Early History
John Green purchased land from the DeLancey patent and probably settled the area around 1744. Due to its location between other pre-existing locations, the name of Middletown was adopted, but later changed to South Middletown to avoid confusion with another nearby location. Eventually the word "south" was dropped, giving the current name when the community became a village in 1848. The village was incorporated as a city in 1888.
The First Congregational Church of Middletown, established in 1785, has the highest spire downtown. It can be argued that the construction of the church marks the beginning of Middletown's existence as a village. The current building was constructed in 1872.
Read more about this topic: Middletown, Orange County, New York, History and Economy
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or history:
“When lilacs last in the dooryard bloomed
And the great star early drooped in the western sky in the night,
I mourned, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.
Ever-returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring,
Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)
“History ... is, indeed, little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind.
But what experience and history teach is this—that peoples and governments have never learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)