Buffalo Seminary - Table of Contents

History - Buffalo Seminary
205 Bidwell Parkway, Buffalo, NY

History Highlights:

1851	The Buffalo Female Academy is founded, located in Evergreen Cottage (1814) on Johnson Park, the former property of Mayor Dr. Ebenezer Johnson
1889	The name of the school is changed to The Buffalo Seminary
1894	The graduates sell the clubhouse of Johnson Park in order to build a new clubhouse on Delaware Avenue. (This becomes the Twentieth Century Club.)
1899	The Seminary is merged with the Elmwood School; The Seminary becomes an upper school only.
1909	The new facility at 205 Bidwell Parkway opens. See also: Highlights of Buffalo History, 1909
1953	Larkin House acquired
1929	West-Chester Hall opens

Heads of The Buffalo Seminary

---

Buffalo Seminary and City of Light

Nearly every Buffalonian who read Lauren Belfer's City of Light knows that the Macauley School for girls is based on Buffalo Seminary on Lincoln Parkway. Buffalo Sem is the first high school for girls in Western NY and is now celebrating its 150th anniversary. It began its life in Mayor Ebenezer Johnson's mansion on what is now Johnson Park. When it was completed in 1832, Johnson's estate was the most extravagant in Western NY. It was the centerpiece of 30 acres on what was then the rural outskirts of the small city. Johnson had an artificial lake with a flock of swans, a deer park, and an orchard. Around 1850, a few years after Johnson left Buffalo, the grounds were divided into Johnson Park and Johnson Place, and the cottage became the first home of Buffalo Seminary. - Cynthia Van Ness