Buffalo Judge Penny Woflgang has a weekly interview show which I first appeared on about 5 years ago. On August 14, 2012 she interviewed me for the new book “Gangsters and Organized Crime in Buffalo.”
The interview aired for her “On Target” radio show aired August 18 and 19, 2012. This was taken from KISS 98.5 in Buffalo.
Click Here to listen to the interview.
I did this interview on 6-19-2012 with Joe Chille of Townsquare Media in Buffalo. It aired Saturday 6-23 and Sunday 6-24. Take a listen, it’s 30 minutes. Sun Jun 24 06;00;58 2012 wblk.
The latest and fifth book from Michael F. Rizzo is now available for purchase through Amazon.com. Gangsters and Organized Crime in Buffalo is the first book to concentrate on Buffalo’s Mafia and early gangster history.
The book ties in with Rizzo’s Naked Buffalo Tours, which runs several tours of former Mafia sites in Buffalo.
Book signings, talks, and more, will be listed on here or on Facebook.
Check out the new review on BuffaloRising.com for “Buffalo’s Legacy of Power and Might”.
Grocery chain Aldi is looking to build a store at the former site of Sattlers at 998 Broadway. It is currently the home to a closed K-Mart. The biggest question the city has is what effects the store would have on the Broadway Market directly across the street. My other concern is, what affect would this have on revitalizing the Broadway-Fillmore community? Any opinions on it?
Edwards department store logo
E. W. Edwards & Son was a chain of department stores that opened their first Buffalo store in 1922 at 460 Main Street. Business grew and the company continued expansion in the Buffalo market.
They announced a small 5,000 square foot store on Bailey Avenue in the Langfield Plaza in June 1947. This store was designed to “serve a sufficiently large segment of the population of Buffalo to warrant establishing a branch in this area.”
The store was successful and in 1950 they quadrupled the store size. They were “convinced there is a definite need for suburban shopping centers,” and opened a branch in the L. B. Smith Plaza in Lackawanna in October 1951.
Suddenly they announced they were closing the Buffalo store in 1952. Hens & Kelly took over the Langfield Plaza store and AM&A’s took over the L.B. Smith Plaza store.
This and other Buffalo retailing history can be found in the book “Nine Nine Eight“.
Ad for local women's clothing store Gutman's
was a popular woman’s clothing chain in Buffalo started in 1947 by Alvin H. Gutman. The first location was at 584 Main Street, and in 1955 they added a branch at 91 Grant Street. By 1960 they had added one at 959 Broadway.
The local chain, known for spectacular sales, was very successful in Buffalo and was able to duplicate that success, at one point operating 28 stores in several states. Locally, the company felt that malls were the future, eventually moving their Main Street store into the Main Place Mall when that opened in the mid-1960s. Other locations included five suburban malls.
In 1985 the company filed for Chapter 11 reorganization, with debts eating away at the company. At the time they were down to 17 stores in New York, Michigan, Ohio, and Virginia.
In 1989 they closed their Seneca Mall location, which had lost all its major tenants to the McKinley and Galleria malls, and was failing. The following year they opened an off-price outlet in the Thruway Mall (formerly Plaza), which was losing the battle with the Walden Galleria, a mile away.
In June 1991 they closed the Galleria, McKinley, and Main Place Mall stores. The Galleria store was located near two other local stores at the mall which had recently closed, Sample and L. L. Berger, leaving less of a draw for Gutman’s. Together with cash flow problems, thinly stocked stores, and losses mounting, they filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection again in July 1991.
Following a troubled summer, they shuttered all their locations, except the Eastern Hills Mall, in August 1991.
This and other Buffalo retailing history can be found in the book “Nine Nine Eight“.
Buffalo is over 175 years of age. Most of the housing stock still standing was built after the 1870s, so one would assume that in the time since there would be multiple owners of every house. So far, that theory is interesting to prove!
