Editing Schenectady, New York (section)

===New Republic===
It was not until after the Revolutionary War that the village residents reduced the power of the descendants of the early trustees and gained representative government. <!--Expand - explain what gov't was --> The settlement was chartered as a city in 1798. Long interested in supporting higher education and morals, the members of the city's three oldest churches—the Dutch First Reformed Church, St. Georges Episcopal Church, and First Presbyterian Church—formed a "union" and founded [[Union College]] in 1795 under a charter from the state. The school had started in 1785 as Schenectady Academy. This founding was part of the expansion of higher education in upstate New York in the postwar years.

During this period, migrants poured into upstate and western New York from New England, but there were also new immigrants from England and Europe. Many traveled west along the Mohawk River, settling in the western part of the state, where they developed more agriculture on former Iroquois lands. A dairy industry developed in the central part of the state. New settlers were predominantly of English and [[Scotch-Irish American|Scotch-Irish]] descent. In 1819, Schenectady suffered a fire that destroyed more than 170 buildings and most of its historic, distinctive Dutch-style architecture.<ref name="pearson">[https://archive.org/stream/historyofschenec00pe#page/n19/mode/2up Prof. John Pearson, "Preface", p. xii, ''History of the Schenectady Patent in the Dutch and English Times'' (1883)], Library of Congress, full scanned text at Internet Archive</ref>

New York had passed a law for gradual abolition of slavery in 1799,<ref name="free">[http://slavenorth.com/nyemancip.htm Douglas Harper, "Emancipation in New York"], ''Slavery in the North'', 2003, accessed January 1, 2015</ref> however, in 1824, there were still a total of 102 slaves in Schenectady County with nearly half residing in the city. That year the city of Schenectady had a total population of 3939, which included 240 free blacks, 47 slaves, and 91 foreigners.<ref name="spafford">[http://www.schenectadyhistory.org/resources/spafford.html Horatio Gates Spafford, LL.D. ''A Gazetteer of the State of New-York, Embracing an Ample Survey and Description of Its Counties, Towns, Cities, Villages, Canals, Mountains, Lakes, Rivers, Creeks and Natural Topography. Arranged in One Series, Alphabetically: With an Appendix…''] (1824), at Schenectady Digital History Archives, selected extracts, accessed December 28, 2014</ref>

In the 19th century, after completion of the [[Erie Canal]] in 1825, Schenectady became an important transportation, manufacturing and trade center. By 1824, more of its population worked in manufacturing than agriculture or trade.<ref name="spafford"/> Among the industries was a cotton mill,<ref name="spafford"/> which processed cotton from the Deep South. It was one of many such mills in upstate whose products were part of the exports shipped out of New York City. The city and state had many economic ties to the South at the same time that some residents became active in the [[abolitionism|abolitionist]] movement.

Schenectady benefited by increased traffic connecting the Hudson River to the [[Mohawk Valley]] and the [[Great Lakes]] to the west and New York City to the south. The [[New York State Route 5|Albany and Schenectady Turnpike]] (now State Street) was constructed in 1797 to connect Albany to settlements in the Mohawk Valley. The [[Albany and Schenectady Railroad|Mohawk and Hudson Railroad]] started operations in 1831 as one of the first railway lines in the United States, connecting the city and Albany by a route through the [[Albany Pine Bush|pine barrens]] between them. Developers in Schenectady quickly founded the Utica & Schenectady Railroad, chartered in 1833; Schenectady & Susquehanna Railroad, chartered May 5, 1836; and Schenectady & Troy Railroad, chartered in 1836, making Schenectady "the rail hub of America at the time" and competing with the Erie Canal.<ref>[http://www.donrittner.com/his310.html Don Rittner, "American Railroading Began Here"], Schenectady county and city history, accessed January 3, 2015</ref> Commodities from the Great Lakes areas and commercial products were shipped to the East and New York City through the Mohawk Valley and Schenectady.

The last slaves in Schenectady, New York, gained freedom in 1827, under the state's gradual abolition law. The law first gave freedom to children born to slave mothers, but they were indentured to the mother's master for a period into their early 20s. [[Union College]] established a school for black children in 1805, but discontinued it two years later. Methodists helped educate the children for a time but public schools did not accept them.<ref name="Wright"/>

In the 1830s, the [[abolitionism|abolitionist]] movement grew in Schenectady. In 1836, Rev. [[Isaac Groot Duryee]] (also recorded as Duryea) co-founded the interracial Anti-Slavery Society at Union College and the Anti-Slavery Society of Schenectady in 1837. [[Freedom seekers]] were supported via the [[Underground Railroad]] route that ran through the area, passing to the west and north to Canada, which had abolished slavery.<ref>[http://schenectadyhistorical.org/admin/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Underground-Railroad-and-Anti-Slavery-Movement-in-Schenectady.pdf "Underground Railroad and Anti-Slavery Movement in Schenectady"], Schenectady Historical Society, July 2010</ref>

In 1837, Duryee, together with others who were [[free people of color]], co-founded the [[First Free Church of Schenectady]] (now the Duryee Memorial AME Zion Church). He also started a school for students of color. The [[Abolitionism in the United States|abolitionist]] [[Theodore S. Wright]], an African-American minister based in New York City, spoke at the church's dedication and praised the school.<ref name="Wright">[http://research.udmercy.edu/find/special_collections/digital/baa/item.php?record_id=1360&collectionCode=baa Theodore Sedgwick Wright, "Speech given during the dedication of the First Free Church of Schenectady, 28 December 1837"], ''Emancipator'', at University of Detroit Mercy, accessed May 31, 2012</ref><ref>Neisuler, J. G. (1964). ''The History of Education in Schenectady, 1661–1962'', Schenectady: Board of Education, City School District</ref>

Through the late 19th century, new industries were established in the Mohawk Valley and powered by the river. Industrial jobs attracted many new immigrants, first from Ireland, and later in the century from Italy and Poland. In 1887, [[Thomas Edison]] moved his [[Edison Machine Works]] to Schenectady. In 1892, Schenectady became the headquarters of the [[General Electric|General Electric Company]]. This business became a major industrial and economic force and helped establish the city and region as a national manufacturing center.{{citation needed|date=March 2019}} GE became important nationally as a creative company, expanding into many different fields. [[American Locomotive Company]] also developed here, from a Schenectady company, and merging several smaller companies in 1901; it was second in the United States in the manufacture of steam locomotives before developing diesel technology.