on the Erie Canal, Niagara County NY
I and my family were present when the car parked outside of the hardware store had somehow slipped into reverse… It was running at the time… And plunged into the canal, closing it for the remainder of the day. State trooper divers from Athol Springs came down and the car was eventually pulled out inch
Recollected by Bill Shaw, long-time Middleport resident We worked on Saturdays too in those days. Someone realized that I didn’t have my working papers. I got sent to old Doc Wilmont. He gave them to me and I went right back to work in the machine shop. In 1925, I began working at Niagara Sprayer
By Anna Wallace, Former Village Historian This is how the Basket Factory look in about 1908. Seated on the delivery wagon is Paul McClew of Watson Ave. how is about to leave to deliver 5,000 four-quart baskets to some farmers. Standing beside the wagon are Ray Harrington, John O’Shaughnessey and J.C. Jackson. Mr. O’Shaughnessey and
The trolley depot was at the corner of Main and Park Ave. It was torn down to build the post office. The trolley stopped at all the crossroads. The horse shed for the Universalist Church used to be back behind there too. There were horse sheds behind all the churches. People used them on Sunday
The Star Theatre was referred to as the opera house and was on State Street. On the second floor was a dance hall. The last play put on by the Middleport High School was performed there in 1924. It was called, “She Stoops to Conquer.” I (Bill Shaw) was the manager of scenery for the
Harry Shaw started a milk business from his car. He would load the milk from the family farm on Griswold St. and sell it in glass bottles. He built a little block building on South St. in Middleport for his dairy. After the milk was processed in Lockport at the Gascoyne Dairy, Shaw would deliver
My father owned a large farm north of Middleport known as the Mather Farm. My father, Jay B. Mather, farmed what was the old William Van Horn farm on the Stone Road. Stone Road at one time was known as the Plank road. All of this land was purchase from the Holland Land Co. in
By Edwin T. Sheldon I was born in 1941 at 25 Francis Street. I spent the first 25 years of my life there. I have been reading over the information on the Erie Barge Canal but there was no information on the old Lamp Lighter. I remember that in the 1940s, there was a small
In the 1950’s and into the early 60’s, there a little ramshackle store called “Westy’s” that was situated next to the bridge tower. It was run by an old man named Raymond Midaugh. He used to sell candy, cigarettes and in the fall cider, both hard and soft. In the back room (there were only
Being a former long-time resident of Middleport, I found the article in the Union Sun and Journal about the Village’s sesquicentennial celebration very interesting. I was eight years old the year of the bicentennial and my parents purchased a derby hat for me for the occasion at Harputer’s store on State Street. (No, I’m sorry,
