A Metaphor for Change

A Metaphor for Change. The Canalway Trail. Lock 52 in Port Byron was a busy place prior to 1917. In the vicinity of the lock, you would have seen a bustling waterfront, with dozens of boats locking up or down the canal. At Tanner's Dry Dock, just up the canal from the lock, canal boats were being built and repaired. Lodgers would be dining at the Erie House near the Dry Docks and captains would be picking up orders from the Lock 52 Grocery. The canal transformed Port Byron from a hamlet into a prosperous village with factories, mills, hotels and restaurants. , The opening of the Auburn branch of the New York Central Railroad in 1841, stimulated growth of other villages at Port Byron's expense. The decline accelerated when the old canal closed in 1918, but competition from automobiles and trucks gave cities like Auburn and Syracuse an overwhelming advantage. Today, Port Byron is a residential community - one with a famous past, and a role call of personalities who helped to build our nation. , Brigham Young in Port Byron. Brigham Young, the future leader of the Mormon Church, lived here in Port Byron for several years in the 1820s. He made his living painting furniture and canal boats, carding wool, and doing carpentry. In 1824, he married Miriam Works and in 1825, they had a daughter. Brigham and Miriam moved to Mendon in 1829, but the house where they lived in Port Byron still stands today on South Street. , Young was only just beginning his life; he would eventually build on the foundation begun by Joseph Smith and his Book of Mormon, and establish a commonwealth in the Utah desert where his followers could live in peace. By the time he died in 1877, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, which he helped to found, had become a uniquely American religion. , The development of the Mormon Church was part of a broad religious movement known as the Second Great Awakening that was centered in western New York. It sought to redefine religion and spirituality to the new merchantile and industrial America that was taking shape (in large part) because of the Erie Canal. While liberal Protestantism was invigorated by the integration of social concerns, new evangelicalisms like Mormonism also flourished. , [photos] Brigham Young in a photo from the late 1850s after he had become leader of the Mormon Church. Brigham Young rented this house in 1825 after his first child was born. Built in 1818, it stands today on the corner of Pine and South Streets. Young worked at the Park Pail factory as a painted in 1824. By 1829, the building had been converted to Hayden's Woolen Mills. Images: left : Library of Congress; center and right, courtesy of Penny Helzer.