After the Revolutionary War, the large forests of wild lands then in Ulster County contained a great amount of valuable pine, oak and hemlock timber, both near the Delaware river and for some miles distant from it. This valuable property became an object of enterprise for people to get and convey to market, first generally in the form of logs. Few owners of the land were in this part of the country, which gave people the opportunity to get it where they saw fit, but as the business extended owners were found and many people became engaged in manufacturing the timber into boards, scantling, &c., and into hewed timber, staves and shingles for market. Among these quite a great proportion of the residents in the former and present towns of Deerpark engaged, in which some did a small business, others on a medium scale, and some to a very great extent. This, with few exceptions, was done on a credit system, by running in debt to merchants and farmers for the necessary supplies the individuals wanted for their business, which generally was made payable every ensuing spring and fall, at which time the lumber was run down the river to market. In progressing in this manner many disappointments occurred which caused failures in making payments according to agreements, in consequence of disasters on the river, unsteady prices of lumber and of the produce necessary for that business, wages, &c., and many other causes of failures contributed to make business for justices, and constables of the old County of Ulster, who resided in the former town of Mamakating. As early as 1792 when I was constable and a resident of that town, I had to travel several times a distance of between 15 and 40 miles to serve processes for recovery of debts from persons who resided along the river between Pond Eddy and Cochecton, and who were in poor circumstances to pay debts. These lumbered under great disadvantages in getting round timber from the mountains bordering on the river, which business they had commenced after the war ended. After the war terminated, boards and other sawed timber were much wanted for building purposes within the present town of Deerpark, where the enemy had burned the buildings of the inhabitants, and these materials were not manufactured in this vicinity at that time. It became necessary to build saw mills to furnish those articles, and three men, Capt. Abraham Cuddeback, Benjamin Cuddeback and Capt. Abraham Westfall, built a saw mill on a brook at that time termed Bush-kill, at or near the present tanning establishment of Mr. O. B. Wheeler, near the bridge across the Neversink river on the Mount Hope and Lumberland turnpike; and three other men, Benjamin Depuy, Esq., Elias Gumaer and Samuel Depuy, built a saw mill on the present premises of Abraham Cuddeback, Esq., on the same brook on which his present saw mill stands.