While the thought of preserving the vast number of negatives and accompanying archival material seems like an overwhelming challenge, a partnership forged in 2011 between The Buffalo History Museum and the Buffalo State College Museum Studies graduate program has allowed preservation work to slowly progress over the last seven years. Students are almost immediately bitten by the ‘Beach bug’ on exposure to the collection and become rabid supporters of the preservation, digitization and research of the negatives. A synergistic relationship between the museum and Buffalo State provides an applied learning experience for the students, while simultaneously providing thousands of volunteer hours for the museum.

Once digital surrogates of the portraits are created, access and reproduction will be available through an electronic archive readily accessible worldwide. The significance of the portraits, as well as the supporting documents, will give tremendous insight into a working photography studio spanning over 70 years of history, including two world wars and the Great Depression. Beach’s international reputation as a photographer of great mastery will be restored and Buffalo can reclaim a lost son to the annals of history.

What is today known as the Beach Studio Collection is actually the work of four distinct photographers: Andrew Simson, Eleck F. Hall, Howard D. Beach and Edith M. Richardson. While the majority of the portraits in the collection can be attributed to the work of Beach, research into the relationships between these four photographers paints an interesting picture of apprenticeship, partnership and collaboration. Viewing their photographs clearly illustrates that each was a master of the photographic medium. Further examination proves that each was also an accomplished artist in their own right.

The Simson Studio established at 456 Main Street in 1857 was solely owned by German immigrant Andrew Simson. At the time of his death in 1922, he was reverently known as “Buffalo’s oldest photographer.” Simson’s philosophy embraced photography as an art, a science and a trade. These early photographs often situated the subject in staged settings replete with rugs, plant stands, backdrops and various accessories. For example, in the case of children, toys and dolls were often included. Simson’s clientele was primarily the Buffalo elite.

The Simson Studio established at 456 Main Street in 1857 was solely owned by German immigrant Andrew Simson. At the time of his death in 1922, he was reverently known as “Buffalo’s oldest photographer.” Simson’s philosophy embraced photography as an art, a science and a trade. These early photographs often situated the subject in staged settings replete with rugs, plant stands, backdrops and various accessories. For example, in the case of children, toys and dolls were often included. Simson’s clientele was primarily the Buffalo elite.

Originally part of the Powelson Studio, photographer Eleck Frederick Hall commissioned the French Chateau-style building of the studio and residence at 469 Virginia Street in 1894, just steps from Delaware Avenue. Hall was a well-known and accomplished photographer, renowned for both his talent and commercial success.  Shortly after the Pan-American Exposition, Hall was hired to photograph 248 men for the publication Prominent Men of Buffalo which was published in 1902. The book illustrated “the human forces…behind the progressive development of a prosperous twentieth-century American city.” Like Simson, Hall’s primary clientele were the city’s most prominent people. Ill health was the major cause of Hall selling his photography business. 

Tying the Simson and Hall studios together is the photographer Howard Dwight Beach (whose portrait appears at the beginning of this article). After arriving in Western New York at age 17 from New Britain, CT, in 1884, Beach apprenticed with Simson for over a decade. He became a partner in the business in 1896 and bought the studio four years later. In 1901, Beach received a commission to photograph the Native Americans participating in the Pan American Exposition, and invited 40 individuals to his studio. The names of the subjects are recorded on the photographs. In 1908, Beach purchased the Virginia Street studio from Hall and remained there for the rest of his life. Like Simson and Hall before him, Beach’s clients were the movers and shakers of Buffalo during the Progressive Era and beyond. Beach exhibited his work internationally and won many awards, some of which now form part of the studio’s archival collection. The glass plate negative collection bears his name because most of the extant images can be attributed to him. The collection is the single largest surviving collection in Buffalo from this era.

The Simson Studio established at 456 Main Street in 1857 was solely owned by German immigrant Andrew Simson. At the time of his death in 1922, he was reverently known as “Buffalo’s oldest photographer.” Simson’s philosophy embraced photography as an art, a science and a trade. These early photographs often situated the subject in staged settings replete with rugs, plant stands, backdrops and various accessories. For example, in the case of children, toys and dolls were often included. Simson’s clientele was primarily the Buffalo elite.

