101 Fun Facts to Love about Lewis County, NY & The Tug Hill Region

101 Fun Facts to Love about Lewis County & The Tug Hill Region, NY

1. Lewis County was established in 1805 from sections of Oneida County. 

2. The best guess on the origin of the name for the Tug Hill region is that “Tug Hill” was a frequently used name in the 19th century for many areas reached by horses or oxen, “tugging” a wagon up a long road to a high location. H.E. Krueger, in his article “The Lesser Wilderness – Tug Hill” in a 1966-1967 article in The Conservationist, speculated that Tug Hill was named by two early settlers, Isaac Perry and Mr. Buell when traveling up the hill west of Turin.

3. Lewis County, New York, has 1,276.3 square miles of land, while Rhode Island has 1,033.6 square miles. (The LC is 242.7 square miles bigger than RI!)

4. Tug Hill is larger than the state of Delaware, with 2100 square miles vs. Delaware’s 1948 square miles.

5. Lewis County is named after Morgan Lewis, the 3rd Governor of New York, who signed the Declaration of Independence and fought in both the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812.

6. The county seat is Lowville. The town is named after Nicholas Low, an early landowner, wealthy merchant, and developer. (Despite popular folk etymology, the name ‘Lowville’ has nothing to do with its low elevation or the “lowing” cattle of the many nearby dairy farms.)

7. 164,865 acres of Lewis County are within the blue line of the Adirondacks, the largest park in the contiguous United States. It covers 6 million acres and takes up one-fifth of New York State. It’s almost as big as Vermont and more than double the size of Yellowstone and Yosemite National Parks combined.

8. The Lewis County Fair, which dates to 1820, is the first free and one of the oldest continuously running fairs in New York.

9. Archeological evidence suggests that humans have lived in Lewis County for at least 13,000 years.

10. Harrisville in Lewis County takes its name from Foskit Harris, who settled there in 1833. Harris constructed a sawmill and gristmill, harnessing the West Branch of the Oswegatchie River for power to operate the mills.

11. More than 200,000 maple trees are tapped each spring, making Lewis County one of New York’s leading maple syrup producers.

12. The population density of Lewis County is 21 inhabitants per square mile, while the population density of Manhattan is 72,918 inhabitants per square mile.

13. An antique Bible from the 1500s is housed in the Mennonite Heritage Farm Museum.

14. Franklin Benjamin Hough, born in Lewis County in 1822, was an American scientist and historian. He was the first chief of the United States Division of Forestry (the predecessor of the United States Forest Service) and among the first to call attention to the depletion of forests in the U.S. and he is sometimes called the “father of American forestry.”

15. There are ten Historical Museums located in Lewis County.

16. There are eight traffic lights in Lewis County. (And two caution lights!)

17. There are 23 churches in Lewis County.

18. There are 18 bars and taverns in Lewis County.

19. Approximately 10,000 years ago, during the last Ice Age, glaciers covered Lewis County, carving out many of its lakes, valleys, and distinctive landforms. The glaciers may have been almost two thousand feet thick.

20. Constable Hall in Lewis County is believed to be the inspiration for the classic poem T’was the Night Before Christmas. Poet Clement Moore often visited his widowed cousin Mary Eliza Constable and her five children during the Christmas Holidays.

21. As of the 2020 census, the population of Lewis County is approximately 26,500 people.

22. Walter Hunt, an inventor from Lewis County, is credited with inventing the safety pin and an early sewing machine.

23. Whetstone Gulf State Park in Lewis County is built in and around a three-mile-long gorge cut into the eastern edge of the Tug Hill Plateau. The gorge is one of the most spectacular scenic vistas east of the Rocky Mountains and is called the Grand Canyon of the East.

24. The town of Diana is named after the Roman goddess of the hunt and the moon. It was established in 1830 from part of the town of Watson.

25. Hough’s Caves, in Lewis County, was an important spot on the Underground Railroad. Local abolitionists hid escaping slaves seeking freedom in Canada at this location before being ferried across the St. Lawrence River.

26. In 2015, Copenhagen in Lewis County was the snowiest place in America, with 21 feet of snowfall recorded.

27. The snowmobile trail system brings significant winter tourism dollars to the county. In Lewis County, snowmobile visitors raise nearly a half million in tax dollars annually.

