13.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.37 and the average family size was 2.94. In the village, the population was spread out, with 23.9% under the age of 18, 8.9% from 18 to 24, 27.4% from 25 to 44, 20.8% from 45 to 64, and 19.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females, there were 87.6 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 80.1 males. The median income for a household in the village was $31,792, and the median income for a family was $37,143. Males had a median income of $32,464 versus $20,052 for females. The
per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...
for the village was $15,107. About 12.0% of families and 14.3% of the population were below the
poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...
, including 21.8% of those under age 18 and 10.8% of those age 65 or over.


References


External links


Town of Mount Morris

Letchworth State Park

Mount Morris Dam


a 2011 article from ''The New York Times Magazine'' about developer Greg O'Connell's attempts to revitalize Mount Morris {{authority control Villages in Livingston County, New York Rochester metropolitan area, New York Villages in New York (state)