The Buffalo Basketball Bisons and Leo Ferris: A Team and a Leader that Changed the Game
By David Neth
On the evening of May 4, 2018, the sky in Fredonia was filled with black smoke emanating from the Fredonia Baptist Church’s clocktower as the historic church burned. The building, which is home to Family Church Fredonia, had just undergone a two-year, $1.3 million renovation after being sold for in 2015.
One of Western New York Heritage’s faithful readers recognized the church from Jacqueline Trace’s story, “Fighting the Demon Drink in Fredonia: The Women’s Temperance Crusade,” which appeared in our Winter 2015 issue, and included a newspaper article regarding the restoration of the church’s clock tower.
Since it was built in 1853, not only has the church been a landmark for the village, but it also served as a meeting place for important events throughout history, most notably the first meeting of the Women’s Crusade for Temperance.
When Boston lecturer Dr. Diocletian Lewis was invited to give a talk on “healthy living for young ladies” by the Fredonia Library Association in December 1873, he was also invited to speak about temperance two days later by the Good Templars, a local temperance society. The talk was held at the Fredonia Baptist Church and drew nearly 1,000 people. Dr. Lewis told a story of how his mother and a group of women had persuaded businesses in a town in Central New York to stop selling liquor.
The story inspired the people of Fredonia and the next morning, over 300 people once again met at the Fredonia Baptist Church to organize Fredonia’s own temperance crusade. Over the next week, the women marched through the streets of the town to spread their message and by 1884, the local temperance movement had turned the town dry.
The church has continued to serve the community since the temperance crusade and the fire in the clock tower that struck in May is not going to stop the community from restoring the former gem. In June 2018, the destroyed tower was taken down “piece by piece” and the building was sustained until the funds are raised to rebuild it. A fundraising page has been created with a goal of $100,000 to restore the 165-year-old village landmark.
The Women’s Crusade for Temperance began at the Fredonia Baptist Church in December 1873.
Credit: From Frances Graham & Georgeanna Gardener’s Two Decades: A History of the First Twenty Years’ Work of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union of the State of New York, 1894. Courtesy Darwin R. Barker Library and Museum.
