Canton’s history is
mostly unwritten
The public archives hold only 3 old photos of Canton. The rest are in attics, shoeboxes and the historical society. Help start the collection.
The story
from WikipediaRead it all ↗Humans have been present in this region of New York since the Paleo-Indian period which is from about 15,000 to 7,000 BC. Iroquoian peoples arrived between 1,200 and 4,000 years ago, and both the Mohawk and the Oneida consider the Adirondacks to be part of their territory. When white settlers began to arrive, the area was part of the Mohawk Nation, which was part of the Iroquois Confederacy. The Mohawks are known as Kanienkehaka, or "the people of the flint," and they were considered the keepers of the Eastern door for this edge of Haudenosaunee territory. The first settler arrived in 1800. The town was organized/incorporated on May 14, 1805, from part of the town of Lisbon. The name Canton was supposedly selected due to contemporary interests in the China trade. Canton was one of the original ten towns of the county. In 1845, the community of Canton was incorporated as a village with …
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Timeline
built from the dates on the items belowStart Canton’s collection
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Canton’s history is told.
2 of 10 decades since 1900 have photos 🔁Retake an old viewSt. Lawrence University, 1908: stand where they stood+15 📦Share a family photoSign in to add one+10Famous people from Canton
See all 11 →
Canton, decade by decade
1990s
Nothing in Canton is on the National Register yet
That’s true of most small towns. It doesn’t mean Canton has no history, only that no one has written up a nomination. The closest listed place is Village Park Historic District (Boundary Increase II) in Canton, 0.1 miles away.
Canton and the nearest listed places
Closest to Canton
How a place gets listed
Then & now
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as St. Lawrence University (1908) and it appears here side by side.
🔁 Retake this view · +15Stories next door
nearby towns’ historyFrom the Library of Congress (3) and the National Register (1). Images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.