A Curious Story: Lillian Pagett Hobson

 by Susan Zehnder, Education Director

While our country was founded almost 250 years ago by immigrants, attitudes about immigrants and immigration have always been complicated. In Elmira in 1930, the citizenship of Miss Lillian Pagett Hobson was challenged on the grounds that she hadn’t lived in the country long enough to meet the residency requirements. My research seemed to confirm the objection was valid, but it was overruled, and Hobson became a US citizen on January 31, 1930.

Each country determines by law who is eligible to become a citizen. Requirements for becoming an American citizen have certainly changed over the years. The first US immigration and naturalization act was passed less than 15 years after the United States was founded. It excluded women, Blacks, and Native Americans from becoming citizens. Since then, more than 55 laws and 18 policies have been adopted to regulate who can and who cannot become a citizen. (Read this blog on a specific immigration law passed in the 19^th century.)

Today’s applicants for US citizenship must pay a fee, pass a civics test, meet residency requirements, prove they’re proficient in English, and if it applies, register for selective service. In Hobson’s day, the rules were much the same. Applicant names were printed in the local newspapers. If the person met the requirements, they were given the oath of citizenship. If they did not meet the requirements, reasons were given why not. Hobson’s case revolved around whether or not she had lived in the United States continuously for five years.

Lillian Pagett Hobson was born in Ireland. Her connection to Elmira was through her grandfather, William Pagett, called “one of the oldest of Elmira’s residents.”  In 1847 Pagett had left England for the United States. In 1855 he settled in Elmira. He and his wife, Anna, had a son and a daughter, Lillian’s mother.

Pagett owned and operated a successful tannery business. When the Civil War broke out, he was awarded a lucrative contract to feed prisoners at Elmira’s Civil War Prison Camp. With his earnings, he bought multiple oil wells in Pennsylvania and properties in Elmira, New York City, and Brooklyn. When he died in 1918, the properties passed down to his remaining heirs: his wife, a niece, and his granddaughter, Lillian Pagett Hobson. His wife died two years later.

Ten years after this, Lillian Hobson moved to Elmira. Two years later, she filed for US citizenship, claiming she had been living here with friends for five consecutive years. Her application was challenged by the District Director of Naturalization of Western New York, Leroy N. Kilman. Kilman determined that Hobson had gone back and forth between Ireland and the United States during the years she said she was living in Elmira. His objections were overruled by Supreme Court Justice Joseph D. Senn, and Chemung County Clerk John A. Matthews administered the oath of citizenship to Hobson on January 31, 1930. Right away, she applied for a passport to return to Europe to visit her father.  The district director filed another appeal, and that is the last mention of the issue in the papers.

Hobson’s name does show up again connected to another issue, and it may have influenced the judge’s decision to override the challenge. As one of two heirs to valuable property owned by her grandfather, Hobson already had invested in Elmira.

In early January of that same year, the Gorton clothing store and a nearby pharmacy, located at 105-107 East Water Street, were heavily damaged by fire. While they never determined how the fire began, both businesses continued to operate. Then less than 30 days later, just after Hobson had become a naturalized citizen, the company announced they would be constructing a larger, quarter-million-dollar, state-of-the art building and expanding their business. It would be located on property owned by the Pagett family at the corner of Main and Water Street. The building would be designed by distinguished architects Pierce and Bickford. The Gorton Company had agreed to lease the property from Hobson and her cousin Frederica Pagett Gates for 99 years at the cost of $20,000 per year.

The new building would be an economic boost to the city as the country had just entered into the Great Depression. However, not everyone thought it was a good thing. In April and through the beginning of June there was a contentious controversy over the new building’s footprint. The difference was 3 feet 4 inches and both the city and the developers did not want to budge. It affected how far into the sidewalk the building encroached. The developers claimed that construction was already set in motion and they couldn’t change anything. Opponents insisted that they change, which would mean a $140,000 to $200,000 debt to the city. The hearing was full of accusations, threats, and shouting. Only ten days later, things got much worse.

At rush hour on June 13, the construction’s temporary sidewalk collapsed, killing two people and injuring dozens more. After intensive investigations, the coroner declared that it was an accident and Gorton’s was not at fault. Construction continued. Many of the injured filed civil action suits against the Gorton Company and investors Hobson and Gates. Eventually, all cases were settled out of court.

The Gorton-Pagett building operated for 58 years, closing in February 1975.

Miss Hobson ended up staying in the area. Her name appears periodically in the paper, identified as a donor to charitable causes. Then in 1970 and 1972, two letters to the editor appear in the Star-Gazette. In both she complained about having to pay school taxes when she had no children. She is listed in the Elmira City Directory until 1976. In 1978 her name shows up one last time. It is printed in the paper for failure to pay property taxes on the East Water Street property.

