Nature Trail Signs: We Need Your Help!

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These signs will bear words from men and women of European, Native, and African descent, all associated with the 1816 Meetinghouse.

We need to your help to choose which words to put on these signs. Here are twenty quotations, five each in four categories of people associated with the 1816 Meetinghouse: Quakers, African Americans (abolitionism and the Underground Railroad), women’s rights activists, and Seneca people. To vote, please select one quote from each category that you feel is the most fitting. The two quotes with the most answers from each category will be used on the trail. Please feel free to share this survey so that we might get as much feedback as possible.

Quakers *

“This town [Farmington] is inhabited by Friends, noted, like all that sect, for their honesty, industry, and neatness.” -John Barber and Henry Howe, Historical Collections of the State of New York (1842)

“It is not for a single generation alone, numbering three millions--sublime as would be that effort--that we are working. It is for HUMANITY, the wide world over, not only now, but for all coming time, and all future generations.” -J.C. Hathaway, Farmington Friend, Preface to William Wells Brown, Narrative of William W. Brown, A Fugitive Slave (1847).

“When this [rational] spirit shall universally prevail among men, there will be no more wars, no more slavery, no more injustice. Then will be held the jubilee of the human race; and every thing that hath breath shall praise the name of the Lord.” -William Lloyd Garrison to Thomas M'Clintock, May 1, 1840, McClintock-Neeley Collection, Women's Rights National Historical Park.

“They never seemed to ask, What will the world say? But walked straight forward in what seemed to them the line of duty, please or offend whomsoever it might." - Frederick Douglass, The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, reprinted from the 1892 ed. (New York: Macmillan, 1962), 229."The true basis of religious fellowship is not identity of theological belief, but unity of heart and oneness of purpose in respect to the great practical duties of life." [Thomas M’Clintock], Basis of Religious Association. Adopted by the Conference Held at Farmington, in the State of New York, on the Sixth and Seventh of Tenth Month, 1848 in Proceedings of the Yearly Meeting of Congregational Friends (Auburn, New York: Henry Oliphant, 1850).

"The true basis of religious fellowship is not identity of theological belief, but unity of heart and oneness of purpose in respect to the great practical duties of life." [Thomas M’Clintock], Basis of Religious Association. Adopted by the Conference Held at Farmington, in the State of New York, on the Sixth and Seventh of Tenth Month, 1848 in Proceedings of the Yearly Meeting of Congregational Friends (Auburn, New York: Henry Oliphant, 1850).

Native Americans

"We the women of our race, feel troubled with deep anxiety, for our children, who are in our hands . . . We are astonished to hear that the Tonawanda Reservation, we have to give up . . . We the women of the Tonawanda have exerted our influence, in trying to have our Chiefs to be united in their mind in their councils & they have done so, --not one of our Chiefs here, have signed the Treaty." - Minerva Black Smith and others to President John Tyler, Tonawanda, March 14, 1842, Post Family Papers, University of Rochester.

“Brothers, we want the President to know that we are for peace, and that we ask only the possession of our rights. True, we are small in number, but we only ask for justice. We want to be allowed to live on our land in peace. We love Tonawanda. We have no wish to leave it. It is the residue of the land of our fathers. Here we wish to lay our bones in peace.” - Tonawanda leaders, petition read at Farmington, The Case of the Seneca Indians, in the State of New York, Illustrated by Facts (Philadelphia, 1840).

“Our fathers and your fathers met long ago, and the friendship that was formed then has lasted long, and we believe we have now no true friends but the religious Society of Friends.” - Samuel Gordon, Seneca Chief, remarks at Council held in 1816 Farmington Meetinghouse, June 1840

“When your army entered the Country of the Six Nations, we called you the town destroyer. . . When you gave us peace, we called you Father because you then promised to secure to us the possession of our Lands. Do this and so long as the land shall remain that beloved name will live in the heart of every Seneca. . . Are you determined to crush us?” - Cornplanter, Seneca Chief, to George Washington, c. 1790, copied in a letter from Quaker Charles Marriott, February 13, 1840.

“Friends & Brothers! We are thankful that it is the will of the Great Spirit that we have met here at this time. . . we have always had full confidence in your integrity, and that you would endeavor to assist us. - Seneca White, Seneca Chief, Farmington, June 1840.

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African Americans *

"O what use is preching [sic] & all this pretended or blind devotion, so long as this horable [sic] business of traffic in the bodies of men, women & children is sanctioned & actually carried on by those making the highest pretentions to goodness.” - Daniel Anthony to Susan B. Anthony, June 4, 1848, Susan B. Anthony Papers, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe.

“When I arrived there [at Otis and Amy Comstock’s home in Farmington] I was about twenty-two years of age, and felt for the first time in my life, that I was my own master. I cannot describe to a free man, what a proud manly feeling came over me when I hired to Mr. C. and made my first bargain, nor when I assumed the dignity of collecting my own earnings. . . Hope, - cheering and bright, was now mine, and it lighted up the future and gave me patience to persevere.” - Austin Steward, Twenty-two Years a Slave, and Forty Years a Freeman (Rochester, 1857).

“The Liberty Party cannot consent to fall below, nor, in any degree, to qualify, its great central principle, that all persons - black and white, male and female - have equal political rights, and are equally entitled to the protection and advantages of Civil Government.” - “National Liberty Party,” 1852, which nominated Farmington Quaker William R. Smith for Governor of New York State, Gerrit Smith Broadside and Pamphlet Collection, Syracuse University.¬

Selby Howard /Died February 18, 1885 /aged 83y, 10m, 23d / husband of Harriet / Born a slave / Lived a freeman / Died in the Lord - Gravestone, Farmington Friends Cemetery.

“First Day, August 13, 1848. This afternoon attended an Abolition meeting at the meeting house. It was a spirited one. It was addressed by Frederick Douglas, M.R. Delainey Glen and John Whitrool. Frederick and Deiny wanted all of those that voted to vote for Van Buran as the best thing that they could do to stop the extension of slavery.” - Welcome Herendeen, Farmington Quaker, Journal, August 1848.

Women's Rights *

“Men and women shall stand on the same footing in all matters in which they are equally concerned, . . . and the words the ultimate judgment to be in the mens [sic] meeting, be erased---."- Genesee Yearly Meeting Minutes, June 11, 1838. Adopted 1842.

“Men’s and women’s meetings stand on the equal footing of common interest and common right.” - Genesee Yearly Meeting of Friends, Discipline, 1842.

"Right is of no Sex--Truth is of no Color--God is the Father of us all, and we are all Brethren." - Frederick Douglass, Masthead, North Star.

“Wherever we turn the history of woman is sad and drear and dark, without any alleviating circumstances. As the nations of the earth emerge from a state of barbarism, the sphere of woman gradually becomes wider but not even under what is thought to be the full blaze of the sun of civilization is it what God designed it to be.” - Elizabeth Cady Stanton, speech at Farmington Meetinghouse, October 6, 1848.

“All men and women are created equal; they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights among; among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” - Declaration of Sentiments, Seneca Falls Woman’s Rights Convention, 1848. Signed by more more than two dozen Quakers affiliated with Farmington

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