Thomas Families
South Street
Elbridge, New York
The Thomas families represent African American land owners and farmers, some of whom were perhaps freedom seekers, who settled in Onondaga communities in houses very like those of their European American neighbors.
The Thomas family arrived in Elbridge, New York, sometime before 1850. The 1850 census listed Tom Thomas, aged 54, and Jane Thomas, aged 44, probably the parents of John Thomas, aged 24. A fourth member of the household, Harriet, aged 7, may have been either Jane and Thomas’s daughter or John’s daughter. All members of the family listed their birthplaces as New York. Both Thomas and John listed their occupations as laborers.
By 1855, John Thomas had married a nineteen-year-old woman named Charlotte. The census noted that Jane had been born in Dutchess County, Thomas and John in Hudson County, and Charlotte in Africa. Both Thomas and John were farmers.
The two Thomas houses stand on the west side of South Street in the Town and Village of Elbridge, two doors south of the corner of Brown Street. Both houses are simple gable-end-to-the-street buildings. One is story-and-a-half. The other is two stories. Both are currently inhabited, and each has been altered with changed siding and fenetration. Both, however, retain their historic forms and original locations.
Further Research
Evidence that these homes belonged to the Thomas families comes primarily from Sweet’s 1874 Atlas, which lists the Thomas families as living here. More research needs to be done in deeds and assessments, as well as later census records, to confirm this.