99, held religious services in the
old Academy, on the present site of the Universalist church, and had
some youngsters of the village under his instruction. His descendants
lived in Cooperstown for more than a century after him.

The main building of Hartwick Seminary was erected in 1812, at the
present site, near the bank of the Susquehanna River, about five miles
southward of Cooperstown, and some four miles eastward from Hartwick
village. The school was opened in 1815, and received from the
legislature a charter in 1816. It is the oldest theological school in
the State of New York, and the oldest Lutheran theological seminary in
America. In addition to being a theological school, Hartwick Seminary is
now devoted to general education, and includes among its pupils not only
boys, but, in spite of the prejudice of its founder, young women.

Among the original trustees named in the charter of Hartwick Seminary
was the Rev. Daniel Nash, the first rector of Christ Church,
Cooperstown. Judge Samuel Nelson, and Col. John H. Prentiss, of
Cooperstown, were afterward trustees for many years, and in their time
there was among the people of this village a lively interest in Hartwick
Seminary, the literary exercises at the end of each scholastic year
being largely attended by visitors from Cooperstown. It is significant
of the close relation which formerly existed between the two villages
that the street which runs westward from the Presbyterian church in
Cooperstown, now called Elm Street, was at one time known to the
inhabitants as "the Hartwick Road."

Local history has wronged[24] the memory of John Christopher Hartwick by
the oft repeated statement that he committed suicide. It is true that a
man named Christianus Hartwick took his own life in 1800, and that his
grave lies in Hinman Hollow, only a few miles from Hartwick Seminary.
But John Christopher Hartwick, after whom the town and seminary are
named, died a natural death at Clermont, N. Y., four years before the
suicide.

A wanderer in life, Hartwick after his death was long in quest of a
peaceful grave. His remains were first buried in the graveyard of the
Lutheran church in East Camp. Two years later, in accordance with the
wish expressed in Hartwick's will, the body was removed and entombed
beneath the pulpit of Ebenezer church, at the corner of Pine and Lodge
streets, in Albany, deposited in a stone coffin, secured by brickwork,
and covered with an inscribed slab