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Louis Borko

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 Louis Borko 1877- Sections G131      Louis Borko, AKA Lajos Borko, was born in Hungary in 1877 and is among the many immigrants that swarmed into this area from Eastern Europe at the turn of the last century – passing thru the famous Ellis Island immigration depot in New York City. Louis and his wife Julianna arrived here about 1902 but Julianna died a few years later in 1908.      Louis ran a saloon / hotel at 221 Fillmore Ave in Gastown – Gastown being the area many of our Hungarian immigrants settled. In 1915 Louis fell ill and was taken to the Ernest Wende Hospital in Buffalo where he died shortly after.      One last tragedy is connected with Louis. When funeral director Wattengel was transporting Louis’ body back to Tonawanda in his ambulance / hearse, he accidentally hit and killed a young bicyclist. As with many gravestones in the Twin City’s cemeteries, the inscription is written in the language still spoken b...
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Ralph Clench

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Ralph Clench Section C7      Ralph J Clench was one of the Tonawandas’ first resident photographers, setting up a studio here on South Canal Street in the 1870s. In the 1890s he moved it to Webster Street – both sites being located in the very heart of the growing villages. Ralph’s much older brother Frank B Clench had set up his own studio in Lockport in 1864 when the science and art of photography was in its infancy.      Brother Frank is now most famous locally as the photographer who took a photograph of lock-keepers at Lockport, NY which was reimagined as a twelve-character bronze sculpture by Susan Geissler unveiled in Lockport in 2023.      Ralph is buried here with no marker alongside the family of his wife Sophia Tay, one of three daughters of Joachim and Fredericky Tay. Brother Frank B Clench Flight Of Five Sculpture depicting Frank taking the photograph
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Sailors and soldiers Monument

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Reuben Wythe

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Reuben Wythe 1887 - 1944    B111 B113      Not every cemetery story is about a hero. Some are about scandal, desperation, and the way a small community could become captivated by a single family tragedy. The Wythe family of Tonawanda became front-page news in the early 1910s when a young bride named Ruth Cleveland Wythe found herself at the center of a sensational forgery case that spread from Buffalo to Tonawanda.      Ruth Cleveland was still in her teens when she first appeared in the newspapers after being arrested for stealing a diamond ring from The Levlyn Jewelry Store in Buffalo. Convicted but released on probation, she soon married local roller-skating celebrity Reuben Wythe in the spring of 1911. Reuben was well known across Western New York and Pennsylvania for his speed skating races, often competing before packed roller rinks in Tonawanda, Lockport, Youngstown, and Pittsburgh.      The young couple moved into the home o...
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Rose family

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Rose Family D119-D122      The Rose family was active in the commercial and transportation industries of the Tonawandas during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Three members of the family buried in City Cemetery contributed to the area's economic development through business, canal transportation, and military service.      Lorenzo P. Rose operated a flour and feed business in Tonawanda for many years. He was also affiliated with the Prohibition Party during the late nineteenth century.       His son, Ira M. Rose, began working on the Erie Canal as a boatman at the age of seventeen. He later became a builder of canal boats and established the first express delivery service in the Tonawandas, transporting freight and packages throughout the community.       Henry A. Rose  served in the Union Army during the Civil War. He enlisted as a private in Company F, 10th New York Cavalry, on February 20, 1864. ...
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Gipp Family

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 In 1898 georges house in Tonawanda was hit with a tornado. His porch stairs flew over a mile ending up on the shores of the creek. 
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Rogers family

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 George Rogers ? - 1840 Florence Rogers ?-1820 Edward H Rogers 1835 - 1909 William Rogers ?-1892 William J Rogers 1862-1917 Fannie Rogers ? - 1917 Anna Oldenburg Rogers ?-1917
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