Former Elementary School Building in Buffalo NY

Buffalo Public School Number 77, Buffalo New York

Date added: November 10, 2024

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New York
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Buffalo Public School #77 (PS 77) is in the North Prospect Hill neighborhood of Buffalo, New York. Located at 429 Plymouth Avenue, the former elementary school was constructed in 1927-1928. The architect, Ernest Crimi, utilized nearly identical plans for several other schools in Buffalo, as the city underwent an educational building boom due to a shortage of adequate instructional spaces at the start of the twentieth century.

Built during the height of school construction in Buffalo, PS 77 was one of twenty-four new schools and twenty-six additions built by the Buffalo School District between 1919 and 1929. This rapid school construction reflected post-World War I school building patterns as well as efforts by the Buffalo School District to end the use of unsanitary and unsafe wooden annexes for educating the city's children. Designed by Ernest Crimi, head of the Buffalo School District's Bureau of School Architecture, PS 77 reflects the full standardization of school design in New York State by the 1920s. While many guidelines related to school design were promulgated in the late nineteenth century, it was not until 1904 that laws related to the layout, interior spaces, and circulation patterns in schools were passed. These laws resulted in more uniform school designs across New York State, and PS 77 reflects many of the prevailing guidelines of the era.

These standards, while often pertaining to safety, also contributed to a broader curriculum meant to better engage students. Mandatory education laws enacted in 1894 flooded schools with new students, many of whom were from working class or immigrant families. Educators felt that the needs of these new students could not be met by a traditional academic curriculum, and school designers began to incorporate vocational training facilities within newly built schools. In addition to safety features like decentralized staircases, Crimi's design for PS 77 included a large auditorium, gymnasium, cafeteria, science rooms, and manual training rooms, standardized spaces required by law in New York State educational facilities.

The period of significance for Buffalo Public School #77 is 1927-1928, which encompasses the original period of construction. Ernest Crimi's design for the building reflects national trends of school design in the 1920s, and the building retains nearly all of the original features that demonstrate these standards.

The North Prospect Hill Neighborhood

Buffalo Public School #77 is located in North Prospect Hill on the west side of the City of Buffalo. North Prospect Hill is bounded by Niagara Street and Prospect Avenue on the west, Porter Avenue and York Street on the south, Fifteenth Street on the east, and Albany and Hampshire Streets to the north. North Prospect Hill was originally part of Black Rock, a settlement formed in 1803 by Peter Buell Porter. Under Porter's influence, Black Rock competed with the fledgling community of New Amsterdam (later renamed Buffalo) for dominance of trade on the Great Lakes. Porter succeeded in getting Black Rock designated as the port of entry into Western New York in 1810 and worked to promote the construction of a canal from the Hudson River to Oswego, as this route would allow Black Rock to maintain control of a portage route from Lake Ontario to Lake Erie. The fortunes of Peter Buell Porter and Black Rock shifted with the election of DeWitt Clinton as governor of New York in 1817. Instead of pursuing the Hudson-Oswego Canal project, Clinton began work on the Erie Canal, selecting Buffalo, instead of Black Rock, as the canal's terminus in 1825. Because of the Erie Canal, Buffalo became the dominant municipality in Western New York and in 1853 annexed Black Rock into the city boundaries.

In 1860, a horse car line opened in North Prospect Hill, traveling north up Niagara Street into Black Rock. The initial route proved successful, and by the 1880s, Buffalo had over eleven miles of street railways. The expanding network of street railways transformed multiple communities on the city fringes from rural homesteads into densely packed streetcar suburbs. Streetcar suburbs like North Prospect Hill, Prospect Hill, and the West Village grew in popularity with upwardly mobile families, and middle class citizens who could now live away from the sooty environs of the factories where they worked. The suburbs offered an air of respectability, without the expense of Buffalo's elite residential streets such as Delaware and Linwood Avenues. The respectability of North Prospect Hill was reinforced in 1870, when Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux developed The Front (now known as Front Park) near the waterfront.

The development of The Front encouraged further residential development in North Prospect Hill. During the late nineteenth century, hundreds of homes, primarily modest frame dwellings, were erected, and by the early 1890s much of the neighborhood had been built up. The homes built in North Prospect Hill reflect the middle class nature of their occupants. Architects did not design the majority of the homes; instead, the designs often came from planning catalogues. Often, young working class families built small cottages on their lots with the intention of replacing them with larger two-story duplexes once more money had been accrued. This led to many building lots containing two residences, a large primary residence and an alley house, the lot's original cottage, pushed to the rear of the building lot and used as a rental property.

