Town Historians are appointed by law for municipalities throughout New York State.   The Town Historian's role is to assist in researching official town records related to the history of the town and to educate the public about the records.  Ms. Leath is available for these purposes, but she does not do historical or genealogical research for individuals.

See Articles for more information and photographs.

The historical website pages have been made available through a grant from the New York State Education Department, State Archives, Local Government Records Management Improvement Fund grant for historical records which provided funds for personnel and creation of this link on the Town’s website.  For more information, see the Town Clerk's page.

Bethlehem - by Town Historian Susan E. Leath, illustrates the history of our town with over 200 historic images dating from the 1880s to 1960.  The book is part of Arcadia Publishing's Images of America series and is available from the Town Clerk's office at a cost of $21.99.

Bethlehem Diary -- Copies of the Bethlehem Diary, resident Floyd Brewer's sequel to Bethlehem Revisited, are available at the Town Clerk's office.  For those who wish to know some of the history of the town, these make fine gifts. Copies are available at the reduced price of $9.50.
People of Bethlehem -- The book, People of Bethlehem, published by the Bethlehem Historical Association, is available at the Town Clerk's office for $20. This is a great genealogy tool and covers years 1698 through 1880. It also includes 15,000 name entries of over 1,400 families with church, government and private records used for the contents of the book.

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