The Stockade Association

Want to Know the History of Your House?

By Sylvie Briber

With these cold, wintry days, it’s the perfect time to cozy in at the Schenectady County Historical Society’s Grems Doolittle Library to research your historic house! And it is only steps away at 32 Washington Avenue!

In talking with Rich Brown, our Ferry Street neighbor, he was wondering how long the previous owner of his house had lived there.

Rich lives at what I call the “tipsy house” because the doorway looks a little crooked! And maybe I got that name from Giles Yates van der Bogart, author of “The Walls Have Ears,”  who wrote some interesting history on this Widow Kendall House, 10 North Ferry.

This Stockade home has always been special to me. In 1963 I visited this house with my mother, as she knew the owner, Miss Bernice Hodges. Bernice died in 1978 and Rich purchased the house from her estate.

So how long did Bernice live in Rich’s house? At the SCHS library, we turned to the great number of City Directories for our answer. These are like telephone books and the very first one was printed in 1842!!!

We knew that Bernice was living there in 1963 to 1977. Did she live there in 1940?

So we checked the 1940 directory and she was not listed. Was she living there in 1950? Checking that directory, we learned that she was.

Backing up to 1945, she was listed and was still living there in 1943 but not in 1942. So she lived there for 34 years.

The directories sometimes list the profession of the person, too, listing Bernice as the head librarian at the Schenectady Public Library.

So our mystery was solved!

We also asked the helpful librarian, Marietta Carr, to see if there was a family folder for Hodges. Yes, and there was an obit telling of Bernice’s passing in 1978.

The Grems Doolittle Library has great resources for us to use – street maps from the 1880’s with some listing the actual owners of the houses, and family folders with genealogies, obits, newspaper articles and so much more.

SCHS is located at 32 Washington Avenue and the entrance is down the driveway and in the back door.

Hours are Mon. 1-5; Tues.- Fri. 10-5 and Sat. 10-2pm. Call 518 374-0263 to make an appointment for library research and for more information. Yearly membership is $35 and gives you limitless research. If not a member, $8 is charged for each library visit.

Happy Researching!