Walden, New York
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Walden is a village located in the Town of Montgomery in Orange County, New York. As of the 2000 census, the village had a total population of 6,164.
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Geography
Walden is located at 41°33'41" North, 74°11'22" West (41.561268, -74.189442)Template:GR.
According to the United States Census Bureau, the village has a total area of 5.3 km² (2.0 mi²). 5.1 km² (2.0 mi²) of it is land and 0.2 km² (0.1 mi²) of it is water. The total area is 3.90% water.
The village is bisected by the Wallkill River. There are two waterfalls and dams on the river within the village limits, known as the Great and Little Falls; and two auto bridges, the High (Route 52) and Low (Oak Street) bridges).
Demographics
As of the censusTemplate:GR of 2000, there are 6,164 people, 2,197 households, and 1,577 families residing in the village. The population density is 1,208.1/km² (3,129.6/mi²). There are 2,352 housing units at an average density of 461.0/km² (1,194.2/mi²). The racial makeup of the village is 90.61% White, 3.83% African American, 0.36% Native American, 0.63% Asian, 0.02% Pacific Islander, 2.69% from other races, and 1.87% from two or more races. 9.34% of the population are Hispanic or Latino of any race.
There are 2,197 households out of which 40.1% have children under the age of 18 living with them, 50.9% are married couples living together, 14.6% have a female householder with no husband present, and 28.2% are non-families. 22.7% of all households are made up of individuals and 9.4% have someone living alone who is 65 years of age or older. The average household size is 2.79 and the average family size is 3.29.
In the village the population is spread out with 30.2% under the age of 18, 8.1% from 18 to 24, 31.5% from 25 to 44, 20.1% from 45 to 64, and 10.2% who are 65 years of age or older. The median age is 34 years. For every 100 females there are 92.3 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there are 90.4 males.
The median income for a household in the village is $43,507, and the median income for a family is $49,316. Males have a median income of $37,929 versus $25,701 for females. The per capita income for the village is $18,485. 9.8% of the population and 5.5% of families are below the poverty line. Out of the total population, 13.1% of those under the age of 18 and 7.7% of those 65 and older are living below the poverty line.
History
Walden_McKinley_statue.JPG
The area around present-day Walden was purchased in 1736 by Alexander Kidd, and settlers of Scots-Irish, English and German descent started arriving not long afterwards. It was the first settlement west of the Wallkill River, known at the time as Kidd's Town.
In the 1820s, a successful New York shipper named Jacob Walden convinced some of his business partners to finance the construction of woolen mills on the river, attracted by the Great Falls as a source of power and the railroad connections at nearby Maybrook. He dammed the Wallkill above the falls, creating a power station that remains in use today, and his mill was a success.
Other wool-makers followed as the Industrial Revolution picked up steam and the growing population center became known instead as Walden's Mills. Most of them failed a few decades later, but their influence was such that the village incorporated in 1855 as Walden.
The village fathers needed to replace the mills as a source of employment, and began encouraging knife manufacturers to relocate from nearby Dutchess County to the vacant buildings, where the New York Knife Company made much of the cutlery employed by the Union Army during the U.S. Civil War.
After the war, other knifemakers came to Walden, too, and the village became colloquially known as Knifetown. Other industrial concerns, making products as diverse as engines and women's underwear, also set up shop.
In the early 1890s, President Grover Cleveland lowered tariffs on many imported goods, including knives. Competitively priced German cutlery began to flood the American market, and together with the Panic of 1893 and the economic slowdown that followed for several years, the knife companies and their owners went heavily into debt and it looked for a while as if they might not survive.
But in 1897 President William McKinley, a personal friend of Robert Bradley of the U.S. Knife Company, pushed through the Dingleby Tariff that restored the status quo ante. The knifemakers returned to profitability and were able to pay off their debts; and in gratitude Bradley had a statue of McKinley erected that remains in Walden today.
In the 1910s the facilities at the dam began to be primarily used for power and less for industry.
In the late 1920s, one of the largest Ku Klux Klan gatherings outside the South in that era took place outside Walden.
The Depression was hard on many of the village's economic concerns, but the knifemakers persisted. However, after World War II they gradually became less prominent and moved as the rail connections they had depended on were replaced by trucking on the growing Interstates. The last company making knives in the village, Imperial Schrade, closed down its factory after a 1957 fire and moved to nearby Ellenville afterwards. The ruins of the factory still stand behind Walden's most visible economic giant, the Thruway Markets retail complex.
Today, Walden retains much of its working-class feel and some light industry although that is changing as new homebuyers take advantage of it being at the outer fringe of the New York metropolitan area and establish more of a bedroom-community commuter lifestyle.