I came across an interesting book entitled; Turn-of-the-Century Scrapbook of Jonathan Streeter Gates Bolton, NY August 2, 1847 – December 11, 1921. It is a compilation of newspaper clippings from that period. One short article dealt with Huletts Landing and it is fascinating.
It is simply dated August 1911. It does not say what newspaper it was clipped from. The grandmother referred to in the article is the wife of Harvey Hulett, Olivia Pratt. Olivia Pratt was born in 1798 and died Jan 20, 1872.
The Russel Hulett that the article quotes is actually Harvey Russell Hulett who was the grandson of Harvey and Olivia (Pratt) Hulett and the son of Harvey Hulett Jr. (Both his grandfather and his father would have been named Harvey Hulett) They must have called him Russell because he would have been the third male, all living at the same time, named Harvey Hulett! Now how’s that for some confusion.
The article sheds some light into what living in Huletts Landing was like in 1861. I’ve copied it as written (it does say “shoes” in the 4th line) and the wording and punctuation is as it was written in 1911.
Aug. 1911
Fifty Years Ago – And Now
Mr. Russel Hulett of Ticonderoga in a recent conversation recalled his grandmother’s prophecy. Made fifty years ago (1861), when Huletts Landing was a little farm on the cove-level between the lake and its eastern hills, and when occasionally, city-tired folks searching the lovely wooded shoes of Lake George for a place of rest would stop at the farm house, and, for what would today be a small sum, enjoyed for a time its generous, if unpretentious hospitality.
This prophecy was that in a few more years there will stand “on this very spot,” a large hotel and great numbers of people would come to it in the hot weather. Her children smiled. Her grand-children declared – “Grandmother thinks that ere or two swallows are going to make a summer – by-and-by!,” and laughed. But the old lady, nodding her wise head, said – “I won’t live to see it but you will”.
And they did. Where the ancient farm-house then nestled under the maple tree now stands the Hulett House; where the apple orchard straggled, and the corn rows stretched in pennoned over a grassy, tree-dotted plain; where grandmother Hulett used to sit knitting in the chimney-corner, tables are now laid in July and August for two hundred and more guests; where the clear waters of the lake, washing over the stones and lapping the sandy scimiter-shaped shore, once lulied the dear old woman to sleep under the mossy eaves now rocks a fleet of boats, and a fine pavillion tempts the votaries of Terpischore to “trip the light fantastic.”
