On Thursday, April 3, 1879, The Otsego Republican (a weekly paper in Cooperstown NY), which called itself “the Friend of the Farmer with all the latest agricultural reports, cheese, butter, hogs, & general markets,” published this ad for McCabe Bros., Props.: “Having purchased E. A. Potter’s stock of marble & interest in the marble business, we are now prepared to furnish all kinds of marble work such as monuments, headstones, coping, etc., etc. etc., made of either Italian or American marble or Scotch granite at lower prices than such articles can be obtained elsewhere, of the same quality of material & equal workmanship. Yard cor. Main & Fair Sts., Cooperstown NY.”
In January 1880 the Otsego County Bd. of Supervisors let a contract for $24,995 to build a replacement courthouse designed by noted Syracuse architect Archimedes Russell to S. R. Barnes & the McCabe Brothers. The cornerstone was laid June 15, 1880. Courthouse construction was financed by “Court House bonds” issued Feb. 1, 1880. Construction claims relating to cost overruns followed completion of the courthouse.
Among McCabes noted in “History of Otsego County, NY 1740-1878 (Everts & Fariss, Phila., 1898) are Laurence McCabe, member, & John McCabe, Steward of Neptune Engine Co. No. 3, organized May 8, 1841; Peter McCabe, member, Mechanics’ Hook & Ladder Co. No. 5; & Bryan McCabe, Farmer & hop-grower, born in Otsego County in 1855. “Biographical Sketches of the Leading Citizens of Otsego Co., NY (Boston, Biographical Review Publ. Co., 1893) notes that Katie Muller (?) married T. A. McCabe of So. Worcester who owned a general store; his son Wm. H, a graduate of Albany Business College, works in T. A. McCabe’s general store.”
[For those interested in following this part of the McCabe families’ narratives, this footnote: “After nearly 120 years, the New York State Historical Association (NYSHA)[in whose library on the shore of Glimmerglass Lake I found this information in the 1980s] is no more. On March 13, 2017, the State Board of Regents approved NYSHA’s request to amend its charter to change its name to Fenimore Art Museum…”https://www.fenimoreartmuseum.org/about%5D
.