—Part ONE —
Until Robert Maloney’s 1989 history, “A Backward Look at 6th and 7th Lakes,” local histories of the Fulton Chain region had mostly concentrated on the growth and development of the more populated First through Fourth Lakes of the chain. Though my primary subject is the popular hotel that existed on the north shore of Seventh Lake, I wanted to also supplement Mr. Maloney’s information with additional early history about Seventh Lake itself. Newspaper articles cited are mostly from the on-line archives of www.fultonhistory.com and www.nnyln.net.
While millions of acres of Adirondack lands were patented (Macomb Purchase, Totten & Crossfield Patent, Angerstein/John Brown Tract, etc. ) and sold for the speculative purposes of industry, settlement and/or transportation by 1800, it was not until 1820 that the Moose River Tract was surveyed and mapped by Samuel B. Richardson. Another twenty years (1844) would pass before this Tract was patented to Marshall S. Shedd, Jr. and Farrand N. Benedict.
In 1846, Benedict submitted a report and maps to the New York legislature (Senate Document 73, 1846) demonstrating that a combination 190-mile plank road, railroad, steamer and canal project could connect Port Kent on Lake Champlain to Boonville on the Black River Canal.
Two years later (1848), the Sacketts Harbor and Saratoga Railroad was chartered and its directors accepted Benedict’s data for their planned route, part of which passed through the Eckford Chain, Raquette Lake and the Fulton Chain in the western Adirondacks.1
To summarize subsequent history, the owners (Farrand Benedict, Marshall Shedd, Permelia Munn and her heirs) of Seventh Lake’s private lands, Moose River Tract, Township 3, from 1844 to 1889 were absentee landlords waiting for a return on their investment. This could only come with the access that the building of the railroad originating in Saratoga would provide them. Until this happened, logging and other development plans were stalled. But that railroad would extend no farther than just beyond North Creek. Only loggers who developed skidding roads near rivers (declared by the State as “public highways for floating logs”) made headways into the North Woods.
Then Dr. Webb built his railroad through the Fulton Chain region, reaching Thendara (then named “Fulton Chain Station”) in July 1892, extending to the region northward in October that year.