Myrick family

Albert G. Myrick and his brothers Samuel and John William were raised by their mother, Sophia, in Palmyra, N.Y. By the mid-1840s, Albert had begun to build up a substantial business designing and producing stone monuments for graves, and thanks to an impressive network of agents, his business soon extended from New York state to as far away as Kentucky and Michigan. Like many antebellum New Yorkers in his position, he furthered his financial position by speculating in lands in Michigan. By the mid-1850s, he had carved out a secure position in the economic and social elite of Palmyra, cemented through his Masonic ties and business contacts.

As a prominent and wealthy man living in a political and social hotbed, Myrick was almost inevitably drawn into politics. He was one of local movers in helping to found and rally support for the nativist American (Know-Nothing) Party during the mid-1850s, and when that party foundered, he helped to support the Constitutional Union Party. When that, too, dissolved, Myrick turned his allegiance to the Democratic Party, remaining in the Democratic fold for the remainder of his life. More an organizer than a figurehead, Myrick held only a few political offices in his life, most notably a position with the New York Canal Department in the 1850s and 1860s, but he never rose to greater prominence than mayor of Palmyra (ca.1861). Albert died in about 1875.

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