In the Gazetteer and Business Directory of Madison County, N. Y. Hamilton  
Child described the town of Lebanon thus: 

    It is the center town upon the south border of the County. Its 
   surface is a hilly upland, lying between the Chenango and Otselic 
   Rivers. The summits in the west part are 500 to 800 feet above the 
   valley. The valley of the Chenango River, extending through the 
   east part is about one mile, and is bordered by steep hillsides. 

 That picture must have been in the mind of General Erastus Cleveland when 
he brought before the state legislature the act to split off a portion of 
the town of Hamilton to create a new township on 6 February 1807. When 
asked for the new town's name, he cried out, alluding to the Bible, "Ah, as  
the cedars of Lebanon. The new town of Lehanon." The name pleased many of  
them who had trudged long miles from Lebanon, Connecticut, and they  
believed that the general had suggested the name as a tribute to them. 
 The area was first settled in 1791 by Joshua Smith of Franklin,  
Connecticut. Colonel William S. Smith (no known relation to Joshua but his  
commanding officer during the Revolution), the son-in-law of John Adams,  
first vice president and second president of the United States, was  
interested in buying the land. Joshua sent the colonel a firsthand report. 
The colonel was impressed and purchased the 150,000 acres for $24,375,  
paying for it in three installments. 
 The colonel had nine brothers who settled in that part of the town which  
became Smith's Valley, near modern Randallsville. One of these brothers,  
Justus B. Smith, acted as the colonel's land agent, supervising the  
division of the land into lots and the sale of these lots to pioneers. 
Harry E. Hart, in his Lehanon Hill Journal, furnishes the following 
anecdote about Justus B. Smith, and a visit paid him by Jonathan Bates, one 
of those pioneer settlers of Lehanon: 

    It seems that after Jonathan had paid for his land Justus Smith 
   kept putting him off at neglecting to make out a proper deed for 
   the property. After requesting several times that his deed be 
   made out, Jonathan tired of being put off, loaded his rifle and 
   proceeded to Mr. Smiths house. Entering the house Bates stood the 
   loaded rifle near him, folded his arms across his broad chest and 
   demanded a deed to his property be made out forthwith. Smith 
   replied in his usual manner, "I will make your deed tomorrow. I am 
   busy today." "Smith," said Bates, "you will make out my deed today," 
   and reaching for his rifle with meaning "or you are a dead man." 
   There was a wild flurry of papers, as Smith immediately started to 
   make out the deed. 
  
 Smith's Valley later became a station on the New York, Ontario & Western 
Railway and served as the southern terminus of the Utica, Clinton &  
Binghamton Railroad. James H. Smith, in his History of Chenango and  
Madison Counties, described Smith's Valley as once "the seat of many of  
Lebanon's important enterprises, it early lapsed into a state of rural  
repose to be aroused from its Vip Van Winkle period by the introduction of  
the railroads." 
 Just as with Fenner and Georgetown, Lebanon has been, and continues to 
be, a farming community. Marion B. Dunham has written: 

    While the farmers themselves were 'do-it-yourselfers,' some of 
   the specialized jobs were done by artisans who were skilled in 
   that specialty. Lebanon had a tannery, saw mill, cheese factory, 
   black smith, wagon maker, general mechanic, boot- and shoe maker, 
   tailor, dressmaker, milliner, a potashery and a hatter. 

 Luna M. Hammond also noted that "one of the first, if not the best cotton  
factories in Madison County, was built on the Chenango River at 
Middleport ... in 1814. Sheetings and printed goods were made here. Not  
having machinery for making first quality cloth, they changed [she does  
not specify exactly when] to woolen manufacture". 
 Much commercial prosperity was brought to Lebanon by the railroad.  
Although planning and surveying of a line from Syracuse to Earlville was 
begun in the late 1830s, it was not until the Reconstruction Era following  
the Civil War, that the Chenango Branch Railroad was completed, on  
Lincoln's Birthday 1873. 
 The railroad probably had its highest influence on the dairying interests  
in the town. In a newspaper clipping, Mrs. Warren Catlin wrote of this  
influence: 

    In the middle 1890s a man named Eastman built several milk 
   stations close in proximity to the depots along the Chenango 
   Branch Railroad running between Earlville and Syracuse, with 
   the idea of leasing or selling them to milk dealers. One was 
   built at Lebanon where the [Lebanon Dairymen's] League plant 
   now stands. In the early 1900's the first Mutual Company, 
   next the Central Dairy Company, and thirdly Borden owned and 
   operated it. 

 When the Borden company closed the plant in the winter of 1920, dairy  
farmers banded together, formed the Lebanon Dairymen's League, bought the  
plant and reopened it in 1924. Milk was shipped out by train to New York  
City. The plant burned in 1930, was rebuilt and continued in operation 
until, by 1952, under Andrew Turner's management, "a total of 79 dairies 
[were] then delivering milk to the plant." 

	The introduction of the tank truck (which cut the volume of milk  
being processed), higher costs, and stiffer competition forced the milk  
plant, one of the town's last major industries, to close on 1 December 
1958. Despite the closing of the town's last major industry, Lehanon still  
has its productive farms.