Ridgeway Avenue

Richardson Family Connection to the Erie Canal

by David Richardson
Deed dated Oct. 8, 1880
Deed dated Oct. 8, 1880

On October 8, 1880, George Richardson (2nd Great Grandfather to Greece Historical Society Board Trustee David Richardson) bought 100 acres of land at the Southeast corner of Big Ridge Road and Mitchell Road (now Ridgeway and Long Pond Road) for $11,000 from the widow of Daniel Sharp. This was Lot 108 of the 20,000 Acre tract of the Phelps and Gorham purchase. George left the oil wells of Bradford, PA for the Flour City and the rich farming industry that was flourishing at that time. In 1895, George turned the farm over to his oldest son, Edward and his wife Cora Miller. The family raised cows and grew grain.

Family painting of their farm
Photo of farmhouse circa 1930

In the early 1900s, the State of New York began making plans to widen, relocate, and make improvements to the Erie Canal. By 1918, the Erie Canal would be moved from the North side of Big Ridge Road (Ridgeway Ave) to the South side. You can still see evidence of the old Erie Canal to this day, just South of Unity Hospital on Long Pond Road.

As evidenced by this document, Ed and Cora received $480.31 from the State of New York on March 4, 1907. The “new” Erie Canal would divide the Richardson parcel nearly in half and significantly reduce their fields for farming. Ed and Cora’s children witnessed the building of the Canal on their property, as well as the bridge which was built to cross the Canal. The property was eventually auctioned off in 1939. The northern part of their former property is now Canal Ponds Business Park. The south portion was the site of the Central Drive-in from 1946 to 1982 and is now townhomes and a professional building.

NYS deed March 4, 1907
NYS deed March 4, 1907

1938 map illustrating the Richardson land (shaded area) purchased by NYS for the Barge Canal (Environs of Rochester, Vol. 3, Plat 38) via Rochester Public Library
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The Ridgeway Air Park

by William Sauers

For years during the 20th century, many communities in our area had their own airports ranging from grassy fields to paved run­ ways with hangers to store airplanes. Hilton had the Hilton Airport on Burritt Road. The Brizee airport in Pittsford was on Marsh Road. In Henrietta, there was the Hylan Airport and the short-lived Genesee Airfield. Woodward Field was well-known in Leroy; even Honeoye Falls had a small airfield. Let’s not forget the very early Britton Field on Scottsville Road organized by former Greece Supervisor Willis Britton.

What about the Town of Greece? Our first known airfield was run by WW I Ace, Roy DeVal, located in the Shoremont area in 1927. It had one of the first hangers in Monroe County. During the 1960s and 70s, the Greenleaf Flying Club had a private field on Kuhn Road. Of course, there were other landing areas on private farmland.

The largest and most infamous in the Town of Greece was located at the Southeast corner of Ridgeway Avenue and Lee Roads.

Shortly after WW II, Richard (Dick) Kaiser opened Ridgeway Air Park. At the time many veteran pilots

were looking for a place to store their planes or just a convenient field to land and rest, and this seemed to be an ideal spot. The place had a small hangar and at one time 16 private planes were quartered there.

But by the summer of 1947, neighbors began to complain about the low-flying planes over their homes. In July The Greece Press reported that the Town Board received petitions from the residents of the Latona Tract and Koda Vista neighborhood, citing flights allegedly created by the airpark that were “detrimental to the physical and mental health of the residents, especially children.” They wanted the place closed down.

Kaiser claimed that Ridgeway fliers were getting blamed unfairly for the low-flying acrobatics, but eventually did change the flight patterns of the planes flying in and out of the air park. This seemed to have calmed down the nearby residents.

However, a tragic accident occurred in October of 1947 when an Army Air Corps veteran flew too low while coming in for a landing and crashed into the Erie Canal embankment just north of the landing field killing himself and an 18-year-old passenger.

In June of 1948, a social organization, the Greece Aero Club, was formed at the airpark, and in August of ’48, Jim Earl, also an Army veteran, took over ownership of the place. But soon news reports about the airpark vanished.

Dick Kaiser and his wife, June, eventually moved to Utah. By 1956 Kiser’s wife, also a pilot, was flying in (I kid you not)a “Power Puff Derby” in Salt Lake City and Dick was employed by a company in Utah.

We are not sure when or what exactly ultimately ended the life of this airfield. There were reports of young boys using the “old field” for radio-controlled planes in 1955. Industrial expansion eventually took over the airfield land, forever covering any evi­dence of it ever having existed. Now, three-quarters of a century has all but eliminated hearing personal stories of the Ridgeway Air Park.

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