About the 6th Ward

Located halfway between Albany and Binghamton, Oneonta was an ideal location for the railroad. In the late 1800s, the Albany and Susquehanna Railroad built the largest roundhouse in the world to service and store locomotives in Oneonta. It was later leased by the Deleware and Hudson Railroad.

A&S contracted H.A. Fonda to design a housing settlement for the railroad workers nearby. Fonda Avenue was created to connect River Street and Chestnut Street, where the homes were built. The railroad paid for the workers to build their homes, but retained ownership of them. Lacking resources, the neighborhood struggled with gambling and alcohol addiction, and by 1913 the city asked the state Health Department to condemn the neighborhood, which would leave all of the residents with no place to live.

Luckily, a successful dairy farmer on River Street, William Bailey offered to purchase the homes at $75 a piece and move the houses. He offered a deal to the residents if they could dig their own foundations. About half of them were able to get their homes back.

In the late 19th century, much of Oneonta's immigrant community settled in the 6th Ward, making it a vibrant and culturally diverse community.  By the early 1900s, almost half of Oneonta's Italian, Russian, Polish, and Lebanese residents lived in the neighborhood.