Buffalo Bike Tours taking riders on a trip into history
Summer series of rides celebrates city’s heritage along with Erie Canal’s 200th anniversary
By Lindsay DePietro
Buffalo Bike Tours pedaled into the start of its season on Saturday (June 28) with the first bike ride of the Hidden History Bike Tours. But there’s a twist: these tours are celebrating the 200th anniversary of the Erie Canal.
Tour guide Chris Hawley took myself and others through the old First Ward and the Hydraulics neighborhoods of Buffalo.
“What I love most about Buffalo history is the working-class history, which is often my focus. In part because it helps create inspirational stories about how people have struggled and made it through, sometimes not, and what they’ve done to make better lives for themselves and their communities,” Hawley said.
“I think we’ve done a pretty good job in Buffalo of exploring the history of people who owned the plants, who built the mansions designed by the great architects, but a focus on what everyday people did and how to secure a decent life for themselves and their communities is a tremendous source of inspiration for me, and I think for a lot of folks who have done my tours,” he added.
We pedaled along the water, through neighborhoods and across bridges during his tour. Throughout the ride, we stopped at waterfronts and old buildings, houses, churches and businesses as Hawley highlighted their history, unknown to most.
But of course, the first stop we made was in front of the Erie Canal.
“The Erie Canal transformed Buffalo from a frontier village into one of the great commercial and industrial metropolises of America,” Hawley said. “The canal not just allowed Buffalo to boom as a major city, but also opened up the entire Great Lakes to the eastern seaboard.”
For one tour stop, Hawley showed riders the singular building left standing from the old canal district and pre-Civil War era. The building was first established as a bakery.
“They actually made biscuits for Civil War soldiers,” Hawley said.
We also got to see many old saloons, some of which are still popular bars today.
Another highlight of the tour was standing on a bridge looking out at the General Mills factory. We learned of its history and of the other grain-based industries, with the sweet scent of cereal in the air.
During one stop, we parked our bikes and walked through a small vegan cafe, Sevens Cafe Bakery, with delicious looking coffee and pastries. The large building used to be Barcalo Manufacturing Company, which was the first company in the history of the U.S. to offer its workers a paid coffee break. The building is now home to around 100 apartment units and various small businesses, the cafe being just one of them.
At each site, we not only learned basic history of the Buffalo Canal era lifestyle, but also many facts and interesting stories that most people may have not gotten the opportunity to learn about.
And although the ride started out on cloudy skies, the day was humid, and the sun began to shine by the second half of the tour.
The old First Ward and the Hydraulics Neighborhoods is not the only tour being offered this summer. The Buffalo Bike Tours is offering a rotation of six different tours.
These tours highlight the underrepresented voices of the Erie Canal: voices that have been often overlooked in the traditional narrative of the canal’s history.
Explore the list of history bike tours below:
- Canawlers & Brawlers: A Tour of the Old First Ward & Hydraulics Neighborhoods With Chris Hawley – Grain scoopers, Irish immigrants, canal labor and industry.
- Women of the Canal: A Hidden History Tour With Maria Blair – Stories of reformers, abolitionists and early trailblazers.
- Before Buffalo: Native Land, Treaties and the Canal’s Impact With Perry Ground – A Haudenosaunee perspective on land, sovereignty and the canal.
- Black History by Bike: From Canalside to Jefferson With Terry Alford – Black freedom seekers, entrepreneurs and community builders.
- The Legendary Last Leg: From Buffalo to Black Rock With Hannah Quaintance – Rival ports, canal boats and early city formation.
- Erie Canal in Song: A Musical Ride With Tyler Bagwell – Folk songs, oral traditions and Buffalo’s musical roots.
Buffalo Bike Tours will be holding these tours each Saturday at 10 a.m. through Sept. 13.
This year, it is only $15 per rider instead of the usual $69, thanks to the support of the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corporation.
You can either bring along your own bike for the tour, or rent one of the many bikes that Buffalo Bike Tours offers.
They are located in a blue shipping container at Canalside this season. Their approximate location is 44 Prime St.
Their new site also houses a curated gift shop featuring a selection of Buffalo goods and merchandise.
Every bike tour will be led by guest historians, artists and community leaders, and each individual has unique knowledge to share.
“To me, actually, history is not that interesting by itself. I really love the idea of applied history, of seeing, taking this history and how does that inform our decision making, how does that inform how we experience and understand the city and how can it inform our decisions moving forward,” Marc Moscato, owner of Buffalo Bike Tours, said.
Moscato noted Buffalo has experienced a pretty significant population loss over the last several decades. That’s an unfortunate fact, but the lower traffic rates make the city perfect for biking.
“To do a walking tour of Buffalo is sometimes a challenge because we’ve become spread out as a city. The bikes are a great vehicle to be able to take in a large area of the city and really immerse yourself in it,” Moscato said.