28. The Maple Ridge Wind Farm in Lewis County is one of the largest in the eastern U.S.

29. Florence Augusta Merriam Bailey was an American ornithologist and nature writer. She was born in Locust Grove, New York. Between 1890 and 1939, she published a series of field guides on North American bird life. These guides were often written with amateur birdwatchers in mind, leading to the popularity of the birding movement.

30. The famous Lewis County delicacy, Croghan Bologna, has been made in the village of Croghan since 1888.

31. Approximately 35,254 snowmobile riders visit the Tug Hill Trails each year.

32. In 1815, Joseph Bonaparte, the elder brother of Napoleon I and former King of Spain, purchased a tract of land from James LeRay. Part of it became the town of Diana in Lewis County.

33. The highest point in Lewis County is Gomer Hill, a 2,115-foot-tall mountain in Turin.

34. Lewis County, NY, has 35 spots identified as the National Register of Historic Places.

35. Franklin Benjamin Hough, born in Martinsburg in 1822, discovered a mineral that would bear his name, Houghite, a local variety of hydrotalcite. 

36. There are 7 Lewis Counties in the United States. New York, Idaho, Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee, Washington, and West Virginia all have a Lewis County within their borders. There is also a Lewis & Clark County in Montana and a St. Louis County in Missouri.

37. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” In 1807, the inhabitants of Mungers Mills in Lewis County, to indicate their resentment against the British and sympathy for the citizens of the defenseless city of Copenhagen, Denmark, then under siege by the British, elected to change the name of their bustling little community to Copenhagen.

38. Kings Falls, in the Town of Denmark, is named after ex-King Joseph Bonaparte’s affection for the beautiful setting of the 40-foot cascade on the Deer River.

39. Montague is the second smallest town in the state by population, with 78 residents.

40. On April 18, 1966, the village of Copenhagen, NY, was honored by a visit from the Lord Mayor, Urban Hansen, mayor of Copenhagen, Denmark.

41. The names of the Black River, the Black Creek, and Oswegatchie (“The place of the black waters” in the local Native American language) may stem from the natural tannic acid from the hemlock trees that darken the water in many places.

42. Though more than 50 miles from Lake Ontario and 225 miles from the Atlantic Ocean, Port Leyden was named because it was an essential stop for shipping on the Black River Canal.

43. The village of Osceola was named after the great Native American Seminole Warrior Osceola.

44. Lyons Falls, originally known as High Falls, became known as Lyon (later Lyons) Falls in Honor of the Caleb Lyon family.

45. An unusual three-way bridge was built in Lyons Falls to span the confluence of the Moose and Black Rivers. It was featured in Ripley’s Believe It or Not. Later, in the early 1960s, it was replaced by two separate bridges.

46. The state legislature named the town of Pickney to honor the Revolutionary War general and statesman Thomas Pinckney of South Carolina.

47. Croghan is home to the International Maple Museum and Hall of Fame in Lewis County.

48. Matthew Bush, of Croghan, NY, is a top-ranked US ax-man and team captain of the US National Ax Team, has held world titles in many Lumberjack Championships, and is the only American ever to win ESPN’s Great Outdoor Games Endurance Event.

49. Lewis County is home to a beloved cryptid, the monster Lyonesse, who lives in the Black River in Lyons Falls.

50. There are more cows than people. Lewis County has almost two cows per person – with an estimated cattle and calf population of 51,000 bovines.

51. The average price of an owner-occupied home in Lewis County is $146,000.

52. The average median household income in Lewis County is $64,401.

53. The annual per capita income of Lewis County is $31,127 per resident.

54. The average age of someone who lives in Lewis County is 42.

55. There were 1,122 farmers on 625 farms counted in Lewis County during the 2017 Agriculture Census.

56. $113,927,00 in milk sales came from Lewis County in 2017.

57. 182,000 acres are used as farmland in Lewis County.

58. There are 36 State Forests in Lewis County

59. In 1877, Copenhagen resident Joseph Butlin came upon a mammoth tusk lodged five feet amid a swampy muck in Lewis County, proving that this large prehistoric animal once walked the land.

60. Mary Montague Pierrepont, the daughter of a former landowner in Lewis County, inspired the town’s name. It was created from the larger township of West Turin in 1850.

