Aerial Views

The American landscape is very intriguing. I actually started in New York State and took a look at the way the counties are laid out. I wanted to start there and then take a closer look at Erie county. 

The counties themselves just seem haphazardly put together. I'm assuming they are divided by natural landmarks among other things. Erie county itself has some sort of pattern with roads going vertically and horizontally. 

As you can see it looks almost like its divided with a solid line down the middle.  When you look closer, at say Cheektowaga there is even more of a distinct pattern of roads and houses.

I then wanted to look at a few other states, New Mexico is much like New York with its counties and how it's roads are set up. 

The counties are just everywhere and anywhere it seems but the roads and houses have a much more distinct pattern. Texas on the other hand is completely different, the counties there are just chopped up into almost equal squares. 

I thought it was interesting to look at industrial farms in Texas as well. From what I saw is many found them pretty while others found them ugly and vile. 

On the flip side you have farm land that is something we may all be more used to seeing. Then we have a view of Oxnard farm fields in spring with Ventura City and Pacific Ocean in the background which is in Ventura City, California. 

The view of this is amazing with many different attributes. Not only is there the farm pattern, but also the city behind it. 

Millionaire's Row!

This weekend I went on the Millionaire's Row walking tour. I think it actually fits in nicely with our homework assignment this week as well. These houses are not only classy, but they also scream money. While on the tour we were actually fortunate enough to be able to go in two of the houses, which I guess is rare. I was shocked to find out how many more mansions there used to be. I want to say at least 5 were knocked down, not to mention the many that were knocked down by children so they could rebuild a new mansion. Another thing to keep in mind is that most of these mansions have been repurposed and are not residential, but commercial buildings now. 

The house I liked the most, at leas tfor its exterior was the Charles W. Goodyear House. It now functions as the Oracle School, which i believe is a charter school. The exterior is a French Renaissance Revival and it is stunning. The roof stands out do to its green color, and it clearly shows the French architecture. The architecture of the house was by Green and Wicks who were a very prominent architecture firm in Buffalo. The was built in 1902 and luckily still stands today! 

We were fortunate enough to be able to tour what is now a building owned by the American Red Cross. It was owned by Carolyn Tripp, who during her life worked with the Red Cross and donated her hosue to them after she passed away. 

The mansion itself is absolutely huge! There are three levels, the third they presume was where the servants lived. The mansion also had an elevator, which is still in working condition. It was actually the first residential elevator in Buffalo! There is also furniture in the building at the top of the staircase that was original furniture that was refurbished. It is hard to believe that she only lived here with her 6 children. It is overwhelming to be in a place with such detail and grandeur. 

The tour was more about the stories of the people rather than the architecture, however it was still very interesting. A lot of the families married each other, so the millionaires of Buffalo kept to their little strip on Delaware Avenue. Many buildings were demolished before preservation became a big deal, many were knocked down by family memebers because they could no longer afford them or because they wanted to rebuild a new house. From my understanding there are only 2 or 3 that are still being used as residential, while most others are owned by businesses. There seem to be many different arhitectural designs as well including French Renaissance, Tudor, Victorian, and Spanish among others.

As you can see there are many different styles, and it is honestly hard to decide which one is my favorite. The last picture above is actually a very early mansion, which is why it looks smaller, it is clearly more colonial, however at the time i am sure it was considered very large. Man yof these houses were built for anywhere from about 50,000 to 500,000 at the time they were built and are now worth up to about 15 million. It is amazing that we have preserved these houses and repurposed them into schools, disaster relief like the Red Cross, and even buildings to help children who have domestic problems. 

On one last note, lets not forget the Medina Sandstone that is so very popular in Buffalo. This is the orignal sidewalk on Delaware Avenue....

Classy Houses!!!

In my opinion there is a a difference between a classy house and a house that just screams money. I think classy does not just mean a house, it means a home. The Allentown Historic District is a great example of this I think. Many of the homes there are in my opinion very classy, and have that home feeling to them. They have character and they eahc have their own story, their own history. Here are some examples.....

On the other hand there are houses that scream money. These houses in my opinion are the "cookie cutter" houses. They are usually built by a devlopment company (Marrano is one in the WNY area) at the request of the buyer and have very small difference from house to house. While they are not necessarily for the rich, they are definitely for the middle to upper-middle class. I lived in one through high-school and in my opinion they have no character or history(not to mock my parents house), but it is not my cup of tea. Here are some example of Marrano "cookie cutter" houses....

As you can see they for the most part look very similar with minor aesthetic differences. To me they scream money. I think many people build these houses for their family with the idea it shows they made it. That however is just my opinion. 

Forest Lawn Cemetery

The Forest Lawn Cemetery tour was very different than the last two tours I took. That doesn't mean it was any less interesting though. The cemetery itself has 165,000 inhabitants and 1.5 million documents on file. That is astounding! It was actually opened in 1849 when Charles Clark was in Boston and saw a new movement. The movement was the Rural Cemetery movement. Instead of burying your families dead at the family farm, people were buried in an eclipsed area. Clark came back from Boston and bought 80 acres of land from Erasnus Granger. It wasnt until a year later that a fur trader bought the first plot for burial. Walking through the cemetery we came across some trees. I always thought the Buffalo and Erie County Historical Soxiety was the only thing standing from the Pan-Am Expo, but I was wrong! There were actually tree planted during the Pan-Am that are in the cemetery, they came from Louisianna. 

I have come to realize that sandstone from Medina is very popular...in fact one of the families that helped shape Buffalo had their mausoleum made out of it. The family was the Larkin family. It is 3 stories tall and houses 35 members from the Larkin family. 

There are a lot of mausoleums at the cemetery, and it's actually interesting how the whole system works. The family actually buys the plot to build it, and actually has to pay an endowment to the cemetery for upkeep. And when you sign a contract to get buried here, it's for life! No one will ever be moved from the cemetery! There were of course plenty of Celtic crosses, which historically helped make the merger of paganism and Christianity easier. 

I also learned about cenotaphs, which was a word I had never heard before. They are basically memorial without anyone buried there. Forest Lawn Cemetery actually has quite a few! Including this guy...

There were also random steps almost going nowhere. They actually had iron or metal fences and handrails going around them once. But during World War I the government asked for metal for the war effort and families donated the metal. 

The cemetery itself has over 120 different species of trees. Unfortunately the October Surprise Storm in 2006 I believe cost 1.4 million in damages to the plant life and insurance didn't cover it. There are trees from all over the world, including elm trees which were planted in various locations. I know we talked about homes sold out of the Sears catalog. There were once burial monuments also sold out of the seats catalog! One is on this cemetery, it's a light blue color and made from zinc. 

There was also the Blocher Memorial, which is one of the most impressive Victorian style memorial in the world actually! The story behind the family is also very interesting. 

And of course there is the only cemetery memorial Frank Lloyd Wright ever designed in Forest Lawn Cemetery. "Blue Sky" was built in 2004, paid for by Forest Lawn Cemetery. You can actually get buried in one its crypts if you want, however I'm sure it's really expensive. The family that had it designed for them went broke during the depression, and couldn't afford it anymore. The family was Darwin Martin's family. 

There is one last place we stopped on the tour. It is called The Meadow. It has trees everywhere that are over 100 years old. It was maybe my favorite place during the tour. The many different species of trees is absolutely stunning!