Lafayette’s Farewell Tour: Fast Fredonia Frenzy

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Previous: Gaslighting The General 

The trot to Fredonia was anything but quick. The Buffalo and Erie Road turned out to be less “finished” than Joseph Ellicott had hoped. André-Nicolas Levasseur, one of Lafayette’s traveling party who would eventually publish an extensive journal of the General’s American Farewell Tour, went out of his way to point out the poor condition of the Main road between “Portland” (a.k.a. “Westfield”) and Fredonia.

“On leaving Portland,” wrote Levasseur, “yielding to the fatigue of the preceding days, we were sleeping in the carriage notwithstanding the violent jolting occasioned by the trunks of the trees forming the road over which we were rapidly passing.”1

Ellicott had rather strict guidelines for those he hired to clear roads, especially when it Continue Reading “Lafayette’s Farewell Tour: Fast Fredonia Frenzy”

Lafayette’s Farewell Tour: Gaslighting The General

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Previous: Special Delivery To Westfield, A Fitting First

The first week of June in 1925 saw unusually warm temperatures across the northeast.1 Nearby Jamestown had record-breaking highs in the low 90s.2 You can imagine the temperature on Main Street in Fredonia at 2:45 in the afternoon on Thursday, June 4. Still, the crowds came. So many, in fact, that the village had to redirect traffic away from the primary road running through its downtown.3

The ceremony was spear-headed and organized by the Benjamin Prescott chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. Citizens marched down the flag-decorated streets and assembled to see the unveiling of a new marker dedicated to memorializing two major events in this small rural community.4 One hundred years to the day earlier, General Continue Reading “Lafayette’s Farewell Tour: Gaslighting The General”

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