The Border Town Of Fort Covington, New York - Part 2

I was driving around historic Fort Covington, NY (see also Part 1, posted yesterday) and had come to the center of town:

Most houses were in fine shape and definitely looked historic to me:

There were a number of brick homes with this type of gingerbread trim, apparently a popular style in town:

This house reminded me of many seen in Canada - which makes sense, of course, being just over the border:

A full front porch, filled with chairs:

I was surprised to see a gigantic birthday cake, topped with lighted candles, so I pulled to the side of the busy road. I learned that this was the 200th anniversary of Fort Covington:


The sign behind it gave a bit of history, how it was settled in the 1790s as French Mills and renamed in 1817:

Fort Covington was filled with lovely, historic homes:

And most of the homes I saw were large and impressive:

I began to wonder if only rich people lived here, but a quick online look at homes for sale in town showed them as being surprisingly low priced. I was enjoying this driving tour, so I kept going. I'll post Part 3 tomorrow:

The Border Town Of Fort Covington, New York - Part 1

I'd heard about Fort Covington ever since I moved to the north country, but I hadn't yet been there. I checked Google Maps and found it, only about 25 miles from my house, on the Canadian border and inside an arc of the Little Salmon River. A historic town with a population of only 1600 people, it was originally called French Mills but the name was changed to Fort Covington after the War of 1812:

I turned onto Highway 37, an east-west route which parallels the Canadian border and found myself in a commercial zone with more businesses and more traffic than I would expect from a town of 1600 people. And there was an auto dealer/repair business called Northern New York Auto Sales:

Across the highway was Smith Lumber:

And Smith Auto Repair, probably owned by the same family as Smith Lumber and I wondered if it was related to Northern New York Auto Sales. I suspected it was:

A funeral home:

I began seeing a few houses, many of which were set behind giant, old trees:

Twin Leaf Express. I stopped here on my way out of town and bought gas at the full service station, then went into the deli/convenience store/diner for a cup of coffee where I learned that coffee was free when you bought gas. Business was booming, with so many cars coming and going that the gas station attendant told me to stay there while I went into the store:

Sweet Treats - closed for the season of course, but I'll bet it's a busy place in the summertime:

Adirondack Auto Parts:

St. Mary's Parish Cemetery (there were at least two of them in town):

By then I was in the residential area, about which I'll post more tomorrow: