George Skiff

By Rev. William B. Lusk, Courtesy of Ruth Gould Hoyt

George G. Skiff 

Born: ~June 1840, a son of David C. Skiff and Hannah of St. Armand

Died: May 14, 1902 age 62 years, buried in Brookside Cemetery GAR marker Co. D 96 Reg. N. Y. Vol.

Married: Almira E. (July 1848 - 1904)

Children: Cora A. Skiff born ~1866, James A. Skiff b ~1868, Jimmy? On August 8, 1884, a young man named Jimmy Skiff was one of the guides photographed by A. W. Durkee at Paul Smith's boathouse.

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Memories of the Early Days of St. Regis Presbyterian Church

By Rev. William B. Lusk, Courtesy of Ruth Gould Hoyt

 

Since my coming to Paul Smith, in Spring of '97. I held services for the guides every Sunday in the Keese Mill school house. It was surprising that so many well known guides and people of the settlement, not noted for their interest in church affairs, attended those services. I recall Joe Newell and his sons, Lovell, Sam and Sylvester, Elias Hall, Irwin Jacquis, Harvey Hyde, Abner Tyler and his son, Wortley, JimCross and his son Will, Moses Sawyer, the Otis brothers, Fred, Myron and Abert, Jack Martin, Tom Clark, Harry Thompson, Orvis Crary, Tommy Redwood and, occasionally, George Skiff. These men, with their wives and families, crowded the little school house, the seats of which were so uncomfortable that most of them preferred to stand around the walls, so I became eager to have a church erected and already had my eye on a site, a little knoll on the Sr. Regis River, almost surrounded by water. It looked very unpromising as it was overgrown with bramble and the stumps of old pine trees showed up over the entire to. but I detected is possibilities. This was just a dream that I did not think would he realized for years but a call made by me, which I shall now describe bought it to pass sooner than anyone

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