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Ziba hurd - biographical information


Excerpted from History of Wyoming County, N.Y. with Illustrations, Biographical Sketches, and Portraits of Some Pioneers and Prominent Residents
New York: F. W. Beers & Co. 36 Vesey Street
Published: 1880

Page 165

CASTILE VILLAGE. The first effectual blow the white man ever struck within the limits of the present corporation, to banish the desolation of the primeval wilderness, was given by Ziba Hurd, on the premises now owned and occupied by G. A. Davis. It was done on the 19th day of July, 1816. That blow, with its numerous repetitions, leveled and destroyed the forests, converting the places they had hitherto occupied into, first, luxuriant and fruitful fields, and then village lots that were one after another changed into comfortable and happy homes.

The first building ever erected in the village was on the lot where Dr. Smith now resides. It was of logs, and a shanty at that — the roof all on one side. The next was a framed house, built but a short time after the log shanty and by the same man, but on the site now occupied by the residence of G. A. Davis.


In 1816 Ziba Hurd articled four hundred acres of the Cotringer tract of John Gregg, Esq., of Canandaigua. It was the first purchase ever made of any part of the site of the present village of Castile. The timber was generally beech and maple, along the creek some hemlock, on parts of the site some very heavy pines. The land cleared by Mr. Hurd in 1816 included the site, garden and orchard of the present residence of G. A. Davis. In the following winter he went to Vermont, and on his return, early in the spring, brought with him two yoke of oxen, two cows, two potash kettles, one double wagon and several hundred yards of “fulled cloth.” He built the log shanty above referred to, near where Dr. Smith now lives, and the frame house before mentioned on ground nearly opposite.


In 1817, with the help of Gunnel Stanard, Mr. Hurd cleared twenty acres of land, adjoining and north of the three or four acres cleared the year before; built an ashery where Norman Calkins’s dwelling-house now is, and began manufacturing potash, the only article the pioneers had to depend on for cash. In this year Jacob Kellogg articled fifty acres of land where his son Asahel now lives, and commenced clearing it. He built a log house for himself and family, and a log shanty for his shop, he being a blacksmith. In the autumn of 1817, Sylvester Derby and family moved to the place. Derby was a mason, and occupied Hurd’s shanty. In this year also a clearing was commenced on the Jonathan Gilbert place, where Mrs. Crawford now lives. It included some three acres where the buildings are. Daniel W. Bannister built a saw-mill on ground now in the upper and west part of the Hopkins mill pond. Timothy Bannister built a double log house opposite the present “Christian’’ church. Ziba Hurd was made one of the three road commissioners of the then town of Perry.


J. Gilbert and family joined the settlement early in the spring of 1818. During that year Hurd completed a saw mill on the lot now owned and occupied by D. Pickett, Esq.; Tilly Gilbert came and settled in the village; Hurd and J. Gilbert built the cloth-dressing works, and the former built a barn near where J. D. Lane’s ice-house now stands (the barn is now owned and occupied by F. C. Spellman as a joiner’s shop and lumber-house); Hurd and the other commissioners of the town of Perry straightened the Allegany road between Castile village and the present town of Perry; J. Gilbert built the west part of the upright of the house where old Mrs. Davison now lives; Elisha Hurlburd joined the settlement and worked for Ziba Hurd, and Nathan Whitman and Joshua Smith came; Elihu Burr commenced building a grist-mill where the Hopkins mill now is, and built a log house near the Hopkins mill, and Ziba Hurd harvested over four hundred bushels of the real Genesee wheat, which he could sell for either six quarts of whiskey, or twenty-five cents in cash, per bushel.


The events of 1819 were as follows: Ziba Hurd and J. Gilbert added a carding machine to their cloth-dressing works. E. Burr completed the mill began the year before. School district No. 1 (village) built its first school-house, on the site now occupied by Mrs. Moshier. Rev. William True, of Covington, organized the first religious society in the village of Castile (the “Christian” church). T. Gilbert commenced building a framed house on the grounds where the Cure now stands. 
In 1820 T. Gilbert built a framed house where J. W. True now resides, and T. Bannister converted his log house into a tavern. Laban G. Wheeler started the first store ever in Castile village, in a part of the Bannister tavern; and it is said he transported all the goods from Perry on his back. The brothers David and Heman Merwin located this year in Castile village, and David Merwin built a log house on grounds now included in Miss Greene’s lawn. He and George Burr built a distillery just below the said lawn. 


February 27th, 1821, the town of Castile was set off from Perry; Z. Hurd was elected the first supervisor, and T. Gilbert the first town clerk. J. Gilbert and Woodruff erected the first store building, on the lot where Mrs. Crawford’s yellow house stands, and Sylvester Derby completed the building started by T. Gilbert two years before, and used it as a public house. 


In 1822 J. Gilbert built a store on the lot next southwest of Dr. Wright’s present residence, and Dyer Walker a framed house on the lot where Dr. Smith resides, which forms the present wing to the upright. H. Merwin commenced building what is now the back part of the house where Mrs. Bowman lives; and he also built an ashery a few roads below Pond’s grocery. Lucas Janes built a house and tannery on the grounds originally occupied by Ziba Hurd’s ashery; and Isaac Pratt built the saw-mill now owned and worked by Chapman & Son. 


In 1823 Lyman Hurd built a framed house on the lot now occupied by the residence of G. F. Lucas, Esq. — the house that J. B. Howard owns, and F. H. Smith occupies. In 1824 the clothing works, nearly opposite the Cure, were burned. 



Page 169

ZIBA HURD, a son of Daniel and Lucinda Hurd, was born In Tinmouth, Vt., May 22nd. 1785, and married Miss Sally Gilbert, of Bennington, in 1805. Six of their seven children grew to maturity, and three are still living. Mr. Hurd was the founder of Castile village, as elsewhere related. To him belongs the honor of naming the town. He was a justice of the peace many years. His first wife died January 18th, 1841, and he was married the same year to Miss Mary Center, who died January 25th, 1864. Mr. Hurd himself died March 14th, 1854.


For more about Ziba Hurd's life, from a 1955 article about the VanArsdale house in Castille, click this button...
Ziba Hurd & VanArsdale house
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