I confess I did not take advantage of any 4th of July happenings in the Mohawk Valley. In my defense, I worked Saturday and Monday, and we had a few things to take care of on Sunday. Ah, but what excuse can there be for a veteran like me? I did not even watch my DVD of 1776 (too long), and I lay in bed on the night of the fourth hoping whoever was shooting firecrackers would finish soon, because the noise was bothering my dog.
We did go for a very pleasant walk earlier and explored a spot we have walked by many times but never looked at closely: Herkimer Reformed Church, located at the Historic Four Corners.
The church is a beautiful stone building, surrounded by an iron fence. In between the church and the fence are some very old gravestones. Steven suggested we take a closer look at the grave stones. The gate was open, so we walked in.
Time and weather have worn away the words on most of the stones. We made out a few dates from the seventeen and eighteen hundreds. I could read part of one for the wife of Conrad Folts. No doubt an occupant or relation to occupants of the Folts Home, now a nursing home (and perhaps the subject of another blog post). Many of the graves had markers with a star and a flag, showing that a veteran was laid to rest there. I felt that was a good thing to observe on Independence Day.
A plaque on the church itself informed us that the church was founded in 1723. Later I checked their website and learned that the stone building was built in 1834, after the second building to house the church burned down.
So that is what I did on the 4th of July. I explored an historic church on the Historic Four Corners, and paid my respects to the graves of several veterans.
For more information on Herkimer Reformed Church, visit their website: http://churches.rca.org/herkimer/index.htm, or you can find them on Facebook.
Mohawk Valley Girl 