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| Roof's Tavern ca. 1826 |
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| Johannes Rueff moved his family to the Canajoharie District from the Fort Stanwix area in the spring of 1778 to escape the threats of frontier warfare. He purchased the old stone Schrembling house where he established a tavern and the area became known as Roof’s Village. General James Clinton is reported to have stayed there, or at Roof’s farm, as his army gathered at Canajoharie for their march south to Otsego Lake.
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Reuben Peake took possession of the property and built a new hotel in front of the tavern in 1826. The business then became known as Murray’s. In 1834 James Fenimore Cooper wrote in his personal correspondence the following:
“It is now 16 years since I was here. Roof’s Tavern, which I remember from childhood, is still standing, altered to Murray’s, and the road winds round it to mount to Cherry Valley as in old times. But the house is no longer solitary. There is a village of some six or eight hundred souls, along the banks of the canal. The bridges and boats and locks give the spot quite a Venetian air.”
In 1888 the tavern was replaced by the Hotel Wagner.
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