Now that Hamlin Park has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places I've decided to do a short series of the history of the neighborhood. This information comes directly from the National Register nomination that Preservation Studios completed. Check back for additional installations in the series in the coming weeks. Stay up to date with all things Hamlin Park by liking the Hamlin Park Historic District on Facebook.
THE DRIVING PARK
The other component of the
Hamlin Park district was originally home of Cicero J. Hamlin’s Buffalo Driving
Park. Cicero Jabez Hamlin was born on November 1819 on a mountain farm in
Columbia County, NY and was the youngest of ten children. His family was born
in New England and his father was a Methodist preacher. Hamlin moved to the
Western New York region in 1836 and settled in East Aurora, a village to the
southeast of Buffalo. By 1839 he had established a general store in the village
that was relatively successful.
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| Cicero Jabez Hamlin - 1888 |
Cicero Hamlin moved to
Buffalo in 1846 and established a dry-goods business under the name of Wattles
& Hamlin, which was located at 252 Main Street. The partnership was
dissolved the following year and Hamlin carried on alone until 1852. He
established himself as a key employee in the carpet and home furnishings
company of Mendsen and Co. in 1860. This proved to be another successful
venture for Hamlin, who enlarged the business and reorganized it under the name
of Hamlin & Mendsen during the same year. He retired from the dry-goods business in 1871, but he
continued to lease the Main Street building. Hamlin built a new building at
256-268 Main in 1888 that was designed by noted architect Cyrus K. Porter. At
the time it was built, it was “the largest store in the city and one of Buffalo’s
most noteworthy buildings.” The
building was dubbed, “The Hamlin Block” and was built for Barnes, Hengerer,
& Co. Although it has been altered over the years, the building is still
extant.
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| Hamlin Block in c.1890 |
Hamlin built many other
buildings in the area between 1848 and 1888, including a house for his family
at 432 Franklin Street, which remains intact as an example of Italianate
residential architecture. Hamlin’s
East Aurora farm was used to breed over 500 cattle per year and was quite the
attraction. The building is currently used as a restaurant and banquet
facilities called the Hamlin House.
One of Hamlin’s crowning
achievements was establishing the Driving Park on Buffalo’s east side. Hamlin purchased the land in 1868 and
built the Driving Park as a harness racing track and polo grounds in the same
year. He was not alone in this venture, which became, “world famous in the
annals of the race-course.” The Driving Park was a popular attraction and at
its height was able to draw over 40,000 people in a single weekend, earning it
the nickname, “The Kentucky Derby of the North.”
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| Hamlin's Driving Park, which later was home to the Expo of 1888-1889 |
It was so important that
Olmsted incorporated it into his design for Humboldt Parkway, which defined its
eastern boundary. Patrons of the driving park would often spend the day
enjoying the races, then walk en masse south on Humboldt Parkway until reaching
The Parade (Humboldt/MLK Jr. Park). They would then enjoy inexpensive beers at
the parade house designed by Calvert Vaux. After its popularity waned at the
end of the nineteenth century, the driving park was abandoned.
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| Advertisement for the 1889 Fair on the former Driving Park Grounds |
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| Backside of the 1889 Fair advertisement |
In 1888, the driving park
was sold for development as an International Industrial and Agricultural
Exposition. In 1896 the buildings were destroyed by fire and, although it was
reported that Hamlin might rebuild the driving park, the venture was ultimately
abandoned. In 1912 the driving park tract was sold to Toronto developer John C.
Cook. This marked the beginning of
the transformation to a residential section. Although Cook intended to rename it ‘Melrose Lawn,’ the name
‘Hamlin Park’ stuck. Cook’s plan
rejected nineteenth-century picturesque ideas and looked to progressive
twentieth-century urban concepts. Lots were broad and uniform in design, with
aligned setbacks and could not be subdivided. The driving park was a
rectangular area bounded by Northland Avenue at the north, East Ferry Street at
the south, Lonsdale Road to the west and Humboldt Parkway to the east.
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| Original plot layout when the Driving Park went residential. Collection of Buffalo History Museum |
THE BUILDERS OF HAMLIN PARK
Unlike some of the wealthier
areas of Buffalo during this time period, the homes in Hamlin Park often showed
little variety in their styles and were designed and built primarily by
contractors. Some of the homes were also variations on styles that were offered
in mail order catalogs made popular by companies like Sears & Roebuck
during this period. Almost half of all the buildings in Hamlin Park have been
documented as being constructed by one of several building companies.
