History of Graves Maple Products

In 1635, John Graves immigrated to the American Colonies from England and settled in Concord, Massachusetts. He was followed by Jeremiah Graves and Benjamin Graves in 1645. Benjamin served in the Indian wars in 1675 and died in 1724.

According to the New England Historical Genealogical Society Jeremiah Graves, a descendent of John Graves was born in Connecticut in 1728 and served in the revolutionary war. He had 8 children by his first wife and five by his second wife. He had children from 1750 through 1806 at a span of 56 years.

We don’t know how the Graves family exactly arrived in Potter County, Pennsylvania. Both Ezra Levi Graves, a son of Jonah Graves and Ezra Levi Graves, (the son of Ezra Levi Graves) are both buried in Sharon Center, Pennsylvania.

Ezra Levi Graves was born in Vienna, New York in 1834 and moved to Michigan where Roy Albert Graves was born in 1875. The nearest we know sometime in the later 1800’s the Graves’ moved to Pennsylvania. In the 1890’s just before the turn of the century Roy Albert married Cora Seely and they moved to Clara, Pennsylvania. They moved in with Cora’s parents, George and Miranda, who settled on the farm in the late 1800’s. The Seely family owned the neighboring farm. Through the years the family made maple syrup, using oxen to haul sap and the use of buckets on trees. The maple syrup was canned and used by the family as needed.

Roy and Cora lived in a small room attached to the house. They began a family there with the birth of Roy Lyle, William and Nelson Albert. Soon after, with a growing family Roy and Cora bought their own place, a farm half a mile up the road from the Moffit family. The Moffit family farm became available after the sudden suicide of Mr. Moffit. Mr. Moffit had wished to sign his farm over to his son but after a trip to the county courthouse, Mr. Moffit requested his son agree to take care of his mother should something happen to him. The son refused to this request, so the property was never signed over. Later that evening after dinner, there was a gunshot in the basement and Mr. Moffit took his own life.

Nelson A. Graves purchased the current Graves Farm from his grandmother Miranda Seely in 1930 after the passing of his grandfather George Seely. Allowing Miranda Seely to remain living at the house until her passing in 1940.

In 1938 Nelson A Graves married Esther Drabert from Roulette, Pa. Nelson and Esther soon started raising their children, which were William, Nelson Robert, Linda and James. They too collected sap each year with the use of buckets on trees and used horses to haul sap which was later replaced with a John Deere tractor. Sap was boiled under a small shelter outside, then taken inside to be finished and canned. Also used mostly by family as needed.

In 1966 Nelson Robert (Bob) was discharged from the U.S. Army and married Barbara Wilson of Portville, New York in 1970. They put a mobile home in and later built a house on the farm where they still reside. They raised their three children Roy Joseph, Kelly, and Jackie on the farm. They continued to make maple syrup through the years, with the first modern evaporator being purchased in 1978 which was a wood fire 3x8. This was soon replaced with a 4x14 wood fired evaporator in the early 1980’s as they expanded their tap count from a couple hundred taps to 800-1000 taps. These were originally buckets hung in the woods, then transitioned to tubing on gravity.

In the early 1990’s with Roy Joseph (Joe) going to college they quit making syrup for a few years.

In 1997 Joe married Brandy Leilous of Bolivar, New York. They soon built a house on the family farm and began raising their family too. Their children are Ryan, Camden, and Kaitlyn.

Soon after this Bob and Joe along with their families started making maple syrup again. This time with a 3x10 evaporator with 500 taps on tubing with gravity. They soon started expanding and reached 2100 taps on the farm. This came along with a Leader 3x12 Inferno evaporator system and reverse osmosis.

In 2022 Joe and Brandy along with Bob and Barb formed Graves Maple Products, LLC.

This brought on another expansion the same year as they leased a neighboring woodlot which added an additional 5,000 taps and bought their total to 7,000 taps.