Following their fifth straight exhibition win, a 51-27 besting of the Akron Goodyears, the Bisons took on the 1945-46 Eastern Division champion Rochester Royals at the Edgerton Park Arena. Buffalo was no match for the Royals, losing in a romp, 78-57. This started a downhill spiral as the team lost its next four league games, including a 54-44 rematch with Rochester at Memorial Auditorium in front of the second largest crowd the Bisons drew that season, dropping them to a 3-6 record. Buffalo ended its five-game losing streak, however, with a heart-pounding, 52-50 overtime win over the Anderson Duffy Packers at the Aud. It was a hard-fought game, literally. At the end of the first half, police and arena officials broke up fights among the teams’ players that began with a scuffle between the Bisons’ Howie Rader and the Packers’ Ed Lewinski. 

In what would turn out to be the last home game for the Bisons, though nobody knew it at the time, Buffalo lost to the Sheboygan Redskins, 50-38, on December 16 in front of a Memorial Auditorium crowd of less than 1,000.  The following day, with a 4-7 record and crowds well below expectations, general manager Ferris announced that the team had “suffered a financial loss” and was offering shares in the franchise for sale, with free tickets for the investment. “We’ve drawn only 15,000 in our last six home games,” he said. Looking to increase attendance, he announced, “We’re offering 30 of our 100 shares for sale at $1,000 apiece and with each share goes 1,000 tax free tickets to our next two home games, Dec 25 and 28.” Ferris further indicated that if fan support did not improve, the franchise might be moved to a Midwestern city. The shares were offered to individuals, civic organizations and business concerns, and Ferris hoped that some civic groups would invest so that the Bisons might become “something like a civic organization.”

He did not give much time for a response to the offer. The following day, word leaked that Ferris was in Moline, IL, discussing with sports leaders from that city a possible transfer of the franchise. “We are interested in moving the club to a basketball interested community where a good solid set-up can be arranged,” Ferris said. “The Buffalo club, fourth in the eastern division of the league with four wins in eleven games, has lost $25,000 in six home games,” he added. 

Ferris made a similar offer to Moline that he had made in Buffalo. He was looking to sell 40 percent of the shares in the team and if that happened the Bisons would move to Moline. “Moline is the first city we visited, and from everything we have seen here, we believe that this is the best locality for the team,” Ferris told city officials. He then met with 15 Moline and Davenport (IA) business leaders to discuss financial arrangements needed to move the franchise. Meanwhile, on December 19, the Bisons lost to the Packers, 61-46, at the Anderson High School Wigwam in Anderson, IN, and three days later lost an exhibition game to the Dayton Mets in Ohio, 57-47. 

On December 23, while Ferris was forming a new corporation, Tri-City Sports, Inc., to move the Buffalo franchise to Moline, the Bisons were defeating the Jeeps on the court in Toledo, 43-39, behind 17 points from Otten. The following day, Christmas Eve, Ferris officially announced the team would be moving to Moline after a bloc of six men bought stock in the Bisons. All the remaining home games in Buffalo were cancelled as NBL commissioner Ward “Piggy” Lambert approved the transfer on December 26.

The Bisons played one final exhibition game as Buffalo, losing on the road to the Baltimore Bullets on December 26 by a 59-44 score. Gates was the Bisons’ leading scorer with 11 points. Buffalo finished their season in the Queen City with a 5-8 NBL record, though they were 8-2 in exhibition games. Don Otten led the team in scoring while in Buffalo, with a 10.9 points per game average, while Gates was second at 8.8.

Now the Tri-City Blackhawks, representing the cities of Moline and Rock Island, IL, plus Davenport, IA, the team played their first game in Moline on January 4, 1947. The Blackhawks finished the 1946-47 season with a 19-25 NBL record and a fifth-place finish in the six-team eastern division. Gates finished the season with the Blackhawks but was not re-signed by Tri-City for the 1947-48 season after being involved in a fight in a game against the Nationals. Founding partner Ben Kerner bought out Ferris’ interest in the franchise after the move to Moline.

