Program

Legends & Lore®

Subject

Legend

Location

3815 Main St, Strykersville, NY 14145, USA

Lat/Long

42.70155, -78.44763

Grant Recipient

Town of Sheldon

In the days when Sheldon was a wilderness, Garrett Stryker purchased a few hundred acres of land to settle, little more than a quiet trail through the woods, land that would become Strykersville. In 1810, when he packed up his wife and eight children for the move, the family piled all of their worldly possessions into a wagon and trudged the couple hundred miles from Richfield to Sheldon. The matriarch Saloma Stryker led the oxen-pulled wagon the whole way, guiding the team with her willow riding crop.

When the footsore family arrived at their new home and hunkered down for the night, Saloma planted her willow riding crop in what would become the center of town. Whether she was discarding the reminder of her toil the second she was able, propping herself back up to her feet, or staking her claim like the Marines on Mount Suribachi, no one knows for sure.

However it happened, the willow riding crop took root, and as Strykersville grew, so too did the willow and its legend. A majestic tree by all accounts, the willow stood tall and proud in the middle of Strykersville. According to locals, it was the first tree to bud in spring and the last tree to shed its leaves in the fall. But as all things must past, the once-mighty tree gnarled and wilted. When in 1944 a house was built in the same lot, the tree was removed, burned to the ground.

Out of a twig, a mighty willow had grown, and its fair to say town history went up in flames the day the tree was burned. The willow has been gone nigh a century now, and many current residents have no knowledge of it. But to this day, there are reports of a willow continuously sprouting in that same spot no matter how many times it is ripped up.