61. Bodies of freshwater cover fifteen square miles of Lewis County.

62. The Town of Greig was initially named “Brantingham” after Philadelphia merchant Thomas Hopper Brantingham. Unfortunately, Brantingham turned out to be a bit of a scoundrel; he defaulted on the purchase price for the Tract, wound up in prison, and, after litigation with Alexander Hamilton, ended up having his interests foreclosed and title lost. The town elders decided to have its name changed from Brantingham to Greig. It was renamed in honor of John Greig, a lawyer in the Finger Lakes region of New York who ultimately ended up with title to substantial holdings in the northern part of the original Brantingham Tract.

63. In 1800, part of the township of Mexico and part of Oneida County became a new township, Turin. The township stretched from the Black River to Tug Hill and included, at that time, the townships of Turin, West Turin, Lewis, Highmarket, Osceola, Montague, and Martinsburg.

64. The Town of Turin It took its name from Turin, the famous and beautiful capital city of the Kingdom of Sardinia (now part of Italy).

65. Benjamin Doud settled in Turin in 1797. His great-granddaughter was Mame Doud Eisenhower, wife of President Eisenhower.

66. St. Stephen’s in Croghan, NY, was once a thriving religious institution with a school, a convent for nuns, and a monastery where members of the Franciscan order of Friars Minor received training. Fr. Leo Heinrichs, who was declared a “Servant of God” by the Roman Catholic church due to his martyrdom in Colorado, served as pastor of St. Stephens in the early 1900s.

67. 42% of Lewis County is under forest preservation by the state of New York. That includes easements and all State Forests, Preserves, Wilderness areas, Wildlife Management Areas, and boat launches.

68. The Black River Canal was built in 1828 to connect the Erie Canal to the Black River. Along its 35-mile length, the canal had 109 locks, connecting Boonville to Carthage through Lewis County. Several of the canal’s former locks remain visible along New York State Route 12 near Port Leyden.

69. With over 650 employees, Lewis County General Hospital is the largest employer in Lewis County.

70. Clinton Hart Merriam, born in 1855, was an American zoologist, naturalist, and physician. He was commonly known as the “father of mammalogy,” a branch of zoology referring to the study of mammals. Although Merriam was born in New York City, his family home and place of boyhood was “Locust Grove,” a homestead in Lewis County, New York.

71. A small stone marker marks the intersection of Lewis, Jefferson, and St. Lawrence County at 16 Byrns Rd, Gouverneur, NY 13642.

72. Lewis County has approximately the same population as the small city of Elmira, NY, while there are 5.5 times as many inhabitants within Syracuse’s city limits as all of Lewis County.

73. Nine native species of frog and one native species of toad live in Lewis County, NY.

74. Theodore B. Basselin was an American lumber magnate from Croghan, New York, best remembered for an endowed scholarship he created at the Theological College of the Catholic University of America. The Basselin scholarship has funded the philosophical education of many notable American churchmen. He served on the Forest Commission for six years. During his tenure, significant progress was made in forest fire prevention, protecting state lands, and establishing the Adirondack Park.

75. Lewis County owns approximately 4,200 acres of land and maintains 44 miles of multi-use trails.

76. Lewis Co is home to Singing Waters Park, which is 105.7 acres and features waterfalls, hiking trails, day-use areas, and ten tent campsites.

77. The sedimentary rocks of Lewis County contain fossils from the Ordovician Age, which was 485 to 444 million years ago. At this time, trilobites roamed the sea that covered most of North America. 

78. Lowville Academy, founded in 1808, is one of the oldest and longest continually operating schools in New York State.

79. Lewis County is home to eight snake and three turtle species.

80. Lewis County is home to 9 species of bats.

81. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory child actor Peter Ostrum (born November 1957) settled in Lewis County to practice veterinary medicine.

82. The Blizzard of ’77 saw well over 100 inches of snow, a wind chill factor that ranged from -35 to -47 degrees, 30-foot-high drifts, and 53-mile-and-hour wind gusts. Scores of communities were isolated and cut off by blocked roads and travel bans, and Lewis County was under a state of emergency declaration.

83. The most haunted location in Lewis County is thought to be Martinsburg’s Greystone Manor, whose paranormal activity was investigated by Syracuse’s Central New York Ghost Hunters.

