Excerpt from Spafford Onondaga County, New York The town of Spafford, one of the most picturesque in the County of Onondaga, is about ten miles in length from north to south, and about four miles in width from east to west. Its surface consists of high ridge land bounded on the west by Skaneateles Lake, and on the east by Otisco Lake and Valley, descending abruptly on either side to these lakes and valley, and gradually declining northerly from the summit at Ripley Hill, situate near the southern boundary of the town between this and the town of Scott, Cortland County. Ripley Hill is 1,122 feet above Skaneateles Lake, and 1,982 feet above tide water; and from it can be seen in fair weather, not only lands in the towns of Skaneateles and Marcellus, which bound the town on the north, but the surrounding country for twenty to thirty miles distant. Cold Brook, which flows to the south through a beautiful valley bearing its name, and the Inlet to Otisco Lake, are the principal streams; but beyond the fact of their perennial character, and that they mark the course of two deep and beautiful valleys, they are not worthy of mention. The soil is a sandy gravelly loam, and in early times was covered by a dense growth of maple, beech and linden trees on the uplands, interspersed with hickory, chestnut, pine and hemlock trees in the deep valleys, and especially along the eastern border of Skaneateles Lake. Spafford boasts of no valuable mineral products within its borders, yet there is a weak spring of salt water, and indications of the presence of natural gas along the western shore of Otisco Lake. A spring of sulphur water exists near Borodino on the eastern shore of Skaneateles Lake, and an outcropping of the Hamilton group of limestone appears at different places in the southern portion of the town. None of these natural products, however, have been developed or turned into practical use. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

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