Nowhere else in municipal management do we fine or shame private citizens for failing to maintain public property.
Author Archives: Cynthia Van Ness
Who Was Buffalo’s First Woman Property Owner?
What makes women property owners unusual at this time is that once they married, they could not buy, hold, or sell property under their own names. On their wedding day, by law, husbands automatically acquired all right and title to whatever land or fortunes women brought to the marriage.
Use These Five Simple Tricks to Get Research Assistance
What we want to do here is help you, the person with local history, family, or house history questions, get help from libraries, archives, museums, historical organizations, government record offices, and genealogical societies.
Remembering City’s Martyr in Fight Against Klan
The Buffalo Klan members were not rural, undereducated whites with poor economic prospects. Here, the Klan’s 4,000 members were drawn mostly from the Protestant, educated, professional and merchant middle class.
Was the Michigan Street Baptist Church a Secret Hiding Place?
The professional historians who compiled the 2013 Historic Structures Report of the Michigan Street Baptist Church were unable to find any period evidence that the church served as a hiding place during Underground Railroad days.
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How Come No One Has an Old Picture of My House?
Illustration of woman with camera courtesy of Pixabay Or maybe you’re looking for an old picture of your playground, corner tavern, or favorite neighborhood delicatessen. The first place to check is with your local library, museum, or historical society. Maybe it turns out that they have thousands of old pictures but they don’t have yourContinue reading “How Come No One Has an Old Picture of My House?”
Buffalo Takes on the Ku Klux Klan
On the evening on August 31, 1924, shots rang out in front of 128 Durham Street, near Delavan and Grider in Buffalo. Moments later, Special Officer Edward C. Obertean lay mortally wounded; Klansman Thomas Austin was dead; and a Ku Klux Klan recruiter, or Kleagle, had a gunshot wound in the groin. Armed warfare hadContinue reading “Buffalo Takes on the Ku Klux Klan”
Back Cover Blurb for City on the Edge
It is easy to dismiss Buffalo as the poster child of urban decrepitude and dysfunction. It is also wrong.
Thoughts on Little Libraries
LLs are a creative solution to the fact that in many places, book supply exceeds demand. There are more books than there are collectors or libraries or used bookstores or rummage sales who want or need them.
