Niagara Falls: Early History

[@itsJoshW]

Good video. The settlement of Niagara Falls on the NY side happened originally by Robert De Lasalle. Toward the creation of each of the NY towns, the creditor of "founder" had always traced itself back to Robert De Lasalle, who one Village was actually named after. Toward the early 1900's, Lasalle was coined and was known for being the area of middle class folks, while the mid town of "Niagara Falls", known then as the Village of Niagara Falls, stretched from the falls itself to Hyde Park, and was conjoined with two major routes: Pacifica Avenue (Later, Buffalo Avenue) and Pine Avenue (which later was adjusted to be "Niagara Falls Blvd" as they built new roads).
One little known fact many do recall of the NY side was the number of Italian Immigrants that migrated here toward the middle of the United States founding, but what many didn't know is that Niagara Falls had a bit of a segregation problem. Portions of the downtown (NY specific, that is) region was separated between "itlalian" and "black" neighborhoods, with the rare instance of a wealthier black individual living up in the Village of Lasalle (my family, for instance). Many firefighters, police officers, lawyers, doctors, dentists, etc, were all of Italian historical descent, while the majority of the population was predominantly "workers" in factories off Pacifica Avenue, or business owners of various smaller businesses.
Eventually toward the mid 1900's, after segregation was wiped, and toward the end of the Industrial age, many workers lost their jobs, many had to relocate to new areas, and many wealthier owner class individuals would move to further out towns and villages within NYS.
A shared common historical fact that almost everyone forgot was Prohibition. Around this period of time, Honeymoon Bridge infamously was the crossing point between the Cataract cities. Most citizens of Niagara Falls were dual citizens, as they would travel continuously between the two up unto the 1920's, in specific, in larger quantity due to trafficking. One large contributor to this was the Mafia, and in particular, Prohibition in the United States. As the Canadian side cleaned up their act, the American side slowly delved deeper into organized crime, and eventually this lead Niagara Falls, on the NY side, down the path it is today, while the Canadian side prospered.
Since this period of time, the Canadian side has built an amazing skyline, lush with sky scrapers, hotels, and activities for the tourist, while the American side was late to this punch. The American side eventually tried to focus on it's tourism, but in the wrong avenues -- with a dozen hotel's at insane costs, with only a Casino to show, many fail to view the "city" as much of a sight, while still wanting to view the natural wonder.
As the city, on the NY side, lays as a toxic ruin of the past 100 years of corruption, crime, and chemicals from industrial manufacturing and corruption-dumping to locations homes were built under, the Canadian side prospers but still fails to capture what it requires to become a Toronto.
Both cities tried in the last 20 years to make themselves known, from a tight rope walker, all the way to an eclipse; The failure is nothing more than a spectacle of poor leadership, poor vision, and a poor understanding of why people enjoy traveling for nature.
The only saving grace is where one side fails, the other side prospers. I'd love to live in a land where the cataract cities grew to where they once were, but from the direction it's headed, in my mid 30 years of living, I don't know if I'll ever see the day. But I hope so. We could be the beauty of the entire north-eastern continent, but we fail to capture what it meant to be the Honeymoon capital.