Morrisville, NY

Morrisville is a Madison County village on U.S. Route 20, where Main Street runs east toward Madison and west toward Cazenovia. Thomas Morris arrived in 1796, and the settlement first called Morris Flats became the county seat in 1817. That role put the courthouse and county offices at the center of village life for nearly a century; the county seat moved to Wampsville in 1907, and the old county property became SUNY Morrisville. The college now gives the village an educational and agricultural presence, with the Morrisville fish hatchery and Equestrian Center among its local facilities. The village sits in the town of Eaton, with the Chenango River rising in the nearby Morrisville Swamp and crossing the southwest part of the village. Main Street, the former county-seat grounds, and the college campus make Morrisville easy to read as a place that shifted from county government to education while keeping its early road-and-river geography.