By Mark Goldman:
I am personally thrilled with the recommendations made by ECHDC Chairman Levy. I am deeply proud of our community and the hundreds of people who stepped up to express their interest and concern about an issue that they felt so strongly about. I am deeply proud as well of our leadership who were willing and able to learn from and listen and respond to those who spoke up. The combination of an informed citizenry and a responsive leadership gives me great hope not only for our waterfront but for the future of Buffalo as well. This is, I believe, a significant day in our history and we should celebrate it.
While everybody knows that the Pierce-Arrow, that fabulous automobile known round the world that was favored by kings and pashas, playboys and bon vivants during the first thirty years of the last century, was made in Buffalo, how many people know where George Pierce (photo), the genius who founded the company that made that car of dreams, opened his first factory? You would be wrong, though understandably so, if you said that the first Pierce-Arrow plant was in that spectacular Taj Mahal of industry that dominates the landscape, towering regally, like Mont St. Michel off the coast of Normandy, over its drab surroundings most prominent of which are three eating establishments--Vino, Papa Jake and the Carriage Trade-- that I am sure the 6000 or so men and women who worked making those cars in that dream-like factory wished had been there then.
Well, then, if not there, where? Some of you know. Jim Sandoro, founder, curator and empresario of the Buffalo Transportation Museum knows. So too do Carl and Clary Burgwardt who since the early 1970s have created in a 7000 sq foot space in Orchard Park one of the most interesting and idiosyncratic museums anywhere, the Pedaling History Bicycle Museum. And, since talking to them I, who has done as much poking and digging around in the rich fields of Buffalo history as any one, since meeting with these people and visiting them in their establishments, finally know too. So, to end the mystery, to tell you a fact which just might, if you allow it, change your way of thinking about the waterfront, I will tell you. The first Pierce plant was.....you got it...on the waterfront; not anywhere on the waterfront but in the heart of the old streets of what we now interchangeably call "The Inner Harbor" or "Canalside." That's right. Right there, on the new streets that were unearthed and recreated as part of the 2004 plan for the area, at the corner of two iconic waterfront streets--Prime and Hanover--at the crossroads where two of our history's most powerful engines of economic growth--the railroad and the waterfront came together--George Pierce, in the 1880s built his first factory.
At first he made birdcages and then, for a reason that I have not figured out, he made the transition to bicycle manufacturing and by the end of the 1880s the George N. Pierce Company, located right next to the Commercial Slip at 6-22 Hanover Street, was producing a whole range of bicycles and tricycles for men, women and children. In an 1895 catalog, five models of "Queen" tricycles were offered for sale. The smallest, with a 16-inch wheel, for girls 3-5 years old, sold for $5.00, or $8.50 with rubber tires; the largest, with a 32-inch wheel, for girls 8-15 years old, sold for $12.00 or $18.00 with rubber tires.
The factory, though, was the thing. In a day of small manufacturing companies, with small work forces and small structures, the Pierce plant was a gigantic exception, the first and, with any luck, the last "big box" on the waterfront. At 25,000 sq feet this five story building, made of brick, wood and steel hovered over this intensely dense and busy part of the city. Everybody wanted Pierce's bicycles and by the time of the Pan American Expo in 1901 they were being shipped, from Hanover Street, by the DL&W railroad whose tracks were just outside the plant's front door, to homes in countries all over the world. The bicycle, produced in that fabulous factory in the heart of what we now call "Canalside", had made Pierce a rich man and had put Buffalo on the map as one of the world's great centers of bicycle production.
Soon, Pierce made the transition from bicycles to cars and in 1901 The George N. Pierce & Company built two cars, both manufactured at the Hanover Street plant. By the end of the year Pierce has sold over two dozen autos and in 1904 he unveiled the Pierce Arrow, at $4000 the biggest and most expensive automobile on the U.S. market. It was time to move to bigger and newer quarter and in 1907, Pierce left Canalside, abandoning his factory at Hanover and Prime for his brand new, gigantic really "big box" facility, the building that we know today as The Pierce Arrow Building at Elmwood and Great Arrow.
So, while there is clearly no trace on the old waterfront of George Pierce, his bicycles or his automobiles, maybe there is a way, some way, for us to reference that fabulous piece of Buffalo history in our newly developing plans for the Inner Harbor. Stayed tuned... Next week we will suggest a way.
Photos: BuffaloAH
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I am personally thrilled with the recommendations made by ECHDC Chairman Levy. I am deeply proud of our community and the hundreds of people who stepped up to express their interest and concern about an issue that they felt so strongly about. I am deeply proud as well of our leadership who were willing and able to learn from and listen and respond to those who spoke up. The combination of an informed citizenry and a responsive leadership gives me great hope not only for our waterfront but for the future of Buffalo as well. This is, I believe, a significant day in our history and we should celebrate it.
