The Buffalo History Museum Podcast

In 1917, six women's suffragists from Buffalo were arrested and sent to Virginia's Occoquan Workhouse for picketing in front of the White House. This is the story of the Buffalo Six. 

For over a half-century, Highmark Stadium has been the backdrop to many of our best (and worst) memories. Today we share a history of the beloved gathering place and discuss what's it's meant to Western New York. 

In this episode, we revisit late December 1813, when British forces crossed the Niagara River and set the village of Buffalo ablaze. Through the eyes of frontier doctor and militia leader Cyrenius Chapin, terrified families fleeing into the snow, and survivors like Margaret St. John, we explore the chaos, courage, and cruelty of one of the most defining moments in the city’s history. 

On December 8, 1980, as U2 played to a sparse crowd outside Buffalo, the world was upended by the murder of John Lennon, transforming an ordinary night into a defining moment in music and cultural history.

Thank you to Jeff Miers, WKBW, Willie Nile, and Billy Sheehan for providing audio and other assistance on this very special episode. The audio of Bruce Moser is taken from an interview done by WKBW in 2017. Sadly, Moser passed away in 2020. 

Ely S. Parker was a Tonawanda Seneca leader, engineer, Civil War officer, and later U.S. Commissioner of Indian Affairs—and his story begins in the shadow of the Erie Canal. While the canal is often celebrated as a triumph of American innovation, we explore its deeper impact as a force of dispossession that carved through Haudenosaunee homelands and helped shape Parker’s lifelong fight for Indigenous land, rights, and sovereignty. We conclude in the present day, with Parker’s posthumous admission to the New York State Bar in 2025, a historic act of recognition 176 years after he was first denied that right.

Edward Caleb Randall was a highly-respected lawyer from Buffalo. In 1892, his life would change forever. That's when he met Mrs. Emily S. French, a psychic medium from nearby Rochester, New York. 

The Erie Canal was an engineering marvel that shaped our city, state, and nation. Digging the man-made waterway not only required innovation, but also the efforts of thousands of laborers, man of them Irish immigrants. This is a story of the excavation of the canal's most challenging sections and how the Irish played a vital role. 

After fleeing from Tulsa in 1921, Andrew Smitherman made his way to Boston before later settling in Buffalo. While in Boston, he penned a poem describing his experiences during the Tulsa Race Massacre. Reading the poem is Jillian Hanesworth, Buffalo's Poet Laureate Emeritus. This episode is being published in conjunction with the previous episode titled, And a Shot Rang Out: Andrew Smitherman and the Buffalo Star. 

In late May of 1921, racial tensions erupted in Tulsa, Oklahoma's Greenwood District in what would become known as the Tulsa Race Massacre. Among the leaders of Tulsa's Black community was Andrew J. Smitherman, publisher of the Tulsa Star newspaper. After being charged with inciting the riot, Smitherman fled north and settled in Buffalo. There, he started a new newspaper, the Buffalo Star. This is the story of his involvement in the Tulsa Massacre and his impact on the Buffalo community. 

In 1968, Shirley Chisholm became the first Black woman elected to serve in Congress, representing New York’s 12th District. Four years later, she became the first woman and first Black candidate to seek a major party’s presidential nomination. Following her career in politics, Shirley moved to Buffalo with her husband, State Legislator Arthur Hardwick. She's buried in the city's historic Forest Lawn Cemetery where a new statue in her honor is soon to be unveiled.