The Patchogue-Port Jefferson Road also known as NY State 112 was known as the Patchogue Stage Road in the 19th and early 20th centuries, serving as the main thoroughfare for New England residents taking stagecoaches from Port Jefferson to Patchogue for a total of 12.55 miles.
Most of the old stage road was acquired by the state of New York in 1913, however the Patchogue–Port Jefferson state highway did not receive a posted designation until the 1930s renumbering of state highways in New York, when it became NY 112.
The road continued on through the hamlet of Coram for 4.5 miles beginning at Granny Road where the Holy Sepulchre Cemetery was established in 1942, besides the intersecting of Sunrise Highway and the Long Island Expressway to the south, the only major intersection was at the Middle Country Road in the middle of Coram, until 1972 when the North Ocean Avenue was expanded to the designated Patchogue- Mt. Sinai Road an alternate four lane Road connecting the two hamlets.
Old maps show it traveled north from Coram through desolate pine and oak forests, except for development that began off Pauls Path beginning in 1929 and expanding during the 1930s through the 1950s, the Coram Drive In Movie opened in 1954.
The Brewster Terry house stood on the east side of the road just south of Paul's Path, entering Coram “center” the road passed by the original Coram firehouse built in 1933, the Rovagna’s general Store, and a scattering of homes just north of the Middle Country Road, passing by the Still family farm and continuing on past Pine Road, where the Town dump was located and then continuing on to Port Jefferson
Parts of NY 112 have been realigned to bypass curves or turns in the original stage road. One former segment lies behind a New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) maintenance yard in Coram which passed by the old Coram Sanatorium 1913-1930s.
Additional sections near Pine Road in Coram and a segment near East Gate in North Coram were at one time a part of the original route.
In the 1960s and 1970s, NYSDOT wanted to realign both NY 112 and NY 25 in Coram .
Plans to realign NY 112 in this area date as far back as the 1930s.
The road has remained a two lane roadway albeit for an expanded center turning lane and vegetated island separating the north and south lanes.
In 2009 a ground breaking was held for the expansion from Old Town Road north to Route 347, and a chunk of the original concrete roadway was presented to Coram Fire District Commissioner Thomas Lyon, whose father, Frank Lyon worked on the original roadway. Construction began in 2017 to widen the roadway from Middle Country Road, south to the Expressway.
The Old Town Pump
The old town pump at the intersection of the Patchogue-Port Jefferson state road called the Middle Country Road in Coram served as a landmark for many years, The device was the old type of chain pump and was for many years a convenience. When the state highway department rebuilt the Middle Country Road, the pump was right in the path of the new route. It was removed and lay at the side of the road for several years. The D.A.R. (Daughters of the American Revolution) made a large hole next to the road was filled in, the old pump was dumped into the hole and covered up.
It was buried at the foot of a large maple tree next to “Billy’s Windmill,” a roadhouse and refreshment stand at the junction of the old road and the new. There is a triangle of ground on which there is a boulder bearing a tablet commemorating the burning of the British forage at Coram during the Revolution.
Permission to dig this well was given in 1833 to Richard W. Smith, Smith petitioned the commissioners of highways, “to build a well at or near his signposts, standing a little to the west of the southwest corner of his barroom and the said well to be used with a pump only and a small trough or half-hogshead tub for the purpose of a watering place for his convenience.” The commissioners examined said place and considered it of no inconvenience to the public and granted the privilege to make the well.
Mr. Smith kept a tavern, and it dated back to early in the eighteenth century. The stage coaches stopped there with the mail, and during the Revolution it was occupied by the British. In 1865 the tavern burned down. In 1867 a new house was built by Horace Overton which was later owned by Mrs. O’Doherty. On July 3, 1883. The town approved the purchase and placement of the well at Coram opposite the residence of Mrs. O’Doherty, a pump, the expense not to exceed $12.00 for the use of the public.
In a 1899 a newspaper article reported on deteriorating condition of the pump stating It is a chain pump and the chain has by long use worn away the inside of the tubing so that the water runs back almost as fast as it can be raised. It requires vigorous and patient turning of the crank to bring any water at all and the bearings are partly gone so that the wheel shaft slips out of place unless care is taken to hold it there.
Written by,
Jeff Davis
March 2021