Niagara Square, formerly called “Court House Park”, was a very early city public square. It was at the very center of the city’s original plan of radial streets laid out by Joseph Ellicott. In 1874, at the request of Park Board, Olmsted was engaged to prepare plans to beautify the site. The difficulty was that the city only owned the streets and the small triangles between them where the thoroughfares entered the square. The center island was undeveloped. At that time, the buildings around the square were primarily private residences, plus the Buffalo Central High School at the site of what is now the New York State office building (between Court and Genesee streets), and the Niagara Square Baptist Church, occupying part of the site now filled by the Statler Building.
Olmsted recommended that any change made to the center of the square should not interfere with the views across it from along the major streets crossing it. Because of the need to facilitate transportation through it, including a streetcar line, he opposed creating a large central element such he had created for the parkway places and circles elsewhere in Buffalo. He proposed a smaller circular space of 100 feet in diameter. The space would be occupied by a low spray fountain and pool, surrounded by a simple stone curb and rail, and planted with water plants around the circumference. Olmsted pointed to a fountain he and Calvert Vaux had previously created at New York City’s Union Square as a smaller version of what he wished to replicate in Buffalo.
Around the central element, Olmsted specified the roadway to be a full 60 feet in width. He recommended planting the small triangular segments where the crossing streets entered the square with trees and shrubs, retaining any existing trees if of good quality and adding others as needed, grouped at the apex of each segment. Around the trees he would have circular benches installed. Across the sidewalk from the tree groupings would be another seat, backing against low railings to protect the turf and shrubbery planted behind.
The most controversial issue Olmsted addressed in his design was the possibility for a planned monument commemorating the sacrifices of the Union soldiers and sailors who fell in the recent civil war might be placed in Niagara Square rather than in Soldiers’ Circle as originally envisioned. The impetus for building such a monument originated with the Ladies’ Association for the Erection of a Soldier’s Monument in Niagara Square, Buffalo, which formed in July, 1874. The group solicited designs for the memorial, and began raising funds to pay for its construction. They received a pair of designs, with the one their leadership favored being a sandstone arch by Henry Hobson Richardson. Richardson had already provided designs for Buffalo structures, including the residence of William Dorsheimer on Delaware street near Virginia street, and the massive New York State Asylum for the Insane on Forest avenue. He provided a drawing of his proposal in early December of that year, with a copy to Olmsted, as well.
The Board of Park Commissioners initially expressed a view that whatever monument was chosen should be placed at the center of the square, where Olmsted preferred the low fountain. He argued that such positioning would only be visible from a third of the streets entering the square. Instead, he recommended that the memorial take the form of an arch, the bases of which should be located at the point that Delaware street narrowed and departed the square to the north. He specifically had in mind Henry Hobson Richardson’s arch when he finalized his plan for Niagara Square.
Although ground was broken for the Soldiers Memorial on July 4, 1876, the fundraising to provide for its construction stalled well short of the funds needed. Later, a less ambitious – and less costly – monument was erected in Lafayette Square instead. Neither did the Common Council approve the funds which would have allowed the rest of the Olmsted plan to be implemented. Niagara Square remained undeveloped as a park. In time, a second trolley line was build across the square, and the small center space of the square was eliminated.
In 1895, the topic of improving the square came up again. The Park Board solicited input for improving the square. There were designs submitted from Olmsted, Olmsted and Eliott, the successor firm to Frederick Law Olmsted, as well as competing designs from local architect George Cary and a third plan, the author of which is unclear, referred to as the “Champs Elysees” plan. The plan the Olmsteds submitted was, essentially, a simplified version of what the elder Olmsted had provided a score of years earlier. The Park Board accepted public input, and held considerable internal debate over which plan to implement. The discussions persisted well into the next year. Then, a surprise decision by the city Corporation Council rendered the question moot. He ruled that, while the Park Board had the legal authority to “take possession” of the square, the Legislature had not imparted to the Board the means to implement any alterations and that the effective control of the square remained with the city proper.
The square remained unchanged until after the assassination of President William McKinley in Buffalo in 1901. Desirous of erecting a prominent monument to honor the late president, architect D. H. Burnham recommended an obelisk in Niagara Square as the best memorial. Designed by the firm of Carrère and Hastings of New York City, the marble obelisk with fountains at its base was dedicated in 1907 on the sixth anniversary of McKinley’s murder. With minor alterations to the central circle, specifically the addition of the present perimeter of trees, the center of Niagara Square is today very much as it was in 1907. What has changed considerably are the replacement of private residences by much larger, mostly governmental, buildings, and the closures of some of the streets radiating from the square.
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