Honeoye Falls, NY

Honeoye Falls is a friendly little village situated on the upper falls of Honeoye Creek approximately fifteen miles southeast of Rochester, New York.

The Seneca Village of Totiakton had been founded in this area. The inhabitants were housed in long houses, fashioned of logs held together by willow branches and twigs. A British explorer, Wentworth Greenhalge, coming upon the Seneca Village in 1677, estimated the population of the village to be roughly 1000. The Seneca of this area, members of the Iroquois Confederacy, were known as the "Keepers of the Western Door" and as such a most important segment of the Iroquois Six Nation League.

After the Revolutionary War, the Phelps and Gorharn Purchase made possible the sale of property to settlers wishing to come to this area. Captain Jonathan Ball purchased land which carried the "Ball Farm" label. Tiring of frontier speculation he sold 1820 acres to Zebulon Norton in 1789 for 12 1/2 cents per acre. After this land deal Captain Ball retired to his native state of Connecticut. The original deed for this property is in the safe in the Honeoye Falls Village Hall office.

The village, as we know it, was founded in 1791 by Zebulon Norton. Norton, a miller from Connecticut, was interested in the water power available at the site of the falls. In 1791, after building a home for his family, he erected a grist mill at the top of the falls and a saw mill on the opposite bank of the creek.

Almost immediately a village flourished and was known as Norton's Mills. A bridge was built in 1810 connecting both sides of the village, making for a larger and more closely-knit community. By this time, the village was known as West Mendon. Like Rochester, this tiny community built its factories and mills along the upper and lower falls of its water supply. By 1822 a lively little hamlet with mills, stores, a school, a post office and churches had evolved.