COLDEN ACADEMY! March 25, 1768 at the Colden Store, Coldengham, New York

Friday March 25, 1768
Coldengham, New York
Store of Cadwallader Colden, Jr.

The Academy

Colden paid Charles Rooby almost forty pounds for shoes on this day, 250 years ago. The DayBook records that Colden paid 19:17:3 for shoes for his family over the past year. An expensive shoe sold for about 10 shillings, so this is the equivalent of over 40 shoes! See prior blog on shoes.

Colden paid an additional nineteen pounds for "Shoes for Scholars." That is roughly another 40 shoes!

March 25, 1768 transaction in Colden Store DayBook.

This entry is the first that directly references the Academy that Colden had instituted a few years prior. Other services for carpentry, painting, or masonry recorded in the DayBook may have been for the Academy, although most were assumed to be for Colden's Stone Mansion.

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This article is one in a series of a daily accountings of Colden Store transactions. Be sure you read the first installment for an introduction to the store. You should also read this article which appeared in the Journal of the Orange County Historical Society.

The Coldenham Academy opened in November 1762 under the tutelage of William Adams. Its location is believed to be the Colden homestead in Coldengham. It was described as a "large and convenient house capable of accommodating from 20 to 30 students with a proper Housekeeper and other Servants necessary for washing, cooking, and keeping the Scholars in the best and most decent manner." [1762-10-25 New-York Gazette] It appears they also provided shoes.

William Adams left in 1767 to open his own school in New Rochelle. Edward Riggs was hired to continue "the Academy at Coldenham." The restructured academy opened the prior May (1767). Whether the school was still in session in March of 1768 when Colden paid almost twenty pounds for shoes, is not known.  No further mention of the academy appears in New York City papers after this date.

Edward Riggs appears 26 times in the DayBook along with his maid, his girl, his brother, and his brother-in-law. His last purchase was in May 16, 1768. That transaction ended with rent paid to Thomas McClaughrey and a reconciliation of his account with the amount due Riggs of 15 pounds 12 shillings and 10 pence.  Perhaps that was a farewell to the short life of the Academy?

Advertisement from New-York Mercury May 4, 1767.

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