We're On Facebook! (Again)

Due to new rules at Facebook we've updated our Facebook Group. Be sure to "Like" our new Facebook Page. We'll be updating it with photos and other event updates during the winter. You might find a picture of yourself on a Buffalo Tour!

WGRZ.com features City Hall

Click on this link: Architectural Showcase: Buffalo City Hall

Buffalo Tours at the Lewiston Art Festival

Thanks to everyone who visited us at last weekend's Lewiston Art Festival! We met about 500 people and had a great time. Here's a photo of Cindy and Paul manning the Buffalo Tours tent. [photo by Carol at Graycliff]

African-American Heritage Tour of Buffalo

Some time ago we took a great group of visitors on a themed tour of African-American heritage spots in downtown Buffalo. Wouldn't you know, but we just stumbled upon one person's slideshow of the tour. If you take photos during a Buffalo Tours event and would like them posted, E-mail Buffalo Tours and we'll be happy to show them off!

Buffalo Bike Tour

Our Gold Medal Grain Elevators Bike Tour took place on June 4th. It was so popular that we are having a second one on Saturday, July 30th at 10am. Be sure to contact Buffalo Tours at (716) 852-3300 for a reservation: Tours are $20 and a working bike and helmet is required.

In the meantime, chaperone Meagan Baco made a short film about the first tour. Check it out below:

Buffalo Tours at the Erie Canal Harbor

Fellow docent Maureen Evans was featured in a TV piece about our Erie Canal Harbor tours. Check out the free tour on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays at Noon this summer!

Erie Canal Stories

Buffalo News 7/4/11
Note the video on the above page is not related to the canal tours.
WGRZ 7/4/11

Buffalo on Cover of Preservation Magazine

You can read the entire article, Reinventing Buffalo, on the National Trust's website. WIVB Channel 4 also interviewed our Executive Director, Henry McCartney, on TV about the article.

Magazine swoons over Buffalo architecture: wivb.com

Buffalo to Austin, to Buffalo

In October 2010 I drove from my hometown of Buffalo, New York to Austin, Texas for the 2010 National Preservation Conference.  This year the 2011 Conference happens to be in Buffalo so I won't be traveling at all.  Since the Conference has many repeat attendees and half of America's population lies within a day's drive of Buffalo, I thought potential visitors might want to see just a few of my photos.  You probably won't travel a 4,500 mile route through 16 different states like I did, but here's my travelogue anyway.

All I used was a GPS, a cheap digital camera, a "This Place Matters" sign and a tiny pumpkin as a sort of Travelocity Gnome / Flat Stanley (it was Halloween, after all).  Thanks to Andrew Gorman of the National Trust for setting up my field session schedule, Henry McCartney of Preservation Buffalo Niagara for all the other Conference arrangements (including days off for travel), and Jennifer Walkowski for providing the pocket-sized pumpkin.

TO PLAY: Click on the captions before clicking Play or a new window will open.  There are about 25 slides changing automatically every 10 seconds.  This slideshow is in 3 parts: Before, During, and After the Conference.

--Fred Schrock, Education Coordinator

Buffalo Tours Docent Writes Lincoln Book

Longtime docent John Fagant recently published The Best of the Bargain: Lincoln in Western New York, available at Amazon.com and Talking Leaves Bookstores. The book describes in detail the recently-elected Lincoln on his inaugural trip through the region in 1861. You can read a chapter of the book at BuffaloAH.com and even hear a February 4th interview with the author himself at Toginet.com. His book was even referenced by a New York Times columnist.

Congrats John!

Baby, It's Cold Outside - FREE TOURS in January and February

Every Friday at 10am in January and February, Buffalo Tours will offer free downtown walking tours when the temperature is 25 degrees or below. For each degree above 25 the cost goes up $1 to a maximum of $10 per adult ($5 for students). Price is determined 15 minutes before the tour using the Weather Channel website for the 14203 zip code. Tours meet in the Buffalo Visitor Center at 617 Main Street.

In the coldest weather, Buffalo Tours' trained, volunteer docents quickly go from historic interior to historic interior, from M&T's gold dome to St. Paul's Cathedral. This Winter Special was the result of a walking tour held last February for twenty people. The temperature that day: three degrees Fahrenheit, not including the wind chill factor. Maybe it's crazy to be outside when the weather is this cold, but that hasn't deterred our visitors yet. Why not reward the heartiest tour-takers with even crazier prices?

Unlike winter Bills games at the Ralph, shirts are required on all tours. Tour goers are not allowed to pray for bad weather. Attendees from within Western New York are encouraged to brag that "this is nothing" in the vicinity of out-of-towners. No change is given for coupons or Buffalo Tour Bucks.

Reservations are not required. For more information, visit BuffaloTours.org or call (716) 852-3300.