Collis Potter Huntington - Vol. 1

BY THE TIME the young traveling salesman had reached his majority in 1842, he had accumulated sufficient funds to enter into a partnership with his brother Solon in Oneonta, New York. Solon had come to Oneonta with his bride in 1840, and opened a store of general merchandise in a stone building that had been occupied for many years by the Mendel Brothers. The firm of Huntington Brothers was enterprising and prospered rapidly. In addition to the store the two men were engaged in various manufacturing enterprises, while Solon became also an extensive land owner.

Oneonta was a post office and township located on the Susquehanna River in Otsego County, New York, about seventy-five miles W.S.W. of Albany. The Act creating the township was passed by the state legislature at Albany, April 17, 1830. The township was formed by taking a portion of each of the townships of Milford, Otego, Huntsville and Davenport. In 1840, the population numbered 1,936 inhabitants and the village contained schools, three or four churches, numerous stores, and several factories, foundries, and mills. It was incorporated as a village after an election on the fourteenth of October 1848, ordered by the county judge, James Hyde, upon application by some of the leading citizens among whose names was that of Collis P. Huntington.¹

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