 In 1790, George Scriba, a merchant of New York City and a German by birth, purchased of land lying between Oneida Lake and Lake Ontario, for the sum of $80,000 (approximately $870,000 in today's money).This purchase, known as "Scriba's Patent", was bounded on the east by Fish Creek and on the west by the Oswego River, and embraced 14 towns in Oswego County and four towns in Oneida County.Around 1794, Scriba founded the settlement of Vera Cruz at the mouth of Little Salmon Creek (today known as the Little Salmon River), on the shore of Lake Ontario, northeast of Fort Ontario.