Before Buffalo: Native Land, Treaties, and the Canal’s Impact with Perry Ground

Before there were docks, warehouses, and grain elevators, this land was home to the Haudenosaunee Confederacy—a place of deep cultural, political, and spiritual importance. The Buffalo Bike Tour on Saturday, August 23rd  takes you far beyond the typical Erie Canal narrative, guided by Perry Ground, a master storyteller and Turtle Clan member of the Onondaga Nation.

Through oral history, Indigenous knowledge, and hard truths, you’ll uncover the lesser-known story of how the Buffalo Creek Reservation was transformed—through treaties, displacement, and development—into the city we know today. Sites include the former Seneca villages along the creek, Mineral Springs Road, and the contested lands shaped by the Treaty of Buffalo Creek (1842) and dealings with the Ogden Land Company.

Perry unpacks these events not as relics of the past, but as histories that still shape the land and people of Buffalo. This is more than a bike tour—it’s a chance to listen, learn, and look at our landscape with new eyes. Note: this is a one-way tour with an option to ride back.

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