When the sons of John A. Bowlby were small boys they caught a mud turtle and carved their initials on its back. Several years after they had grown to manhood the same turtle was found, bearing the same initials and still residing on the same farm and near the same place where it was first found. It had grown in age but not very much in size. Henry McElwee accepted the offer and dug 1000 rods beginning at the Conhocton River on the Walker farm and digging a ditch about five feet wide through the Bowlby farm and to a depression in the swamp on the Wilkes farm between their house and barn where he found the underground outlet of the present Williamson Lake, which since it formation and the building of the Williamson road, has silently wended its way underneath and known only to a few people. Much credit is due Mr. McElwee for obtaining his land in that way.
Generations come and generations go, as the wheel of time rolls on.
In this particular case we are glad to say that the third generation of the Bowlby family still own the old home. The family name itself has died out among the descendants of this district, but a monument to the name is left, which, no doubt, will remain for many years to come. It is the Bowlby District, so named because the giver of the land for the erection of the school house in 1863 was John A. Bowlby. Prior to that year the district was a part of the Babcock Hollow school district. She was a woman who was noted for her evenness of temper and one who had a vocabulary of kind words for everybody, no matter who or what they were.