Hamburg has grown in all directions since its first settler,
John Cummings, came to Water Valley in 1806 and
built his mill on the banks of Eighteen Mile Creek. Hamburg's
early settlements frequently changed their names as they grew.
Jacob Wright's 1808 tavern at Abbott's Corners developed into
Armor, and the 1811 brick gristmill of the Smith brothers became
known as Smithville and then White's Corners, before it grew into
Hamburg village. The train stop in northern Hamburg received its
name when postmaster Heman Blasdell hung a sign bearing his last
name on the hamlet's tiny railroad shanty.
Using more than 200 stunning photographs and postcards,
including many never published before, Hamburg records the
excitement of life in this community in days gone by. Rich with
images of Hamburg's golden years of growth and prosperity at the
beginning of the twentieth century, the book brings back some of the
town's lost architecture: the B.M. Fish Dry Goods Store, Biehler's
Tea Room, the Hamburg Academy, and Kopp's Opera House, where
large gatherings, such as the Hamburg Free Library Annual Ball, were
held. It shows the reported birth of the hamburger at the Erie County
Fair and revisits the lazy summer days at Woodlawn Beach. It even
captures a gang of pig rustlers who terrorized Blasdell in 1906.