New History Tours

This tour will travel to Mt. Hope Cemetery, the first municipal rural landscape cemetery in the country. After visiting their current locations in the cemetery, we will visit significant sites around the city of Rochester where some of these innovators made their earlier marks on the world. Included will be Hiram Sibley and Don Alonzo Watson (Western Union, Purchase of Alaska), Henry Augustus Ward (Ward’s Natural Science Establishment), George Baldwin Selden (Automobile), James Goold Cutler (Mail Chute) and Josephus Requa (Machine Gun).

guide: Ron Richardson

J. Edgar Hoover described Emma Goldman as “the most dangerous woman in America.” This tour will travel to the sites where Emma worked and lived in Rochester and address why Hoover hated her and millions of men and women throughout the world loved her. George Campbell McDade, is the author of “If I Can’t Dance, Its Not My Revolution!” a play about the life, times, triumphs and trials of Emma Goldman.

guide: George Campbell McDade       Audio Tour

This tour will travel to High Falls and follow the Genesee River Gorge north along Saint Paul St., parts of the River Trail, and Lake Avenue. Along the way will visit some historic, and not so historic sites important to Rochester’s history. The underlying theme will be the Genesee River Gorge area, but many lesser known, and obscure historical facts will be presented, such as High Falls daredevil Sam Patch, Rochester’s connection to the 1977 New York City blackout, the 1972 Brink’s armored car heist, a foiled suicide lottery, and one of Rochester’s most colorful historical figures “Rattlesnake” Pete, famous for treating goiter by wrapping Rattlesnakes around patient’s necks. We’ll also be visiting some city landmarks that include The Underground Railroad at Maplewood Rose Garden, memorials to Henry Lomb, and George Eastman (Mr. Eastman’s tomb at Kodak Park), Holy Sepulchre Cemetery, and Kodak’s Hawkeye Plant.

guide: Erik Olsson

This tour will visit sites in and near Downtown Rochester where people have taken their political, social, and economic grievances to the streets, and often prevailed. The physical landscape has changed somewhat, but the sites still bring history back to life -a history that includes the Vietnam anti-war movement (the “Flower City Conspiracy,” etc.), the rise of organized labor (1946 General Strike), the Civil Rights movement (especially the misnamed “Race Riot” of 1964) protests and civil disobedience against Reagan-era US attacks on Central America, and popular agitation against urban poverty and injustice.

guide: Jack Bradigan Spula