Category Archives: General Brockport History

by Sarah Cedeño, village historian The Benedict Block suffered two fires within three years’ time. The second of these fires happened in early 1917, when owners returned from business to find their stores engulfed in smoke. This particular fire was one of a spate of fires that had occurred on Main Street in the pastContinue reading “New Year, Old News: Bits from The Brockport Republic of January 4, 1917”

by Sarah Cedeño, Village Historian I write this from the office in the Emily Knapp Museum on the night of the referendum to dissolve the Village of Brockport. This is a reoccurrence from 2010, but what some might not know is that the dissolution controversy was formerly called a ‘merger’ and it surfaced in theContinue reading “Dissolution: A Historical Perspective”

The October 2015 Night at the Museum featured a talk by Dr. Alicia Kerfoot, “The Era of the ‘Ultra’: Early Twentieth-Century Women’s Footwear in the Knapp Museum Collection.” In the adapted video format of her presentation, Dr. Kerfoot discusses her extensive research of the shoes in the Emily Knapp Museum collection, many of which were made in the Moore-ShaferContinue reading “Brockport’s “Ultra” Shoe and the Moore-Shafer Shoe Company”

by Danielle Maerlender Greg Reynolds, a museum internship student at the College at Brockport, is working on an independent study researching the Native American artifacts at the Emily Knapp Museum. In this picture, Greg can be seen with Dan Burns, long-time museum volunteer, examining one of the six Native American projectile points that are housedContinue reading “Native American Artifacts”

An oil painting of Horatio N. Beach, prominent Brockport resident, has been preserved as part of the Emily L Knapp Museum’s Adopt a Picture Program. The painting is dated June 20, 1858 and was signed by Jerome D. Fielding, a local artist. Horatio N. Beach (1826-1896) came to Brockport from Connecticut in 1856, and wasContinue reading “Horatio N. Beach Portrait Preserved”

Here are some interesting photographs we found at the museum: Though we don’t know the identity of the woman in the photo, the technique was meant to capture many images suitable for a locket or brooch. Our best guess is that the image was captured in the mid-late 1800s or very early 1900s. It wasContinue reading “The Woman in the Locket”