The site of the Water/Ways exhibit is Wells’ Long Library (1968); Main Building tower and Cayuga Lake in background.
Sixteen years after the start of the settlement era. Several buildings from this era remain, including Patrick Tavern (1793), oldest house in Aurora and perhaps Cayuga County. Many Federal homes built in the next decade.
Scipio Lodge, F&AM #110, built 1819, dedicated by Gov. DeWitt Clinton, home of the Aurora Masonic Center; Water/Ways partner.
The Village of Aurora Historical Society, Water/Ways partner, is located in the 1906 District School #6.; exterior courtyard. Water/Ways exhibit: “How Cayuga Lake Shaped Aurora: Legends and Lore.”
Wealth from the land, shipped by the lake, built fortunes and offered opportunity in the 1840s and 1850s. African-Americans freedom-seekers joined freedmen and women who were already a significant part of the local community; skilled Irish stonemasons and carpenters built the Victorian houses of the Historic District, including the Edwin B. Morgan House (1859).
From Gleason’s magazine, “Regatta Day in Aurora,” 1853: sailboats gathered and steamboats, which provided routine passenger and freight transportation on Cayuga Lake, offered special excursions for viewers.
Wells College (Water/Ways partner), founded 1868: Glen Park, home of Henry Wells, from Main Building tower.
Aurora’s Erie Canal boom began in the 1830s; a mural by Glen Moore Shaw in the Aurora Inn shows canal boats and warehouses behind the Inn.