I've never heard of "homesteading" in NY as people did it in the west. Lands may have been patented or granted for military service, but speculators or the state were busy buying up the land and selling them for profit - not something likely to lead to what we know as homesteading. Homesteading is a federal program on federal lands and since NY is who took al the land from the Indians there isn't much chance of a federal homestead program in the state. In the early 20th century I do beieve there was a program in NY where farms occupied by families for so-many generatiosn could receive a tax break if they met certain criteria based on the history of property ownership - thus farms that were in families for several generatiosn becaem known as "The Smith Homestead" etc. The program / programs in NY may have come about as the result of the federal homestead benefits given farmers in other parts of the country. This could be had even if your family had only owned the property for 50 years, which leads today to many confusing property histories as people assume that the homestead designation means what it does elsewhere and that the family was the original settler and improved the land in exchange for title. Not so in NY. We have "homesteads" in Cazenovia and surrounding towns which were first sold in the 1790s by the Holland Land Company or by Peter Smith, and which went through several hands until the "homsteading family" acquired it in the 1820s or 1830s. I grew up on "The Old Annas Homestead" which had at least three owners before the Annas family bought it in 1813. The well known "Cook Homstead" is a good example of the confusion as people have assumed that the Cook family purchased it in the 1790s, when they only purchased it in about 1815. Dan W. http://www.rootsweb.com/~nyccazen/ Check out all the new material!!!!!