Cemetery to City Honors:

Timeline of how a piece of land used as a cemetery eventually became the home to City Honors (grades 5-12)

            William Hodge owned a farm lot from the Holland Land Purchase

1832    Asiatic Cholera Epidemic brought over from Europe struck Buffalo causing the need for more burial space for the dead. A cemetery was established on site

1886    The cemetery fell into disuse and was closed.  The graves were relocated to Forest Lawn and the site became known as Masten Park after Buffalo’s 1^st Democratic Mayor

1895    The architect firm that designed the Brisbane Building, M.E. Beebe and Son, designed the castle-like Masten Park High School. The building was constructed on the highest ground in the city and became known as “the school on the hill”  

1912    The building caught fire which led to it being razed. This event led to the rekindling of the legend that the school was cursed for being built on a cemetery

1914    A new school building was opened on the site. The building plans were adapted from Lafayette High School

1927    Masten Park HS was renamed Fosdick-Masten Park HS

1953    The high school closed its doors that Spring due to declining student population from suburbanization, but in the fall it reopened as a Vocational HS

1979    Slipping numbers caused their doors to close and the school became a department warehouse and was scheduled for demolition

1980    City Honors came to the rescue when they found the demand to expand and the building became its new home. The board continues to upgrade the facility.