1901-19131901 The Pan-Am Exposition to 1913 The Eve of W.W. I
1901
1900s:Buffalo celebrates the dawn of the new century in grand style. The Pan-American Exposition of 1901 is a flamboyant display of vitality and wealth put on for all the world to see. But the heady optimism of those days is marred by the assassination of President William McKinley during a visit to the fairgrounds. Electricity, a focal point of the Exposition will soon join technological innovations such as telephone service, automotive transportation, cinema, radio, and powered flight in the mainstream of American life. -- Source: "Buffalo News: Headlines & History"Pan-American Exposition:May 1 Pan-American Exposition opens Sept.. 5President McKinley visits the Pan-Am on President's Day Sept. 6 The president visits the fair for a 4 p.m. reception in the Temple of Music.Leon Czolgosz shoots him twice with a pistol. McKinley is operated on in the expo's hospital and taken to the home of Pan-Am President John Milburn to recuperate. Sept. 14 President McKinley dies at John Milburn's houseSept.. 14.Theodore Roosevelt is sworn in as president in the library of Ansley Wilcox's home at 641 Delaware Ave., now the Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural SiteSept. 23Leon Czolgosz is found guilty of killing the president. Oct. 29 Czolgosz is electrocuted in the state's electric chair at Auburn Prison. Nov. 1 Exposition closes 1901 City mapHotel Fillmore- established by Millard Fillmore's son after the former president's death - isrenamed the Castle Inn to take advantage of Pan-Am Expo business Brewing Industry: Grain trades lead to development of a brewing industry, with 19 independently owned breweries in the city, the largest being the Gerhard Lang Company Buffalo is the 8th largest city in the US in terms of population. Oct. 23 Buffalo Pottery is founded as part of the Larkin Soap Co., a soap manufacturer that grew into one of the country's largest mail-order companies. As a marketing strategy to spur soap sales, founder John D. Larkin gives away pottery to soap buyers. Buffalo Pottery will change its name in 1956 to Buffalo China Inc. Oct. 24 Annie Edson Taylor goes over Niagara Falls in a barrel. Buffalo hosts the biennial meeting of the National Association of Colored Women.Mary Talbert History, illustrations Buildings erected: Annunciation RC ChurchBuffalo General Hospital - East Wing
1902
Buildings erected: The Green & Wicks-designed YMCA Hotel, which opens in 1902, contains 1800 rooms. The Buffalo YMCA is one of the first, if not the first, Association building to provide extensive accommodations for lodgers. Hotel TouraineEmergency Hospital opens in February at Pine and Eagle Streets. It later becomes Sheehan Emergency. Kenilworth Park racetrack (Photo)in Tonawanda opens for business. It will close in 1908. Pratt and Lambert, the largest varnish company in the world at the time, announces plan in February to move U.S. headquarters to Buffalo. There are 500 automobiles in Buffalo and a chapter of the Automobile Club of America actively lobbying on behalf of the city's motorists. BuffalonianWillis Carrier invents the air conditioner. Scranton, Pa., has a dwindling coal supply and a growing steelworkers' union. Buffalonians like John Milburn, the Goodyear brothers, John Albright, W. C. Ely (International Railroad Company president), George Urban, Jacob Schoellkopf convince Walter Scranton, the president of the Lackawanna Iron and Steel Company of Scranton, Pennsylvania to relocate to the Buffalo area.. John Albright quietly bought over one thousand acres of land in the adjoining county of West Seneca. The city of Buffalo and New York State added 325 acres. (Later the city will be renamed Lackawanna.) The Lackawanna Iron and Steel Company begins making steel using the first installed Bessemer Converter. In October 1922, the company will be consolidated into the Bethlehem Steel Co. The Lackawanna Steel Company and the Buffalo and Susquehanna Iron Company Illustrations, history John J. Albright Illustrations, history, architecure
1903
On December 17, 1903, amid the dunes of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Wilbur and Orville Wright achieved one of civilized man's fondest dreams - flight. It lasts only twelve seconds, but that brief flight of a manned, heavier-than-air machine ushers in the age of aviation. Ironically, this milestone, which marks one of the greatest advancements in the history of man, is witnessed by only a handful of people and is largely overlooked by most newspapers of the day. Buildings erected: Charles W. Goodyear HouseLafayette High SchoolKlinck HouseGeorge Barton HouseJohn W. Bush HouseHighland Lodge #835
1904