The growth of North Prospect Hill is reflected in census data taken between 1890 and 1920, data which reflects the expansion of the streetcar suburb. In 1890, the Eleventh Ward, which encompassed all of Black Rock from Porter Avenue to the Scajaquada Creek, with Main Street as the eastern boundary and Lake Erie as the western, had a total population of 30,304. By 1910, the city ward maps were redrawn and North Prospect Hill lay within the Twenty-Second Ward. Porter Avenue again bound the ward in the south, but Albany Street and Fifteenth Street served as its northern and eastern boundaries. Although the ward was a fraction of its previous size, the population of the Twenty-Second Ward was still 12,136. In the 1920 census, North Prospect Hill was within the Twenty-Fourth Ward and had a population of 19,279. The growth experienced by North Prospect Hill in the 1910s and 20s reflected the growth of Buffalo during this period. The city's industry and efficient transportation network opened neighborhoods to young families who'd previously rented their living quarters elsewhere. In North Prospect Hill, the population growth of the 1910s and 20s was spurred primarily by Italians and Italian-Americans who flocked to the area to purchase or build homes.

In the 1920s North Prospect Hill saw an influx of middle-class Italian families which congregated due to the area's reasonably priced houses and building lots. The new arrivals spurred business in North Prospect Hill, opening grocers, barbershops, movie theaters, and other commercial establishments, primarily around Connecticut Avenue. Italians and Italian-Americans brought neighborhood stability and growth to North Prospect Hill, growth that by 1926 made it necessary for the Buffalo Public School System to plan a new school, PS 77, for the neighborhood's children.

Buffalo Public School 77: A Neighborhood School

The Buffalo School District constructed PS 77 in 1927-1928 to satiate the overwhelming demand for new classroom space in North Prospect Hill. The school, designed to serve students in grades K-8, was built at a cost of $500,000 and contained "30 classrooms, double shops, domestic science and art rooms, cafeteria, kindergarten, double gymnasiums, and an auditorium with a seating capacity of 500." Prior to the school's construction, private residences occupied the land, eighteen of which were demolished to make room for the school.

In 1929, the second full year PS 77 operated, 1,030 students attended the school. In addition to a regular slate of primary school coursework, the Buffalo School District utilized PS 77 in the 1920s and 1930s for English language education and citizenship courses for adults, furthering the school's ties to the growing Italian neighborhood. In 1929, the school held a graduation ceremony in the auditorium to celebrate the achievements of 800 women who had completed courses in English and basic citizenship. The graduation exercises and ceremonies are not surprising given the concentration of Italians and Italian-Americans living in North Prospect Hill in the 1920s. Additionally, PS 77 was used as part of a neighborhood lecture series sponsored by the Buffalo Museum of Science. In 1929, the science museum offered a set of four lectures at PS 77 on an eclectic group of topics that included: architecture, Spain, Hawaii, and the history of Yellowstone National Park, These lectures were open to the public and were a consistent feature of PS 77's extracurricular activity throughout the earliest years of its existence. Spaces like the auditorium demonstrate not only how the standardization of school designs provided enrichment and supplemental education for students, but community spaces that offered benefits to local residents as well.

The building was used as one of Buffalo's local public schools until 2007, when it was decommissioned. The building has remained vacant since, although in a secure condition and in very good repair.

Building Description

Buffalo Public School #77 (PS 77) is located at 429 Plymouth Avenue in the North Prospect Hill neighborhood of the City of Buffalo, Erie County, New York. It sits at the center of the block on a lot just north of Rhode Island Street, a secondary north-south traffic artery in this part of town. A few small commercial buildings are present within a two block radius, but the area immediately surrounding the school to the north, east, south, and west is otherwise primarily composed of housing stock dating from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth centuries. Three blocks to the northwest is the late twentieth century Buffalo Public School #30, the local elementary school. PS 77 occupies a parcel approximately one acre in size that stretches the depth of the block from Plymouth Avenue to Normal Avenue. The building is set back forty feet from the street and fronts onto Normal Ave. Planted grass lawns with minimal landscaping surround the front and sides of the building with a large asphalt parking lot at the rear.

