When Joshua Bentley Jr., found the center of the new town to be on an island in a stream, he cut down a small cherry tree, made it into a sharpened stake, drove it down, and named the stream Cherry Creek. The town took its name from the creek, settlement was made, and a village started in the locality once famous for its cherry trees, to which was given the name Cherry Creek.
The first settlement in the town of Cherry Creek was made by Joseph M. Kent in the spring of 1815. He was born in Royalton, Vermont, and after having lived in Herkimer and Onondaga counties, moved to Chautauqua County, settling in what is now Cherry Creek with his wife and seven children. In the summer of 1812, John P. Kent, a son, and John Dighton, cut out the first road from Kent’s Mill in Villenova, 16 miles through Cherry Creek to Kennedyville, for which they received from the Holland Land Company $10 dollars a mile.
James Marks, the next purchaser of land, built his log house, covered with bark and without any floor, and moved in his furniture, consisting of an ax, a gun and a baking kettle. This was the first house built in the now incorporated village of Cherry Creek. His house soon after became unoccupied and remained so until about 1824; it was then fitted up for a schoolhouse for the first school taught in the village.
