Overview

The Haushalter family lived on and worked the land surrounding what is now 6777 Gowanda State Road in Water Valley, Hamburg, Erie, New York from 1856 to 2008. Even now that none of the family live there, it remains an important piece of their identity and memory.

The fifty-acre plot of farmland that would become the Haushalter Farm was one of the original plots created at the very beginning of Erie County, New York history by the Holland Land Company when it divided up the enormous tract of land it owned in western New York.^[1][2] That original fifty acres was only broken up into smaller lots in 2003 with the sale of the Haushalter Farm to a residential developer.

In its entire 181-year history, that fifty acres was only owned and farmed by four families: The Manns, the Browns, the Schweickharts and the Haushalters. Those last two families were really one tightly interrelated family whose blood connections date back to their residence in Alsace.^[3] A fourth set of owners, the Townsends and Coits, may have lived on and farmed the land at its very beginning,^[2] but that is unclear at this time. The Haushalters and Schweickharts owned the land for 150 of those 181 years.

Many of the residents of the Haushalter Farm are buried in Prospect Lawn Cemetery, Hamburg, New York (which is so close to the farm that it could be seen from the driveway until the land between was developed) and Saint Paul's Lutheran Church Cemetery, Eden, New York category.

A portion of the original family farmland now form's the heart of the Hampton Brook Woods Wildlife Management Area.

Pre-European Era

The earliest known inhabitants of the area including the Haushalter farm were the Erie People. The land was taken from them by the Haudenosaunee (also known as the Haudenosaunee Confederacy) and many of the survivors were enslaved by and absorbed into that people.^[4] Evidence of these early inhabitants in the form of arrow heads could still be found on the Haushalter land as late as the 1990s.^[5]

First European Settlers

In 1791, the state of Massachusetts sold Robert Morris (1734-1806) the right to purchase the area from the Onöndowa'ga:' (also known as the Seneca),^[1][6] who were the westernmost members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy. In 1792, Robert Morris sold that right to the Holland Land Company. In 1797, the Onöndowa'ga:' signed the Treaty of Big Tree, ceding their rights to the area^[7] and clearing the way for the official transfer of title from Robert Morris to the Holland Land Company. In 1798, the New York Legislature legalized the direct purchase of land in the state by foreign investors, and soon after, the Holland Land Company divided up its holdings, transfering property titles to the real men behind the company, one of whom was Wilhelm Willink.^[1][8]

On 4 September 1822,^[9][10] Wilhelm Willink sold the parcel of land that would become the Haushalter farm to Charles Townsend and George Coit, land speculators and two of Buffalo, New York's founding fathers,^[11][12] for $343.^[2] On 1 November 1830, Charles Townsend, George Coit and their wives sold the land to Thomas Mann for $264.^[13]

Thomas Mann died intestate shortly after he purchased his fifty acres, at Christmas in 1831,^[14][15] leaving behind his widow, Fanny (Ingalls) Mann, and two minor children: Marquis D. Mann and Betsey Ann Mann. Nathaniel Ingalls, Fanny Mann's brother, acted as the executor of Mann's estate, and the future Haushalter farm acres were the only real estate he owned.^[14][16] Ingalls was given authority to lease the land and use the money to pay Mann's remaining debts.^[17]

On 25 March, 1842, John Sullivan and his wife Betsey Ann sold half of the acreage to Sewell Brown for $500.^[10] Marquis Mann appears to have also leased his half of the land to Sewell, though it was still known as the Mann Farm.^[18] When Sewell died without a will around 27 March 1848, the half of the property he owned passed to his heirs, as did his lease on the other half.^[19]

The Haushalters

On 13 April 1853, right after Sewell Brown's lease on the second 25-acres was up, Marquis Mann sold those acres to John F. Brown, one of Sewell Brown's heirs, for $700.^[20] The next day, an entire army of Browns, the heirs of Sewell, sold the farmland to Johann Daniel Schweickhardt for $2800.^[21] Three years later, the property became the Haushalter farm when Daniel and his wife Barbara Dietrich sold the property to Jacques "Jacob" Haushalter, husband of their daughter Barbara Schweickhardt, for $2500 on 20 October 1856.^[22] A half-acre portion of the original Holland Land Company property seems to have been portioned off at some point, perhaps to a John Nelson, but that too was now sold to the Haushalters by Hannah Storm for $400.^[23]

Jacob Haushalter died on 28 December 1894,^[24] his wife Barbara less than a month later on 11 January 1895.^[25] Jacob's son George filled out the request for probate on 14 January 1895, three days after Barbara's death, so it passed to their living children and grandchildren who had been named with her in the will.^[26]Jacob Haushalter left a large amount of debt for George, the executor of Jacob's estate,^[27] to inherit along with the land. Therefore, the fifty acres had to be sold back to the Schweickhart family for $5000 at the end of that year, specifically to Georg Schweickhardt, Barbara Schweickhart Haushalter's brother.^[26]

In reality, the Haushalters continued to live on and work the land,^[28] though the deed was passed back and forth between other family members several more times. In April of 1897, George Schweickhart and his wife sold the property to Adam Gettelman, their son-in-law, for $1. Adam and his wife turn around and sell it back for $1 a year and a half later.^[26]

On 26 September 1907, the Haushalter farm was officially back in Haushalter hands when George Schweickhart's executors sold it to Mary L. Haushalter for $8,125.^[26][29] Mary's son, Charles, returned to Water Valley from his homestead in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho in 1908 to run the farm. Mary deeded it to him for $1.^[26][30] Charles married Anna Stunick in 1912, and in 1928 she was added to the deed for the same nominal sum.