Amherst, Clarence and Williamsville Historic Places: The Buffalo Niagara Heritage Village

By Katherine Guenther

History is full of individuals who were dealt a bad hand in life but found a way to persevere. Now Buffalo history buffs have a new example to look to: the Buffalo Niagara Heritage Village. The museum that originally began as the Amherst Museum in 1972 faced a difficult set back in 2010.
“In 2010 we were no longer a department of the town of Amherst,” said Jessica Johnson, Curator of Exhibit Collections, “We took it as an opportunity to not only expand our audience but our regional focus for funding and also for exhibitions and programming ideas as well.” The Amherst museum changed its focus from the small Amherst community to the entire Buffalo-Niagara region—a bold move that changed everything for the museum, even its name.
“With the town of Amherst we were only reaching 120,000 people,” Johnson said, “with the Buffalo Niagara Regional name we’re getting 1.2 million.” Thankfully, the decision was met with success and the museum re-opened under the name: The Buffalo Niagara Heritage Village.
While the museum still receives a much smaller stipend from the Town of Amherst most of its funding comes from its own earned revenue through large events such as German Fest.
“Most of our funding is through special events and earned revenue from special events,” explained Johnson. Events such as the Scottish heritage festival, Rock Camp and Americana Days all help to fund the museum.
“Our biggest event every year is our Scottish festival,” said Events Coordinator, Jaime Brawdy, “And this year it will be our 29th year having our Scottish festival.” According to Brawdy the event draws in a crowd of over 5,000 annually.

The Museum

The Buffalo Niagara Heritage Village is unique in that it not only offers visitors a traditional museum but it also offers visitors a small community of 10 historic buildings to tour just outside.
“Outside in our historic buildings section we have 35 acres and 10 historic buildings,” said Jessica Johnson. The historical village offers visitors a rare glimpse into 19th century Niagara Frontier life and its architecture. The buildings include two school houses, a blacksmith shop, a barber shop, a log cabin and a church.
“We’re really unique for Western New York that we have both of those components- both a museum exhibition area as well as a hand-on interactive and immersive experience on our grounds and in our historic buildings,” said Johnson. The Buffalo Niagara Heritage Village is even looking to expand its holdings.
“We are also reconstructing a barn later this fall from the 1820s,” said Johnson, “It was a barn that was dismantled and we’re reconstructing it on the grounds.” The barn predates the establishment of the Erie Canal and according to Johnson this makes the addition a real gem.
“It’s right in an earlier period in Western New York where you didn’t see a lot of settlement,” said Johnson, “So having a barn this early is a nice feature for us.” Johnson’s favorite building is a small log cabin known as the Smith house.
“We have our Smith log house which is a hand-hewn log construction house which was typical of the German construction style in the 1840s,” she said.

“That’s really unique in the sense that you can see the logs when you go inside the house and how there’s spaces in between them and how they had to fill them so there’s plaster over the top. It’s much more rustic than some of the other buildings,” she added.

Traditional Exhibits

It’s easy to forget while getting lost the historic buildings that the BNHV also holds a more traditional indoor museum.
“We have nine galleries inside,” said Johnson, “and they feature things related to regional history, like the Eire canal.” Inside the museum has preserved some of the features of the old Amherst museum with a gallery dedicated specifically to the history of Amherst.

Replica 1980's child's bedroom

“We have a history of our township, Amherst, but it relates really to many regions in Western New York and it’s called From Forest to Front Lawn,” said Johnson, “It explains how our community like many others in Western New York have changed from forested land, to farm land and now eventually suburbs.”
Johnson’s favorite exhibit, Modern Childhood, deals with the invention and evolution of childhood. The exhibit showcases the toys and games of children from the 1800s to the present and opened last February. Board games, dolls and even an old school Atari system were donated to the museum.

1796 boy's outfit

“We had a lot of great donations and objects that were lent to us by people in the community,” said Johnson.
“People’s favorite toys they lent and donated to us for exhibition,” she added. The exhibit includes a replica of a 1980’s child’s bedroom, a pre-1938 Mickey Mouse puppet and many teddy bears from various time periods.
The exhibit also deals with the evolution of children’s clothing and how it developed into a personal style. One of Johnson’s favorite pieces is a 1797 boys’ outfit.
“It was donated to us and it’s a handmade- hand sown outfit for a 3 year-old boy. It’s really elaborate and it really is an early piece for us,” explained Johnson.

How We Moved Here Exhibit

Another exhibit sure to interest visitors is the How We Moved Here exhibit that explains to visitors how the museum’s historical buildings were moved to the Tonawanda Creek location. The relocation of historic buildings has posed a major expense for the BNHV as the buildings can only be moved using a grueling construction project.

“Basically they jack them up and use high beams underneath the structure and put wheels on them and attach them to a trailer or some sort of towing vehicle,” said Johnson. According to her one of the buildings was even cut in half during the process and later reassembled. The process is both laborious and expensive. However, one of the major expenses is in an unlikely place.
“One of the big expenses is having money for the line drops or pulling the electrical lines up over the buildings,” Johnson said. Ironically, some the historic buildings at the museum have been moved more than once.

“In 1972 when the museum started its original location was on Cayuga road, and then in ’74 they moved to Smith road and they started moving the historic buildings there,” she said, “Then when we moved to our current site and they moved the buildings a second time to the facilities here on Tonawanda Creek Road.” While moving an entire building sounds like a struggle, even in our modern era, Johnson explained that during the 19th century many buildings were moved.
“In the 19th century it wasn’t that unusual to move buildings,” she said, “It’s kind of an interesting counter-point that we did that in the 20th century.”

The German Festival

A favorite event for BNHV’s Event Coordinator, Jamie Brawdy is the German Festival on June 18th. While not the biggest festival at the BNHV, the German Festival offers many unique and authentic experiences for visitors.
“The people that come to all these heritage festivals that we have, are very laser focused on if it’s correct in their eyes and if it’s authentic,” explained Brawdy, “So it’s important for us especially as an organization that educates to make sure that all of those aspects are correct.” Brawdy makes sure that visitors are treated to an authentic German experience. The event hosts three authentic German bands that preform in authentic costumes. In addition to music the event hosts venders for everything from German Cuckoo clocks to German chocolate.
“Usually most festivals take place outside, weather permitting. We will leave open some of the homes and we will stock them with interpreters,” she said.
The interpreters are costumed actors that preform everything tin punching to baking pastries. Actors also demonstrate crafts such as, scherenschnitte, a traditional German art form where elaborate scenes and designs are created from cutting paper. The event hosts a strongman competition as well.
“They’re professional athletes and they come out and they do some of the old fashioned, show-off, bar guy, strong guy competition,” Brawdy said. The German Festival is an all-encompassing event that not only entertains, it educates.
“You’re not going to come here and get a slice of pizza and a bud-light and watch a blues concert,” said Brawdy, “At the German Fest you’re going to come here and be amerced in that German culture.”