84. Throughout Lewis County’s fields and forests, you can see large boulders known as glacial erratics scattered across the region today. These large stones were left behind as glaciers retreated from our area 10,000 years ago.

85. On a night in 1954, after a night of drinking to drown her sorrows, Anna Joan Machowski was decapitated in a fatal car crash in the town of Montague. Since then, it is said that her spirit has walked along Sears Pond Road on moonless nights, looking for her missing head. Lewis County locals call her Tug Hill Anne.

86. Sarah E. Simonet, the first woman graduate of Albany College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, was born in 1854 in Schoharie County, New York; she was the daughter of Irish immigrants and lived in Croghan, NY, in Lewis County. She and her husband owned a general store, and not long after Sarah’s graduation, they added a pharmacy. Two years later, she graduated from the University of Buffalo as a physician. Simonet went on to open offices in Croghan and Utica and was held in high esteem by Croghan, which now has a historical marker that stands in her honor. She combined the practice of pharmacy with the practice of medicine. She was dedicated entirely to caring for a medically underserved population.

87. Eastern Lewis County is part of the Adirondack Mountains, one of the oldest mountain ranges in the world. Its rocks date back over a billion years.

88. About 2,500 white-tailed deer are harvested in Lewis County yearly, or about one deer per county resident.

89. Castorland means “Land of the Beaver.” It was established in 1792 to provide a new home for refugees fleeing the violence of the French Revolution. Ironically, Giardiasis, or “beaver fever,” in addition to the harsh winters, killed or drove away many of the fleeing aristocrats seeking asylum.

90. In 1862, William Appleton Jr. stumbled across the Journal of Castorland in a Paris bookstand while visiting France. It was the only remaining copy of the detailed record kept by two Frenchmen, Simon Desjardins and Peter Pharoux, of the exploration and failed settlement of this part of Lewis County by French aristocrats. This history would otherwise have been lost to the passage of time.

91. In 2024, Lewis County was in the path of totality during a total solar eclipse. The next time an eclipse occurs in Lewis County will be in 2079.

92. There are 31 man-made dams on Lewis County Rivers. Eighteen are for hydroelectric production, and the rest are for water supply, recreation, or other purposes.

93. There are over 100 named waterfalls, both natural and man-made, in Lewis County, NY. (*see “Bobbies Waterfalls.com”)

94. Lewis County has eight peaks over 1000 feet in height.

95. On Sept. 21, 2013, Philadelphia Cream Cheese broke the GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS achievement for creating the World’s Largest Cheesecake. The cake was unveiled at Lowville, N.Y.’s 9th Annual Cream Cheese Festival. However, after losing this title to a Russian company’s larger cheesecake in 2017, Lowville unveiled an even larger, world record-claiming cheesecake on September 20, 2024, solidifying Lewis County’s dominance in cheese-making abilities.

96. Tug Hill is not exactly a hill or a plateau. It is a cuesta (an asymmetric ridge with a gentle slope on one side and a steep slope on the other) because it is composed of sedimentary rocks that tip up on one side.

97. The Tug Hill town of Montague in Lewis County recorded the unofficial New York State 24-hour snowfall record of 77 inches (6.4 ft; 2.0 m) in January 1997.

98. Hooker (a hamlet n the town of Montague) holds the state record for snowfall in a single season after accumulating 466.9 inches (38.91 ft; 11.86 m) of snow during the winter of 1976–1977.

99. General Walter Martin, born in Sturbridge, Massachusetts, in 1764, was the founder of Martinsburg, New York. He established the village in 1803 on an 8,000-acre tract he had purchased in Oneida County in northern New York. In 1805, when Lewis County was formed from part of Oneida County, Martin influenced the selection of Martinsburg as the county seat by donating land and money for a courthouse. Martin constructed Greystone Manor, a large stone mansion in Martinsburg.

100. New York State law defines the greater Tug Hill region as encompassing 41 towns in four counties, with a total area of approximately 2,100 square miles.

101. The term “North Country” as a description of our area became popularized in a 1900 novel by Irving Bacheller Eben Holden: A Tale of the North Country. It was a successful book at the time of its release, among the top 10 bestselling books in the United States in both 1900 and 1901, with over a million copies sold. The book is set in the North Country region of New York.