Buffalo Public School #77 dates to 1927 and is a three-story, rectangular, brick building in a modest Neoclassical style. It has a courtyard plan with a double-height gymnasium at the northern end and a double-height auditorium at the southern end. The building was designed by Ernest Crimi, an architect responsible for the design of numerous public schools within the Buffalo area.

Crimi appears to have developed a successful and efficient system for the design of school buildings in Buffalo, and, owing to his use of similar plans, sections, and elevations, many of these schools are clearly designed by the same hand. The school buildings he designed were often based on a rectangular courtyard plan containing a double-height auditorium and gymnasium on the shorter sides and classrooms along the longer sides. The remaining central space was variously used as a workshop, atrium, cafeteria, or garden, as the individual needs of the school may have required. His designs are invariably three stories in height and display a modest Neoclassical or Collegiate Gothic style. They employ a first story base supporting upper stories featuring two-story pilasters, paired six-over-six windows, and stone frames with broken pediments surrounding prominent windows. Buffalo Public School #77 retains all of these hallmarks of Crimi's designs and is a fine example of his work. The building was used as one of Buffalo's local public schools until 2007, when it was decommissioned. The building has remained vacant since, although in a secure condition and in very good repair. Despite contemporary updates in the interior and the replacement of the original windows, the school building retains a number of original features and finishes.

PS 77 is oriented east-west and is fourteen bays wide by eight bays deep. A projecting auditorium on the north side and a projecting gymnasium on the south side are only two stories in height, while the remainder of the building is three stories. As mentioned above, the school is modestly Neoclassical in style. It was built with a steel structure and a flat roof and is clad in a mottled beige brick laid in Flemish bond. On the exterior, a single story brick base sits on a short stone foundation and is capped by a deep, flat, stone belt course. The upper floors of the building are articulated by two-story brick pilasters with stone capitals set in between each bay. In each of the regular bays, large window openings fill the space between the pilasters at each floor. Each opening has a flat stone sill and lintel and sits on a brick spandrel panel; in the third story, the brick spandrel panel is articulated with a diamond diaper pattern. Original plans indicate that the building featured paired, six-over-six, double-hung, wood windows that were replaced in the 1970s with triple, one-over-one, aluminum units. Above, a simple stone cornice and brick parapet wrap the building.

The primary facade is simple and symmetrical. It is composed of a ten-bay center portion with regular bays flanked by two blank bays at either end. In the center portion, the first and last bays project forward slightly, forming pavilions. At the ground floor, each pavilion contains an entrance to the building with double-leaf doors and a quoined stone surround. Above the entrances, the second floor bay contains a single balconied window with a stone frame and broken pediment; in the third story is a square window with a stone frame. The remaining bays of the center portion are as described above. The blank end bays are plain at the ground floor but have a diaper patterned brick motif framed in a contrasting brick in the upper stories.

The north elevation contains two regular bays at each end which flank the school's four-bay-wide auditorium space. The auditorium is two-stories in height and projects forward the depth of one bay. Centered on its northern face are four, tall, arched openings. Historic plans show that originally, these openings contained tall, double-hung wood windows with a blind half arched stucco panel above; however, the windows were removed in the 1970s. Currently, the arched portion retains the original stucco and the remaining portion contains aluminum replacement windows with blind transom panels above. Three decorative stone roundels are present above the openings. On the east and west faces of the auditorium, a single door opening framed in flat stone is present, but both have been filled in with plywood.

The south elevation is almost identical to the north elevation, although as the projecting portion contains the gymnasium, the windows differ. Here, there are four, tall, rectangular openings and two shorter openings. Each contains an aluminum replacement window in the lower portion and a blind transom panel above. On the east and west faces of the gymnasium, a double door opening framed in flat stone is present but both have been filled in with plywood. To either side of the gymnasium are two regular bays, as on the north elevation.

The west elevation fronts onto Normal Avenue, although it is set back approximately 120 feet from the street, creating space for parking. This elevation is identical to the primary facade.

The interior of the building is characterized by a courtyard plan with a double-height auditorium located at the northern end, a double-height gymnasium at the southern end, and single-loaded corridors surrounding the courtyard on each side. Identical original staircases are located at both ends of the east and west corridors. On the ground floor, the building is entered on the primary facade via identical entrances at the north and south ends which connect through to the main corridor. Between the entrances are the original administration offices, as well as the library. The courtyard space at the center contains a one-story volume which originally housed the woodshop, some storage space, and two manual training classrooms; along the north and south sides of the courtyard are the bathrooms, utility closets, and additional storage space. The boys' and girls' locker rooms flank the gymnasium in the southeast and southwest corners of the building, respectively, and the remainder of the ground floor space is occupied by five classrooms. On the second floor, the plan is similar, with ten classrooms located along the eastern and western walls and bathrooms, utility space, and faculty rooms along the north and south sides of the courtyard.

