Eaton

Once touted as the sparkling jewel of Madison County because of its many scenic lakes and reservoirs built to feed the great Chenango Canal, the town and hamlet of Eaton have played an important role in the history of Madison County. From within its boundaries have come such luminaries as Emily Chubbuck Judson, early women's writer; humorist Melville Landon, better known to the world as Eli Perkins; and Samuel Chubbuck, inventor and the maker of the early telegraph equipment for Samuel Morse's telegraph. Eaton captures the history of this once-thriving community through pictures and stories of the Chenango Canal, early turnpikes, and steam engines made famous by Wood, Taber and Morse's Steam Engine Works. Many of these pictures are kept for the future in the Old Town of Eaton Museum, located in one of Eaton's oldest stone buildings.

Mary E. Messere founded the Neighbors for Historic Eaton in 1995 and has been the chairman for 12 years. She is also the president of Old Town Folks Inc. and has been the curator for its Old Town of Eaton Museum for the past six years. For more than 10 years, she has written a popular weekly article in the Madison county papers under the pen name Back Street Mary. She is currently the Madison County historian.