Appendix and Index to Volume 7 of the Buffalo Historical Society Publications Reprinted by Cornell U. The Larkin Factory Administration Building, 680 Seneca St. is Frank Lloyd Wright's first completed nonresidential commission, and it so dramatically breaks with the historicist styles then dominating Western architecture that, by the year 2000, it is considered one of the most significant buildings in the world, signaling the beginning of the Modernism. The Larkin company will go bankrupt in the Depression (although the mail order business will continue until 1967), and the City of Buffalo will acquire the Administration building in tax forfeiture. It will attempt to market the Larkin, then will raze it in 1950 for a truck stop restaurant that never materializes. Buffalo's city government is now the author of the most famous vacant lot in American architectural history. The North Presbyterian Church on Main and Huron is demolished and replaced by the Hippodrome Theatre The largest milling company in Buffalo is the Urban Company. The first in the United States to be powered by electricity, the Urban mills are capable of producing 1,200 barrels of flour daily. George Urban Jr. is the president of the company. Buildings erected: Arthur Hedstrom EstateHotel LafayetteAlbright Art GalleryPhilip Smith HouseGeorge A. Austin House
1905
Lumber: The passage of lumber through the port of Buffalo makes the city one of the great lumber centers in the country. In the early days following the completion of the Erie Canal, Buffalo merchants had handled the shipment of lumber and were involved in all aspects of the lumber trade. Some, like FrankandCharles Goodyear, by buying up millions of acres of Pennsylvania timber land, had come to control the initial stages of lumber production. In 1905 the Goodyear brothers buy half a million more acres of timber lands on the Bogue Lusa Creek in Washington Parish, Louisiana. Their company, the Southern Lumber Company, builds several saw mills and a railroad, and plans a town, "complete with its own colored quarters." Bogalusa Story by C. W. Goodyear (Charles' grandson). E-text of a 1950 book that includes photos and text about the Goodyear brothers and their investment in Louisiana forests and the town of Bogalusa in 1906 Buffalo and Susquehanna Iron Company Illustrations, history Buffalo'spopulation: 376,587; Erie County's: 473,700. The Niagara Movement, held in Buffalo, encourages discussion and actions that contribute to the formation of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Led by William E.B. DuBois, who is assisted by Buffalonians Mary Talbert and the Rev. Jesse Edward Nash, the organization attempts to "aggressively and unconditionally seek the civil rights for their people that all other Americans enjoyed." Mary Talber, is a prominent member of Buffalo's Michigan Street Baptist Church. Buildings erected: Albright Art GalleryWilliam Heath HouseGardener's CottageCharles Mosier House
1906
Appendix A, B, C, Buffalo Historical Society Publications and Index (1837-1838) Reprinted by Cornell U. James N. Adam elected mayor (1906-1909). He co-founded the J. N. Adam department store His brother was Robert B. Adam, who was a co-founder of Adam, Meldrum and Anderson department store. The brothers were immigrants from Scotland. Pandemonium breaks out one fine day in 1906 when a large dark object appears in the sky. Carriages, wagons, streetcars, automobiles and bicycles halt in their tracks as Buffalonians crane their necks to peer at the cigar-shaped object overhead. The record shows that "Every street car on Main Street was stopped and all the children were let out of school to watch it. For two hours you couldn't get a telephone connection because everybody was at the windows." Thus is Buffalo introduced to the Aviation Age. The Aero Club of Buffalo, oldest such club in America, arranges the visit of a dirigible to Western New York to stimulate broader interest in aviation. It is most successful. During the first half of the twentieth century the Niagara Frontier will become one of the nation's leading aviation centers. Buildings erected: Unitarian Universalist ChurchSpaulding BuildingDarwin D. Martin HouseCalumet BuildingAnsonia BuildingE. B. Green HouseLarkin Administration BuildingLarkin Company B, C, D, E, F, G, H, J, K, N, O BuildingFirst Statler Hotel: The magnificent Gothic style St. John's Episcopal Church, built in 1846, is torn down and replaced by the first Statler Hotel across from the hive of offices in the Ellicott Square Building. Pierce-Arrow Motor Car Company Plant: TheGeorge Pierce Company, later known as the Pierce-Arrow Motor Car Company, begins production of motor cars in a modem plant built on Elmwood Ave. The new plant is completed on September 1, 1906 and enables greater production of the internationally known motor cars.