Tri-City joined the National Basketball Association (NBA) in 1949 as part of the merger between the NBL and the BAA. Kerner hired Red Auerbach to coach the Blackhawks in 1949, but the future Hall of Famer quit after 57 games over a dispute with the owner. Following the 1951 season, Kerner moved the team again, this time to Milwaukee where they became the Hawks. A move to St. Louis followed the 1955 season. The Hawks would appear in four NBA championships while in St. Louis—winning the championship in 1958, but losing three times to the Boston Celtics in 1957, 1960 and 1961. Those losses stung for Kerner, as Auerbach was the Celtics’ coach and two of his best players—Bob Cousy and Bill Russell—were draft picks that Kerner had traded away. In 1968, he sold the team to Thomas Cousins and former Georgia governor Carl Sanders, who promptly moved the team to Atlanta. The Atlanta Hawks remain part of the NBA today.

Lack of support had doomed the team in Buffalo, as they averaged less than 2,800 fans per game. The city would not have another chance at an NBA franchise until the Braves in 1970. Pop Gates and Don Otten were the only two Bisons players that had sustained success at the professional level. After being released by the Blackhawks, Gates rejoined the Rens and later played for the Harlem Globetrotters. But his being signed for Buffalo by Ferris helped lead to the racial integration of professional basketball. “When Leo Ferris came to me, it was like a godsend,” Gates said years later. “It was a real highlight of my career to be accepted by the NBL as one of only two blacks in the league.” Gates was enshrined in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1989.

Don Otten stayed with Tri-City and was named the NBL’s Most Valuable Player during the 1948-49 season. He continued with the Blackhawks when they joined the NBA in 1949 and then played for four different teams through the 1952-53 season. In 1949, he and his brother Mac (another BGSU star) became the first brothers to play for the same team in an NBA game. And, on November 24, 1949, he broke the NBA record for personal fouls with eight in a single game. He was allowed to remain in the game because the team was down to only five players and league rules allowed those final five players to stay on the court. It’s a unique record, likely to never be broken.

Nat Hickey put himself into a few games while coaching the Bisons at age 44, and two years later he played some additional games for the Providence Steamrollers. This made him the oldest player to ever play in an NBA game, a distinction he still holds.

After selling his interest in the Bisons, Ferris returned to New York State, becoming vice president of the NBL and then general manager of the Syracuse Nats. Leading the reorganization of the Nats, he signed superstar Dolph Schayes away from the BAA’s New York Knicks in 1948, a major coup for the NBL. He also signed Al Cervi and Billy Gabor and those three laid the foundation for Syracuse’s NBA championship team in 1955.

Tensions between the two leagues continued but in the spring of 1949, Ferris began meeting with executives from the BAA about a possible merger. That same year, he convinced four of the five top players from the University of Kentucky’s national championship team to join the NBL and, in a startling development, gave them part-ownership rights in a new team, the Indianapolis Olympians. This was the last straw in the fight between the two leagues and later that year, six teams from the NBL joined 11 teams from the BAA to form the National Basketball Association, with play to begin that fall.

While with the Nats, Ferris teamed up with Syracuse owner Danny Biasone to develop a 24-second shot clock. Something of a math whizz, he devised that the clock time should be 24 seconds by dividing the number of seconds in a 48-minute game (2,880) by the average number of shots taken in a game (120) to get to the magic number. The NBA was initially reluctant to implement the new rule, but scoring jumped by almost 15 points per game when it did during the 1954-55 season. The modern, high scoring professional game came into being almost overnight. Ferris remained in the league for only one more season before starting a very successful career in real estate. He died on June 1, 1993, of Huntington’s disease.

Though the Buffalo life of the basketball Bisons lasted less than one season, the franchise, along with Ferris’ leadership, had a significant impact on professional hoops. Leo Ferris signed Pop Gates to the Bison roster, one of the earliest Black players to play in the league, which helped spur the racial integration of pro basketball. Ferris was also instrumental in the merger of the NBL and the BAA, forming what is today’s NBA. And he forever changed the game with the implementation of the 24-second clock, transforming basketball from a game of stalling tactics to a high-scoring, entertaining affair displaying incredible athleticism that today is among the most popular sports in the world. In addition, the Buffalo Bisons, today’s Atlanta Hawks, was a charter franchise of the NBA that is still thriving, some 77 years later.