One example is a house located on the East Side on Lemon Street, near Cherry Street, in the area known as the Fruit Belt. It is minutes from the Buffalo Medical Campus. This particular house was built around 1879, believed to be by Philip Jaeckle. Jaeckle had owned the property since 1873, so it’s entirely possible he built it earlier than 1879.
Philip died in late 1887 or early 1888, and the property was acquired by Jacob Jaeckle. Jacob owned dozens of properties in Buffalo at the time. In November of 1888 he sold it to Anna Jaeckle for $6500, almost $123,000 today!
Anna lived there for about 22 years, until she died. Her heirs eventually sold the property to Mary Jaeckle. Mary lived there for about 18 years, until she died. The house was then sold to W. Jacob Jaeckle, who had been living there already.
Edwin F. Jaeckle was the executor of Mary’s estate. The Jaeckle name may be familiar to some as it is still used by one of Buffalo’s top law firms.
W. Jacob and his wife Anna sold the house in 1954 to another family. That family still lived in the house when this article was written. Almost 50 years later, and only two different families owned and lived in the house, a typical story in the Buffalo area.
If you have a house you want to know more about, contact Michael for more information.
Buffalo is over 175 years of age. Most of the housing stock still standing was built after the 1870s, so one would assume that in the time since there would have been many owners of each of the many houses. So far, that theory is proving interesting to prove!
One example is a house located on the East Side on Lemon Street, near Cherry Street.
This particular house was built around 1879, believed to be by Philip Jaeckle. Jaeckle had owned the property since 1873, so it’s entirely possible he built it earlier than 1879.
Philip died in late 1887 or early 1888, and the property was acquired by Jacob Jaeckle. Jacob owned dozens of properties in Buffalo at the time. In November of 1888 he sold it to Anna Jaeckle for $6500, almost $123,000 today!
Anna lived there for about 22 years, until she died. Her heirs eventually sold the property to Mary Jaeckle. Mary lived there for about 18 years, until she died. The house was then sold to W. Jacob Jaeckle, who had been living there already.
Edwin F. Jaeckle was the executor of Mary’s estate. The Jaeckle name may be familiar to some as it is still used by one of Buffalo’s top law firms.
W. Jacob and his wife Anna sold the house in 1954 to another family. That family still lived in the house when this article was written. Almost 50 years later, and only two different families owned and lived in the house, a typical story in the Buffalo area.
If you have a house you want to know more about, contact Michael for more information.
Buffalo is over 175 years of age. Most of the housing stock still standing was built after the 1870s, so one would assume that in the time since there would have been many owners of each of the many houses. So far, that theory is proving interesting to prove!
One example is a house located on the East Side on Lemon Street, near Cherry Street.
This particular house was built around 1879, believed to be by Philip Jaeckle. Jaeckle had owned the property since 1873, so it’s entirely possible he built it earlier than 1879.
Philip died in late 1887 or early 1888, and the property was acquired by Jacob Jaeckle. Jacob owned dozens of properties in Buffalo at the time. In November of 1888 he sold it to Anna Jaeckle for $6500, almost $123,000 today!
Anna lived there for about 22 years, until she died. Her heirs eventually sold the property to Mary Jaeckle. Mary lived there for about 18 years, until she died. The house was then sold to W. Jacob Jaeckle, who had been living there already.
Edwin F. Jaeckle was the executor of Mary’s estate. The Jaeckle name may be familiar to some as it is still used by one of Buffalo’s top law firms.
W. Jacob and his wife Anna sold the house in 1954 to another family. That family still lived in the house when this article was written. Almost 50 years later, and only two different families owned and lived in the house, a typical story in the Buffalo area.
If you have a house you want to know more about, contact Michael for more information.
On May 17, 1994 the news everyone in Buffalo feared finally broke. The Bon-Ton had agreed to buy local department store chain AM&A’s for $2.1 million in cash and assume $40 million in debt and other liabilities. The sale was completed in July 1994. Just six years earlier the company had reached $217 million in sales.
This and other fun facts can be found in the book “Nine Nine Eight”.
Found at a local antique store – nice AM&A’s hanger.
Their story can be found in the book “Nine Nine Eight”.
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