1908
Bruce M. Shanks, Buffalo Evening News editorial cartoonist born. In 1951, Shanks, 43, former sports cartoonist at the Buffalo Times, will be named editorial cartoonist of the Buffalo Evening News, succeeding William H. Summers, who died Mar 17 1951.In 1958, Shanks, 50, Buffalo Evening News editorial cartoonist, will win the 1958 Pulitzer Prize for journalism for Editorial Cartooning for his cartoon "The Thinker," portraying labor union members troubled by racketeering union leaders.Shanks will die in 1958. Auto Industry Thirty independent automobile companies will operate in Buffalo during the first quarter of the 20th century, producing among them the Kensington, the Babcock Electric, and the Pierce. The two most famous are the Thomas Flyer and Pierce-Arrow. In 1908. the Flyer took first place in a 16,000 mile race from New York to Paris. During this 16-month trip, the cars traveled the primitive roads of western U.S., Siberia, and eastern Europe. Buildings erected: Walter V. Davidson HouseBarker Square Condominiums
1909
The Co-Operative Amusement Company, composed of over 100 stockholders, largely businessmen and professionals from the East Side, build the "fireproof" Savoy movie theatre with a Neoclassical frontage at the corner of William and Krettner. The architect is Henry L. Spann, who later will design Shea's North Park Theatre, which still operates in 2002 on Hertel Avenue. The Mirror Theatre - a nickelodeon - is built at 311 Connecticut, corner of Plymouth. In 2002, it is a bar and banquet hall called the Armory. Sandhu, Rajit.Buffalo's Forgotten Theaters History, illustrations The first local "flying machine" built of sticks, wire and cloth in an East side barn, is hauled to the Buffalo Country Club polo field at Main and Bailey and flies to a height of four feet above the ground and promptly crashes. Buffalo becomes one of the first cities in the nation to provide vocational education for high school students. Buildings erected: Buffalo SeminaryRalph Huntington Sidway HouseAppleton House39 Bidwell ParkwayHenry Smith House
1910
Industry booms in the early years of the twentieth century, particularly the iron and steel industries. In 1910 over ten thousand people work in the more than 150 iron and steel factories in the city (six thousand worked at Lackawanna). But still, despite their dominance, iron and steel represented only ten percent of Buffalo's industrial output. Over 3,600 people now work in the automobile industry, 3,400 in the manufacture and repair of railroad cars, and 1,800 in the manufacture of copper. Meanwhile, Buffalo's commercial orientation, rooted in the city's traditional function as a clearinghouse for the raw products of the Midwest, remains strong and diversified. On one September day in 1910 thirty-one ships arrive in the harbor carrying lumber, livestock, pig iron, corn, flour, barley, rye, and over one million tons of grain. The next day thirty-three boats docked In 1910 Buffalo is still the greatest grain port in the world, and shows every sign of so remaining. Because of its superb shipping and storage facilities - the dozen or so gigantic steel elevators that line the lakefront handle two million bushels of grain daily - Buffalo is second only to Minneapolis as a milling center. John W. Percy,The Erie Canal: From Lockport to Buffalo Katheryne T. Whittemore, Carving the Harbor That Built Buffalo Essay Eric Brunger, The Ditch That Made Buffalo the Queen City of the Lakes Essay Erie Canal - Links. Includes section on classroom activities Buffalo'spopulation: 423,715; Erie County's: 528,985. Buffalo's Aero Club sponsors a successful flight from the Buffalo Country Club polo field at Main and Bailey by A. L. Pfitzner. Thomas Edison demonstrated the first talking motion picture. Motion Picture Inventions History plus links Polish and Italian immigrants: The communities created by Buffalo'sPolish and Italian immigrants are similar in many respects. Sharply defined by class and ethnicity, identified by and named after a virtually endless litany of parish churches - St. Anthony's, St. Girard's, Assumption, Annunciation, St. Florian's, St. Stanislaus, Holy Angels, Holy Family, Corpus Christi - they flourished, tribelike and tightly-knit, revolving around home, family, and neighborhood. Behind the curtain of ethnicity that separates these communities from the rest of the city (contemporaries referred to them as "cities within the city"), there is great diversity. Buildings erected: ScheideMantel HousePalmer House
1911
Encyclopedia Britannica.1911 entry on Buffalo A leading early stunt flyer, Lincoln Beachy, has been taught to to fly by Glenn Curtiss and demonstrates his talent in June on the Niagara Frontier in a Curtiss biplane He roars off the field at the old Driving Park at East Ferry and Humboldt Parkway, thrilling 20,000 enthusiasts at the Buffalo Aviation Meet, then heads over for Niagara Falls where he wins a $1000 prize for flying into the gorge, passing over the "Maid of the Mist" boat and under the Honeymoon Bridge. Driving Park is bounded by E. Ferry, Jefferson, Northland, and Humboldt Parkway. Later it will be named the Buffalo Fair Grounds, and then as the Hamlin Park neighborhood. The Dziennik dla Wszystkich, "Everybody's Daily," was Buffalo's Polish daily newpaper. This paper contained many death notices of local residents or Polish immigrants which makes this paper a valuable resource for genealogists researching their Polish ancestors. The newspaper ran from 1911 thru 1957 with some months missing and some periods during WW2 not containing any death notices because they were National Editions. Sometimes the death notices contain the place in Poland where the person was born, but usually just says born in Poland. It sometimes states the age and how many years the person was in America. Most list family members of deceased. - Source: Dziennik dla Wszystkich Project Buildings erected: Engine #15 Fire StationSeymour White HouseSaints Peter & Paul RC Church, HamburgCentral Presbyterian ChurchDr. E. J. Meyer BuildingSt. Gerard's RC ChurchFirst Church of Christ, ScientistAutomobile Club of BuffaloGeorge and Dollie ThorneHouseMinot Tanner HouseLarkin Company �U� Building
