Pittstown Town

Rensselaer County, New York

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Pittstown Town Hall is located at 123 Tomhannock Road, Valley Falls NY 12185.
Phone: 518‑753‑4222.

Neighborhoods

Beginnings [1]

The settlers in Pittstown probably came around 1740. Michael Vandercook, from whom the local name of Cooksborough was derived, located here as early as 1763. He is the first documented white settler. William Shepard came from New England in 1770 and purchased a 500 acre farm nearby. Among those who located in the town during or soon after the American Revolution were Benjamin Aiken, who came from Dutchess County about 1778; Edmund Aiken settled in the same vicinity about a year or two afterward. The locality became known as the Aiken neighborhood. William Pendergast settled near Johnsonville before 1780 and Caspar Rouse came about the same time. Stephen Hunt, Israel Thompson, Benjamin Milks, Evans Humphrey, William McCleaver, Stephen Clapp, Isaac Carpenter, Cornelius Wiltsey (or Wiltse), Joseph Gifford, Gilbert Eddy and Hazael Shepard located in the town between 1780 and 1785.

The Town of Pittstown was incorporated in 1788. The first town meetings were probably held in the tavern of James Stitt, for about a dozen years.

  1. George Baker Anderson, Landmarks of Rensselaer County, New York, The Troy Press, D. Mason & Company, Publishers, Syracuse, 1897.

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