Asa Ransom - Table of Contents

Asa Ransom
By Nancy Blumenstalk Mingus

Excerpts from
Buffalo: Good Neighbors, Great Architecture
, by Nancy Blumenstalk Mingus. Pub. by
Arcadia Publishing 2003

Although they did develop forts and trading posts, the French explorers did not build permanent residences in the area. Depending on the source you choose to believe, this honor fell to

These individuals may have been here prior to 1790

There is no dispute, however, that by 1795, when La Rochefoucault Liancourt visited Buffalo, there were already at least four houses belonging to Winney, Johnston, Lane, and Middaugh.

According to Joseph Landon, who was a member of a 1796 surveying party, Jesse Skinner and Hodge were also here.

Another source says that Asa Ransom was a resident by 1796, as were John Palmer and Sylvanus Maybee by 1798.


Asa Ransom

Asa Ransom moved to Buffalo from Massachusetts via Geneva, where he'd married and started a family. He chose to live at what would become Main and Terrace, building a log home there.

In 1797, his wife gave birth to a second daughter,who is credited in some accounts with being the first non-Native-American child born in Buffalo.

Ransom moved to Clarence in 1799, and an inn bearing his name still operates there.


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