With the ending of this episode so too ended Eddyville’s resistance to the changes enveloping the county. The Burr map was retired. The library and school would close and later the post office. With the coming of cars the distance to Rondout, now itself swallowed whole by Kingston, seemed manageable. The canal a few years before had shut down and the railroad was declining. Soon residents would claim to miss the sound of the approaching trains, their steady flow six trains up and six trains down now ebbing. In 1922 all passenger traffic would end.
The Lord does not deal aces to every player and the residents of Eddyville in all its years held only one strong hand, and that briefly, when the D&H opened. But they played their cards well and straight and no man or woman driving on Route 211 past the Eddyville signs should let the moment go unremarked. History was made here.
Editor’s note. We know Eddyville achieved major importance in the early 19th century as the terminus of the D&H Canal, which brought coal from the Pennsylvania coalfields to the Hudson River, and on to New York. We know the early railroads sprung up in the area and perhaps it had an opportunity to retain its importance for a while. We know it was displayed on the Burr map of 1840 as a major point between New York and Albany. Finally, we know from these postcards it was a great fishing hole in the early 20th century. But the rest...