While everybody knows that the Pierce-Arrow, that fabulous automobile known round the world that was favored by kings and pashas, playboys and bon vivants during the first thirty years of the last century, was made in Buffalo, how many people know where George Pierce (photo), the genius who founded the company that made that car of dreams, opened his first factory? You would be wrong, though understandably so, if you said that the first Pierce-Arrow plant was in that spectacular Taj Mahal of industry that dominates the landscape, towering regally, like Mont St. Michel off the coast of Normandy, over its drab surroundings most prominent of which are three eating establishments--Vino, Papa Jake and the Carriage Trade-- that I am sure the 6000 or so men and women who worked making those cars in that dream-like factory wished had been there then.
Well, then, if not there, where? Some of you know. Jim Sandoro, founder, curator and empresario of the Buffalo Transportation Museum knows. So too do Carl and Clary Burgwardt who since the early 1970s have created in a 7000 sq foot space in Orchard Park one of the most interesting and idiosyncratic museums anywhere, the Pedaling History Bicycle Museum. And, since talking to them I, who has done as much poking and digging around in the rich fields of Buffalo history as any one, since meeting with these people and visiting them in their establishments, finally know too. So, to end the mystery, to tell you a fact which just might, if you allow it, change your way of thinking about the waterfront, I will tell you. The first Pierce plant was.....you got it...on the waterfront; not anywhere on the waterfront but in the heart of the old streets of what we now interchangeably call "The Inner Harbor" or "Canalside." That's right. Right there, on the new streets that were unearthed and recreated as part of the 2004 plan for the area, at the corner of two iconic waterfront streets--Prime and Hanover--at the crossroads where two of our history's most powerful engines of economic growth--the railroad and the waterfront came together--George Pierce, in the 1880s built his first factory.At first he made birdcages and then, for a reason that I have not figured out, he made the transition to bicycle manufacturing and by the end of the 1880s the George N. Pierce Company, located right next to the Commercial Slip at 6-22 Hanover Street, was producing a whole range of bicycles and tricycles for men, women and children. In an 1895 catalog, five models of "Queen" tricycles were offered for sale. The smallest, with a 16-inch wheel, for girls 3-5 years old, sold for $5.00, or $8.50 with rubber tires; the largest, with a 32-inch wheel, for girls 8-15 years old, sold for $12.00 or $18.00 with rubber tires.
The factory, though, was the thing. In a day of small manufacturing companies, with small work forces and small structures, the Pierce plant was a gigantic exception, the first and, with any luck, the last "big box" on the waterfront. At 25,000 sq feet this five story building, made of brick, wood and steel hovered over this intensely dense and busy part of the city. Everybody wanted Pierce's bicycles and by the time of the Pan American Expo in 1901 they were being shipped, from Hanover Street, by the DL&W railroad whose tracks were just outside the plant's front door, to homes in countries all over the world. The bicycle, produced in that fabulous factory in the heart of what we now call "Canalside", had made Pierce a rich man and had put Buffalo on the map as one of the world's great centers of bicycle production.
Soon, Pierce made the transition from bicycles to cars and in 1901 The George N. Pierce & Company built two cars, both manufactured at the Hanover Street plant. By the end of the year Pierce has sold over two dozen autos and in 1904 he unveiled the Pierce Arrow, at $4000 the biggest and most expensive automobile on the U.S. market. It was time to move to bigger and newer quarter and in 1907, Pierce left Canalside, abandoning his factory at Hanover and Prime for his brand new, gigantic really "big box" facility, the building that we know today as The Pierce Arrow Building at Elmwood and Great Arrow.
So, while there is clearly no trace on the old waterfront of George Pierce, his bicycles or his automobiles, maybe there is a way, some way, for us to reference that fabulous piece of Buffalo history in our newly developing plans for the Inner Harbor. Stayed tuned... Next week we will suggest a way.
Photos: BuffaloAH
What a fabulous idea it would be to move the Pedaling History museum to the waterfront and include a large portion of the focus to be on Mr. Pierce and his story. It could be located in the same spot as the orginal factory and could tie into the Pierce Arrow museum on Seneca. This could perhaps be the catalyst of a variety of museums/aquarium that could be clustered together to create a toursit destination the same way the museums are clustered together in Chicago and Pittsburgh. Sprinkle in some restaurants of varying degrees, small retail and outdoor attractions (kayak rental place, music stage) and you've got a winner. Why is this so hard for people to see or to accomplish?