" During the following year quite
a nucleus for a town had gathered here. In 1794, Mrs. Sanborne, an
enterprising landlady, whose eye kindled with the recollection of those
days, served up in a tea saucer the first currants produced in the Genesee
country. [Footnote: Conversation of the author with Mrs. Sanborne.]
Canandaigua at that time and for many years after was head-quarters for
all who were making their way into what at that time was called the Indian
country, and from the respectability and enterprise of its early
inhabitants, it became attractive as a place of residence.
But though considerable improvements had been made here, the entire region
was new, romantic and wild. Such was its condition at the time of the
great Indian council that convened here in the autumn of 1794. Indians and
deer, and wolves, and bear were very abundant and were mingled with the
early associations of those who contributed to make this an abode of
elevation and refinement. The cow-boy, often startled while on his way by
the appearance of a bear, went timidly forth on his evening errand,
inspired with courage by the thought that he might, for his protection,
shoulder a gun. Bear incidents, narrow escapes from fighting with bears,
and bear stories of every description, entered largely into the staple of
their conversation, and many an evening's hour was thus beguiled away,
around the huge and brightly blazing fire of the early pioneer.
"Did you hear," said a Mrs.
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