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–Not graded
History · Spencer

Spencer’s post office opened in 1808, and 43% of its homes were built before 1940

2 places in town are on the National Register. Below: 3 old photos and papers and old-book passages.

1808first post office
2on the National Register
43%homes built before 1940
3old photos & papers
3famous people
Add an old photoShare a memory
Quick answers

How Spencer began

When was Spencer founded?

1808

The Spencer post office opened in 1808, the earliest record of the town by name.

2020 census: 719218 years
Founding year: the first Spencer post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓

What stands out about Spencer’s past

Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.

A history waiting to be writtenOnly 3 old photos are in the public archives. The rest are in attics and albums.Old housesHalf of Spencer’s homes were built before 1952.Deep rootsA post office since 1808: 218 years of Spencer.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start Spencer’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Spencer’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
Date a photo3 archive items have no date. Guess the decade.+2Share a family photoSign in to add one+10
The story

How Spencer came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of Spencer.

Read it all →

The land for the town was purchased in 1791 and settlement began in 1794.

When the town was organized in 1806 from the Town of Tioga (the Old Town of Owego), it contained territory that is now in more newly organized towns: Candor (1811), Caroline (1811), Danby (1811), Newfield (1811), and Cayuta (1824) in Tioga and other counties.

The Halsey Valley Grand Army of the Republic Meeting Hall was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2003.

Town resident Cal Harris was tried four times for murder, and ultimately acquitted, over a decade following the 2001 disappearance of his estranged wife.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Timeline

Spencer, 1853 to 1862

Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.

  1. 19th century
  2. 1853Born hereWoodbridge N. Ferris is born here
  3. 1854Born hereGeorge Barker Stevens is born here
  4. 1862Born hereWilliam Valentine is born here
From the old history books

What they wrote about Spencer in 1920

Passages that mention Spencer, cut from the printed page as they were published.

This last reference is to a review of Spencer's volume on Justice written by myself twenty-eight years ago. As a re-reading of Spencer has confirmed the opinions therein expressed, I have ventured to incorporate some paits of the article in the following paragraphs.
A history of political theories from Rousseau to Spencer1920 · page 399Read the page →
Read the text

This last reference is to a review of Spencer's volume on Justice written by myself twenty-eight years ago. As a re-reading of Spencer has confirmed the opinions therein expressed, I have ventured to incorporate some paits of the article in the following paragraphs.

Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
Herbert Spencer, whose Synthetic Philosophy was substantially before the world at the end of our period, gave to sociology a content that was much narrower than that which Comte had given it, but made it correspondingly more definite and manageable. The indebtedness of Spencer to Comte, chiefly ind…
A history of political theories from Rousseau to Spencer1920 · page 347Read the page →
Read the text

Herbert Spencer, whose Synthetic Philosophy was substantially before the world at the end of our period, gave to sociology a content that was much narrower than that which Comte had given it, but made it correspondingly more definite and manageable. The indebtedness of Spencer to Comte, chiefly indirect and unconscious, is readily discernible, but there are at the same time even more obvious the strongly marked

Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.

Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.

By decade

Spencer, decade by decade

Date unknown3 to date
Book of remembrance, Presbyterian church, Spencer, N. Y., 1815-1915Date?Book of remembrance, Presbyterian church, Spencer, N.…BookCemetery inscriptionsDate?Cemetery inscriptionsBookCemetery inscriptionsDate?Cemetery inscriptionsBook
Today3 recent
Hagadorn Hill Road at Harris driveway2024Hagadorn Hill Road at Harris drivewaySpencer, New York2007Spencer, New YorkSpencer, New York2007Spencer, New York
On the National Register

2 historic places in Spencer

The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.

places listed
2
National Historic Landmarks
0
none yet
historic buildings protected
6
each building in a district counts

National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.

Famous people

3 famous people were born in Spencer

Writers, athletes, leaders and more, ranked by how widely they’re known.

See all →
Woodbridge N. FerrisAmerican politician and educator · b. 1853
George Barker StevensAmerican minister · b. 1854
William ValentineAmerican educator · b. 1862

Questions about Spencer’s history

What year was Spencer founded?

The Spencer post office opened in 1808, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).

Memory lane

What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.

Town Square →
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Sources

Where this page comes from

Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →

From Wikimedia Commons (6), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.