Merrillsville Post Office

Adirondack Daily Enterprise, June 12, 2004

Merrillsville Post Office

Franklin Falls may have been the earliest settlement in the town of Franklin, founded in about 1827, but Merrillsville was settled a couple of years later and boasted the earliest United States Post Office in Franklin Township, which was established on July 29, 1837.

In 1831, a 24 year-old man by the name of John Robertson Merrill came over from Vermont with a group of friends and built the Merrill Inn, which still stands today in pretty much its original condition. The inn was the site of that early post office, and of course, Merrill was named postmaster. . . .

This list of Post Offices, transcribed by Teresa R. Eshelman from information from the National Archives, is given in Volume IV (1991) of the Town of Franklin journal, "They Told Me So."

John R. Merrill	Postmaster	July 29, 1837
Discontinued		December 29, 1843
Reestablished		March 26, 1844
Jeremiah D. Merrill	Postmaster	January 4, 1855
Apollos A. Smith	Postmaster	June 18, 1858
Name changed to Hunters' Home		June 18, 1858
Name changed back to Merrillsville		between 1858 and 1861
John Merrill	Postmaster,	July 5, 1861
Charles B. Lyman	Postmaster	December 20, 1864
Wm. W. Merrill	Postmaster	May 24, 1867
William J. Ayres	Postmaster	December 16, 1868
James W. Littlejohn	Postmaster	June 17, 1869
Ferd W. Chase	Postmaster	April 4, 1881
Name changed to Loon Lake		February 16, 1882