State Parks opens archive building

The new archives building at the State Park is open.

The former state parks office building houses historical displays celebrating the Niagara Movement and the founding of the park in a climate-controlled museum setting open to the public.

Regional Parks Director Mark Mistretta led a press conference and ribbon cutting Tuesday for the new facility adjacent to the Visitors’ Center where you can get a $2 slice of DiCamillo’s tomato pie for just $11.

The sparkling new unisex bathrooms have been modified this year as well, now dividing males and females.

Offices previously housed at the park are now in DeVeaux Woods.

The Archives Room was named in honor of 41-year State Parks employee Barry Virgilio who was instrumental in preserving much of the historical record.

Virgilio identified what was worth saving and also spent hundreds of hours, even on his own time, drying out papers damaged by water used to put out a fire at the Beaver Island Casino. Soaked papers were preserved by freezing and stored at Fort Niagara but even that was not foolproof because a power outage caused an unintended thaw.

State Parks Archivist Courtney Geerhart was instrumental in setting up the new archives room. She joined Parks after leaving Niagara Falls Public Library where she led the history department.

The new building also includes the offices of the State Parks Education team as well as a community meeting space.

The same group of bureaucrats visited the new Lewiston switchback trail earlier in the day for a ribbon-cutting on the newly opened trail that snakes down the escarpment from the bikepath into Artpark. The path is posted with a sign that asks cyclists to walk but mid-ceremony, someone photobombed while ignoring the sign, an irony missed by Rob Creehan of the Gazette who also identified State Parks Commissioner Pro Tem/Chief of Staff Randy Simons as commissioner “pro tim”.