As the north and south wings are only two stories in height, the third floor of the building is I-shaped in plan with a courtyard at the center. Twelve classrooms line the north, east, and west walls. Along the southern wall is the kitchen and cafeteria space for the school. The north wing is composed of two large science classrooms which contain original built-in storage cabinets, as well as central island work stations with sinks and gas equipment as well.

Having been in continuous use as a school and a community education center until just recently, PS 77 is in very good condition and retains a great deal of its original features, both in the larger spaces and in the individual classrooms. Throughout the building each of the hallways has viny] tiled floors (over original terrazzo) with a terrazzo base, original plaster walls with wood picture rail trim, and a later acoustic tile ceiling with an original flat plaster ceiling above it. All of the hallways are at their original width and the original door rhythm has been maintained. Many of the original, wood, four-panel doors are present with tall, six-light transoms above. In each of the four stairhalls there is an original stair with terrazzo treads, risers, stair landings, and base trim. Instead of a railing, the stairs have a solid, partial height, plaster wall at the sides capped with a molded wood handrail. The walls and ceilings of each stairhall are the original plaster. At the second floor landing, a large window lights the stairhall and is protected by an original, delicate, Neoclassical cast-iron railing.

A typical classroom in PS 77 is twenty-two feet wide by thirty-two feet long with two large banks of windows. Each classroom has original chalkboards with original wood trim on two of the solid walls. In most cases, the remaining short wall contains a run of original students' coat closets framed by an original, built-in, wood cabinet with divided-light glass doors at either end. Dropped acoustic tile ceilings and vinyl-tile flooring have been installed throughout, but walls are the original plaster with wood baseboard and picture rail trim. In some of the classrooms original desks, sinks, and other fixtures also remain.

The building's library, offices, and cafeteria spaces are still present but have been updated with modern finishes. The library is located on the east wall of the ground floor. It is twenty-two feet wide by sixty-four feet long and lit by four banks of windows. The library has vinyl tile floors, gypsum walls, and a dropped acoustic tile ceiling with the original flat plaster ceiling above. The remaining shelving and circulation desk date to the 1990s. A supply closet at the south end and a librarian's office at the north end of the room each contain some original built-in cabinets. The main administrative offices for the school are located just north of the library on the east wall and consist of a small reception area and open office space with an enclosed office in the northwest corner. Here the flooring is vinyl tile with a dropped acoustic tile ceiling above, but the walls are the original plaster with original wood chair rail and picture rail. The school's cafeteria is located on the third floor and occupies all of the south side of the building. It is entered on both the east and west ends via doorways from the east and west corridors and lit on the north and south sides by several banks of windows. The flooring in the cafeteria is vinyl tile and an acoustic tile ceiling obscures the original flat plaster ceiling beyond; however, the walls are the original plaster and original wood picture rail wraps the room.

The school's original auditorium space on the north side of the building is fully intact. The double-height room is lit by three, tall rectangular windows on the northern wall with entry doors on both the southern and western walls. The original, wood-paneled, bow-fronted stage is located at the eastern end of the room with rounded steps to either side leading down to the seating level. A simple plaster architrave wraps the stage opening and acts as the proscenium. Two blind arches flank the stage and have inset doorways leading backstage. At the western end of the room is the original balcony seating area. The ceiling and walls of the auditorium are the original plaster with a deep plaster cornice. A terrazzo base surrounds the stage and original wood baseboard and chair rail surround the rest of the room, as well as the area behind the stage. The original hardwood flooring is present on both seating levels and all of the original wood and metal-frame seating remains. At the ends of each row, the seats have decorative, stamped metal ends with the number "77" on them.

On the opposite side of the building, the original gymnasium space is also intact. It is lit by large windows on the south wall with entry doors on the north, west, and east walls. An original sprung hardwood sports floor remains, as do the original painted brick walls and ceiling with exposed steel girders. At the center point of the north and south walls are the original folding wood partition walls and tall wall ladders