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Tioga County, New York, circa 1901. "Bridge over the Susquehanna at Owego." With another message from J.C. Kenyon. 8x10 glass negative, Detroit Photographic Company. View full size.
In the July 20, 1894, edition of the Shenandoah Evening Herald, druggist J. C. Kenyon, of Owego, N.Y., recommended women use Paskola ... so they won't be all thin, lanky, and unattractive.
We can thank Dave for some silent unconfusing.
On the Library of Congress website, this photo has the DPC caption "Bridge over the Susquehanna, Oswego, N.Y." The LOC's own caption is "Bridge over the Susquehanna, Oswego [i.e. Owego], N.Y."
But Oswego and Owego are a hundred miles apart, and Oswego is a hundred miles northwest of the source of the Susquehanna, which flows out of Otsego Lake at Cooperstown. Otsego Lake is a hundred miles from Owego (you can follow the Susquehanna there).
The confusion preceded DPC: a painting by Xanthus Russell Smith is called "View on the Susquehanna above Oswego." But if you're above Oswego you're in Lake Ontario. To complicate matters further, in April 2022, a different Smith painting was sold at auction: it was listed as "View of Susquehanna River above Owego."
[Also note the note here: "Misidentified as Oswego, N.Y., until 2010." - Dave]
Joel C. Kenyon --
And despite what you learned in school about drugs leading to an early death, Mr. Kenyon carried on until age 84 (tho presumably he gave up his graffitiing ways somewhat earlier).
For those of you - be you plump or svelte - curious as to where he plied his drug trade, or where he spent the gains of such, both his elixir emporium at 5 Lake and his house (below) seem to be extant.
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