Buffalo Quartet

In which we leave the Townie confines for the big city for sports, literature and some necessary activism.

Here at “Talk of the Townie,” I wear that “Townie” badge proudly as one of the 13,782 residents of the Town of Aurora. After all, it’s not everyone who will turn 76 (in a couple of weeks, the Fates willing) no more than a five-minute e-bike ride from where I turned six and sixteen and sixty-six. That said, I acknowledge that our little hometown, situated at the brief confluence of New York State Routes 16, 20A and 78 on our Main Street, works as well as it does because of our association with the Mother Ship, Buffalo.

Buffalo is two-and-a-quarter centuries old, and as tarnished as her lustre might be, still serves as the nucleus of Erie County and Western New York, with those of us in the outlying districts buzzing about like electrons, kinetically fulfilling many and varied roles.

Once upon a time, silos along the Buffalo River stored the grains from America’s Breadbasket in the Midwest.

To understand Buffalo, think of the nation’s history in macro terms, then sharpen the focus to the easternmost shore of Lake Erie. Westward expansion from the Atlantic after the Revolutionary War made Buffalo a logical destination; the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825 created a hub in Buffalo for goods boating in from the Midwest through the Great Lakes on their way east. The harnessing of the Niagara’s waters promised abundant electricity, which spurred manufacturing. Railroads supplanted the already obsolete canal, carrying tons and tons of goods and raw materials. Immigrants soon arrived from all corners of Europe; African Americans fleeing Jim Crow made their way north, all settling in enclaves throughout the 52.5 square miles that Buffalo encompassed, providing labor for factories and mills. By 1900, the city’s population ranked eighth in the nation. I remember as a high school kid in the 1960s learning that Buffalo boasted a robust population of well over half a million.

Then, well, opinions vary, but most will concede that the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway and the building of the Interstate Highway System eliminated Buffalo as a critical piece of the national commerce puzzle. Steel and grain mills closed or relocated south and out of the country.

Once upon a time, the Central Railroad Terminal on Buffalo’s East Side shuttled thousands of passengers and tons of goods and raw materials every day.

The Buffalo of the 1970s, ‘80s, ‘90s suffered more em- than im- migration. The Blizzard of ’77 didn’t help. You could take that old wedding meme—something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue—and rephrase it to “some things old, a few things new, some things blundered, but there’s hope for renewal.”

On the rebound with hope, with its population nudging every so slightly upward toward 300,000 from it heyday of 500,000-plus, Buffalo still holds sway as the place to be for certain events. We townies may fancy ourselves self-sufficient, but we need that city.

So last week, I found myself making the trek to Buffalo on four consecutive days, a rarity.

Wednesday, March 25, Key Bank Arena: Part of being a Western New Yorker is suffering, Sisyphus-like, at the hands of our professional sports teams. But in February of 2026, this year, the Bills finally made it to the…never mind, they didn’t. I’d like to say I didn’t get caught up in the campaign to beatify Josh Allen, but, but, well, there’s always next year. Last Wednesday, however, my buddy Pierre took me to into the city, right next to Buffalo River, to watch the Buffalo Sabres skate against the Big Bad Bruins. For 15 years, our Sabres have missed the playoffs. They’ve been really bad, kinda bad, halfway promising, even good enough a few times to get a couple fingers on the hem of the playoff skirt, only to lose their grip in the last week of the season.

Could this be the year?

This, though, is their year. We’re [that’s the editorial we; my skates no longer fit] good, we’re gonna make the playoffs, all will be forgiven. The energy has its epicenter in our city where we pack the arena with 18,000 people. That Stanley Cup parade won’t be in East Aurora, I tell ya; we’ll be dancing all the way through Downtown. Stay tuned.

Thursday, March 26, Kleinhans Music Hall: Blue collar, home of the workingman, gritty, willing to wrench a living out of whatever they can, Buffalo may be all of those things, but she maintains her intellectual edge. At Kleinhans Music Hall, ten or fifteen minutes from the arena, home of the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, the Just Buffalo Literary Society hosts authors of national and international fame. And the place is always packed. Authors like Toni Morrison, Patti Smith, Colm Toibin, Terry Tempest Williams, Edna O’Brien, George Saunders and on and on, talk about their literature, all literature and answer questions. They tell us ours is as big, knowledgeable, and appreciative as any on the circuit. It’s a good excuse for us to have a meal at our favorite new restaurant in the city, Dog and Pony on the way. What a reassuring comfort it is to be absorbed into good writing with a few thousand kindred spirits who are also Western New Yorkers. This time, We heard the author of Educated, Tara Westover, speak about the art of memoir.

Barbara Cole, of Just Buffalo Literary Society’s Babel Author Series, introduces Tara Westover, who wrote the best-selling memoir, Educated.

"Take me out to the ball game; who cares if it’s a little chilly?

Friday, March 27, Sahlen Field : In the “You gotta want it bad,” category comes the third trip to our fair city—Opening Day for the Buffalo Bisons, our Triple-A baseball team. My pal Moe has had season tickets since before MLB passed over us for one of two National League franchises in 1992. (Denver and Miami became the two winners; who did we think we were?) He’s a sharing sort and invited me to Opening Day. Projected game time temperature at Sahlen Park, less than a mile from ice-covered Lake Erie, 31.5 degrees Fahrenheit. Hell, yes, I said. We are Western New Yorkers and baseball fans. Several thousand of us hardy souls bundled five and six clothing layers deep. Hey, it was four-dollar craft beer day at the stadium—what, you gonna pass that up? The sun was out, the wind minimal. The temperature rose to damn near 40 by the middle innings. And it was baseball season once again; life is good.

Saturday, March 28, Buffalo City Hall:

Fifty-seven years ago, I marched in Buffalo against the War in Vietnam. Here I was again, with many thousands at the No Kings rally. And I’ll march again and again. As I’ve said in this space before, this isn’t about politics; it’s about decency and kindness and regard for one and all.

I’m with her.