The most prominent builder
in Hamlin Park was the Volgamore-Cook Company, which built over fifty-eight
houses in the district. The majority of the homes built by the Volgamore-Cook
Company were located on Beverly Road, which was one of the last streets to be
developed in the area. There were approximately six different styles of houses
on the street, and some repeated exactly, while others had slight changes in
details or fenestration. The Volgamore-Cook Company constructed the houses on
Beverly between 1915 and 1920 as consumer demand fueled construction. After the partnership with Cook
dissolved, Volgamore went on to build at least twenty-three more homes by
himself. Other prominent builders include the International Home Building
Company, Robert E. Burger, Niederpreum & Co., F.T. Jenzen Builders, and
George Steinmiller.
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| Homes by Volgamore-Cook on Beverly Road, complete with original planted median |
Many of the prominent
builders published advertisements filled with enticing descriptions between
1913 and the mid-1920s. Shortly after the driving park section started to
develop, there was a large push to extend streets and build more homes. The
International Home Building Company added another quarter section just one year
after acquiring the property. An article in the Buffalo Express from that year
explained, “The International Home Building Company is putting on another
quarter section and extending Goulding Avenue west, as well as Wohlers Avenue
through Northland. The opening up of these thoroughfares will facilitate
traffic in this vicinity and will gradually improve the property.”
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| Homes under construction on East Ferry at Wohlers Avenue. Note the brick entry columns, no longer extant. Collection of Buffalo History Museum |
An advertisement from 1913
really captured what the development in Hamlin Park meant: “The value of the
land as a place to live will never be impaired by unsightly structures nor
unpleasant surroundings.” Even after a century, this statement still holds
true.
Many home building companies
that built in the Hager Division also constructed similar homes in the Driving
Park section during or near the same period. The style of houses generally
includes variations of the Queen Anne, Craftsman, and Colonial Revival, though
nearly all are two-story frame-dwellings featuring open porches. Like many
streetcar neighborhoods, there was a mix of doubles and singles to accommodate
families seeking to rent or own. On any given block one can find the same house
type repeated, but individual examples are differentiated from neighboring
homes by details such as porch pediments, types of columns, placement of
dormers, and variations in materials. As a result, similar architectural
characteristics are carried through the entire district, creating a feeling of
continuity throughout the neighborhood.
HISTORY OF STREET NAMES IN
HAMLIN PARK
Several of the streets in
the Hamlin Park District were named after prominent Buffalonians of the early
20th century. Although the history behind each of the street names is not
readily available, some of them have been well documented.
Harwood Place
This short, dead-end street
is located in the driving park section of Hamlin Park and was named after Mary
Ann Harwood Lyth. Mary Ann was the wife of John Lyth who operated the first
hollow tile factory in the United States, located in Buffalo. John and Mary Ann
were married in their home country of England before immigrating to Buffalo.
Before the street developed as residential land, it originally served as a
drive that lead to the extensive stables and orchards behind the Lyth family
mansion (183 Northland).
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| Lyth Mansion constructed in 1872 |
The process of hollow tile
making was invented by John’s brother, Francis Lyth of York, England. When John
and his family immigrated to the United States, he brought along the techniques
his brother developed in order to establish a new industry in Buffalo. John’s
son, Byron, was a prominent homebuilder in Hamburg and built his own home in
Hamlin Park at 2 Goulding Avenue. Some of the company’s products, like chimney
pots, can be seen on several homes in Hamlin Park. One of the best-known
examples of the decorative tile the company produced remains intact on the façade
of 16 Harwood Place, which served as the home of the Lyth family servants
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| Lyth cottage on Harwood Place, just behind the family mansion |
Lyth Avenue, which is just
outside the district, was renamed in honor of John’s grandson, Alfred L. Lyth,
who served as president of the company. Alfred also operated the first
Chevrolet dealership in Buffalo, located at 1159 Jefferson Avenue, opened in
1922 (extant). The street originally served as the driveway for the hollow tile
factory that John Lyth established.
Hedley Place
Charles Harits Hedley was an
instrumental figure in developing the Main-Humboldt area of Hamlin Park. Hedley
served as treasurer of the Parkway Land Company and when he purchased this
tract in the late nineteenth century, there wasn’t a single home on the land,
which the exception of the Stone Farmhouse.
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| South side of Hedley Place at Jefferson Avenue |
Donaldson Road
Donaldson Road was named
after prominent Buffalo banker Robert S. Donaldson. He was a self-made man who
rose in the ranks of the Erie County Savings bank from office boy to president,
serving the company for 64 years. Donaldson was a conservative, who seemed to
always make the wisest decisions to secure the future of the bank. During the
years prior to the Depression, his conservative choices enabled the bank to
survive the market crash in 1929.
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The grass plot circle on Donaldson, just above the hidden Scajaquada Creek
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