 

 

 

 

A Bit of History Repeating

 By Rachel Dworkin, Archivist

Since February 17^th, prison guards across New York State, including at Elmira Correctional, have been engaged in an illegal wildcat strike in an effort to improve working conditions. They are demanding that the state increase pay, address chronic understaffing, and repeal the HALT Act, which banned the use of long-term solitary confinement for difficult prisoners. Under the New York’s Public Employees Fair Employment Act (1967), more commonly known as the Taylor Law, public employees are prohibited from striking. Despite the penalties associated with the law, that hasn’t stopped the guards. It didn’t stop them in 1979 either.

On April 18, 1979, union contract negotiations broke down and guards across the state walked off the job. Striker’s demands included higher pay and a roll-back of the post-Attica Riot prison reforms. The strike involved approximately 7,000 of the state’s 8,500 prison guards, as well as 600 guards at other state buildings and institutions. Among them were the guards from Elmira Correctional and the Elmira Psychiatric Center. In addition to the 385 Elmira corrections officers who went on strike, an almost equal number of prison support staff including clerical workers, teachers, specialists, and others refused to cross the picket line. Prison chaplain Rev. John H. Valk elected to remain at his post inside the prison for over a week in order to see to the spiritual needs of the prisoners while still supporting the strikers.

As with today, the governor was forced to call out the National Guard to take over the management of the prisons at a cost of approximately $400,000 a day. The Guardsmen who filled in at Elmira under the command of Major Richard S. Fidurski were primarily drawn from units based out of Buffalo, Binghamton, and Rochester. None had any experience working in prisons and struggled to make things work. All of them found their regularly scheduled lives disrupted. Two Guardsmen from Co. D, 102 Medical Battalion, Pfc. Levi Coram and Spec. 5 Candice Worthey, ended up having to hold their wedding in the prison’s chapel on May 1, 1979 and taking 24-hours leave for a quick honeymoon in Syracuse before resuming their duties.

Mr. and Mrs. Coram on the way to their honeymoon, May 1, 1979

 

Life inside the prison changed with the guards on strike. All visitation was halted. Parolees had their releases delayed. Prisoners were given more time to hang out on their block outside their cells. They had to eat inside their cells though, as there weren’t enough Guardsmen to manage the mess halls. According to an April 29 Star-Gazette article, inmates seemed to prefer the Guardsmen. “In almost six years, I haven’t been treated so good as I have in the last seven days,” claimed inmate Robert Cmor. Conditions at prisons across the state currently under the supervision of the National Guard vary wildly. Some places are operating almost normally. In others, prisoners are under 24-hour lockdown without showers or medical care. At least four prisoners have died.

On the picket line, the strikers threw rocks, eggs, and insults at National Guardsmen and at one point attempted to block a convoy from entering. Chemung County Sheriff’s deputies and officers from the Elmira and State police worked overtime to help keep peace at the prison gates. Meanwhile, many of the strikers were struggling financially. The strike started at the end of the pay period and strikers had yet to receive their last checks. They were eligible for food stamps, but the Chemung County Department of Social Services refused to offer emergency relief and instead insisted they undergo the usual application process which wouldn’t get them aid until mid-June. 

Sheriff's deputies clear a path through the picket line for National Guard convoy, April 27, 1979

 

Strikers outside Elmira Correctional, April 27, 1979

As the strike dragged on, more and more of the support staff made the decision to cross the picket line to return to work. Across the state, tensions were high between those who chose to strike and those who stayed on the job. The several families of non-striking workers were threatened and one man’s dogs were killed. Nothing like that was going on here, but at least one striking guard did attempt to incite a riot among the prisoners. Superintendent John B. Wilmot, who remained at his post throughout the strike, told reporters he was hurt and disappointed by the 64 non-union supervisors and clerical staff who refused to work.

The strike was finally settled on May 4, 1979 with workers returning to work at midnight. In the end, the strikers won a 7% pay boost the first year and raises of between 3.5-7% the second and third years depending on cost of living. Interestingly, this was the same deal they had rejected before the strike, but they did win a few other things. Guards also won special “training” bonuses of $300 the first year and $200 the next. The state also agreed to make seniority the top factor in determining promotions and begin payouts for on-the-job injuries on the day of the injury and not 30 days later as had previously been the case. The local union rejected the deal by a three-to-one margin, but still returned to work anyway. For violations of the Taylor Law, the union was fined $2.5 million and individual guards lost an average of $1,550 in pay. It was a Pyrrhic victory at best. The union’s demands for the repeal of prison reform were soundly rejected.

On February 27, 2025, a tentative agreement in the current strike was announced but ultimately rejected by the strikers. The state has begun firing some guards and plans to start suspending the health insurance of thousands more. It’s unclear at this point how things will end, but someone at this historical society will probably be writing about it 45 years from now.

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If you were involved in the 1979 strike or have signs, photos or other material associated with it, please contact me at (607) 734-4167 ex 207 or archivist@chemungvalleymuseum.org. If you have pictures of the current strike, I’d love to hear from you as well.