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New York - Elmira Elmira (860 alt.,30,940 pop.), on both sides of the Chemung (Ind., big horn) River, occupies a broad, flat valley fringed by wooded hills. The north bank of the river is bordered by business structures; the principal business section extends along Water Street, which is too narrow for the congested pedestrian and automobile traffic of Saturday nights. Most of the buildings are three-story brick; a few select shops cater to the wealthy residents of Strathmont Park in western Elmira. In the older residential district, west of Main Street, stand the turreted mansions of the last century. The first white men to enter the region were the soldiers of the SullivanClinton Expedition of 1779. At the mouth of Newtown Creek, beside the Chemung River, was the Seneca Indian village of Kanaweola, destroyed during the Battle of Newtown. Most of the early settlers were emigrants from Wyoming and Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. In 1789 a famine struck he valley as a result of a frost that killed all the wheat. The only deaths that occurred resulted not from starvation but from overeating when food was finally obtained. By 1793 the community had developed sufficiently to support a Masonic lodge, one of the earliest in western New York. The Chemung Canal, connecting Seneca Lake with the Chemung River in 1832, stimulated the lumbering industry; and large amounts of timber moved through the village. The present name was adopted in 1828. According to local tradition, Nathan Teall, one of the early settlers, had a daughter named Elmira, for whom her mother often called in a shrill, far-reaching voice. When it was decided to adopt a new name, several people suggested the one they had heard so often when Elmira was a child. The Erie Railroad reached Elmira in 1849 and opened new fields for business activity. Woolen and lumber mills grew rapidly. In 1854 the Junction Canal was built to connect the Chemung Canal with the North Branch of the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania. The metal industries had their inception in 1860 with the incorporation of the Elmira Rolling Mills. By the time a second and third mill were completed, 20 furnaces, eight engines, five trains of rolls, two roll lathes, and one Burden squeezer turned out 22,000 tons of iron annually. During the Civil War, when the Union Army barracks in Elmira required large amounts of supplies, the Woolen Manufacturing Company turned out 16,000 yards of cloth for uniforms. In 1864, the year the town received a city charter, one of the barracks was turned into a prison camp. On July 6, 1864, the first detachment of prisoners arrived, and local merchants made profitable contracts for food. During the nineteenth century the dairying industry in the vicinity grew in importance, and butter and cheese were shipped in large quantities from Elmira. In 1882 Abner Wright of Wellsburg, a neighboring village, first shipped raw milk to the New York City market in felt-jacketed milk cans surrounded by ice. In 1893 he and his associates organized the Chemung Valley Condensing Company and gave new impetus to the local dairy industry. Superior transportation facilities have made Elmira a manufacturing center. The largest industry is the Precision Tool Company, a subsidiary of the Remington Rand Corporation, which was established in Elmira in 1935. Other industrial products are fabricated structural steel, fire-fighting apparatus and chemicals, Bendix drives, glass bottles, silk goods, knit goods, and wood pipe and trim. American-La France Fire Engine Factory, Elmira, New York Art Print Buy at AllPosters.com Casino, Eldridge Park, Elmira, New York Framed Art Print Buy at AllPosters.com Lake Street, Elmira, New York Pre-Matted Print Buy at AllPosters.com