Visting the Oneida Indian Nation (from Cycling Along The Canals of New York State.)
The Oneida Indian Nation, one of the first five Haudenosaunee nations, played a critical part in the success of the American Revolution. You will have learned about this if you bicycled by the Herkimer home near Little Falls, through the Oriskany Battlefield, or by Fort Stanwix in Rome. To find out more, take a short side trip to the Oneida cultural center located on NY 46 five and one-half miles south of the Old Erie Canal Historic State Park towpath.
To get to the Shako:Wi Cultural Center, get on to NY 46 where it turns and crosses over the old canal near Durhamville and head into the city of Oneida. Follow it through Oneida past the intersection with NY 5, and ride another two miles south on NY 46. You'll arrive at the center where you can learn about the Haudenosaunee and the critically indispensable role the Oneida's played in the Revolution. Check out the arts and crafts on display.
After visiting the center, return to the Canalway Trail as you came, following NY 46 back to the Old Erie Canal State Park.
However there is one more interesting very short detour, a visit to the Skenandoah Boulder.
"Oneida" ("Onyota'a:ka) means "people of the standing stone." Oneida legend says that the Oneida were led to these lands by following a moving stone; where it stopped, they settled. There is another ice-age linkage here because glaciers move staggering amounts of loose stone and boulders (glaciers are made up of about one-third stone and two-thirds ice) and deposit these stones as erratics. Erratics are non-native stones and boulders which can be found all over New York. Syenite is one type of erratic and is frequently found in Oneida territories The Skenandoah Boulder is perhaps the largest syenite erratic. It is named for a very famous Oneida Chief Skenandoah, who was a close friend of Benjamin Franklin.
The Skenandoah Boulder is perhaps the largest syenite erratic.
To visit the stone, head east on NY 5 exactly 1.2 miles from the intersection with NY 46. As you pass through village of Oneida Castle, on NY 5, note that this was once the site of the principal Oneida village, known as Kanonwalohale. After visiting the Skenandoah Boulder, return to NY 46 on NY 5, head north on NY 46 through Oneida to the Old Erie Canal State Park.