Most people wouldn’t be surprised to find out that a man named William Scott built a log cabin near the corner of Delaware Avenue and Amherst Street in 1816. It might be a bit more shocking to find out that the frontier home was still standing when that corner was being cleared to build the Pan-American Exposition in 1901.
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Workers clear trees along Amherst Street between Elmwood and Delaware in preparation for the Pan-American Exposition in 1899.
When it was demolished, it was one of the two or three oldest homes in Buffalo – and probably the best example of a log cabin that was still standing in the city at that point.
“It would have been better to move (the log cabin) onto the grounds as an exhibit than to tear it down,” wrote the Buffalo Express in 1901.
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This restaurant was just off the exposition grounds on the southeast corner of Delaware and Amherst, currently the site of a convenience store.
Today the home of two gas stations, a convenience store and a used car lot – before the Pan-Am, Delaware and Amherst was rural farm land. During the exposition, it was the site of one of the grand entrances to the grounds, with a clear view of the Electric Tower a block away.
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![Pan-Am Panorama](https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/a/09/a09bf432-f2ce-11ed-be86-1b48bd870c8e/6461a3b25f044.image.jpg?resize=150%2C51 150w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/a/09/a09bf432-f2ce-11ed-be86-1b48bd870c8e/6461a3b25f044.image.jpg?resize=200%2C68 200w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/a/09/a09bf432-f2ce-11ed-be86-1b48bd870c8e/6461a3b25f044.image.jpg?resize=225%2C76 225w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/a/09/a09bf432-f2ce-11ed-be86-1b48bd870c8e/6461a3b25f044.image.jpg?resize=300%2C101 300w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/a/09/a09bf432-f2ce-11ed-be86-1b48bd870c8e/6461a3b25f044.image.jpg?resize=400%2C135 400w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/a/09/a09bf432-f2ce-11ed-be86-1b48bd870c8e/6461a3b25f044.image.jpg?resize=540%2C183 540w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/a/09/a09bf432-f2ce-11ed-be86-1b48bd870c8e/6461a3b25f044.image.jpg?resize=640%2C216 640w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/a/09/a09bf432-f2ce-11ed-be86-1b48bd870c8e/6461a3b25f044.image.jpg?resize=750%2C254 750w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/a/09/a09bf432-f2ce-11ed-be86-1b48bd870c8e/6461a3b25f044.image.jpg?resize=976%2C330 990w)
The Pan-American Exposition at night. The Electric Tower stood approximately at what is today the corner of Amherst Street and Lincoln Parkway.
By the spring of 1902, the Pan-Am grounds were dismantled, and the land was being parceled for the current development of city streets between Elmwood and Delaware.
![Pan-Am Map](https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=150%2C109 150w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=200%2C145 200w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=225%2C163 225w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=300%2C217 300w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=400%2C290 400w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=540%2C391 540w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=640%2C464 640w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=750%2C543 750w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=990%2C717 990w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=1035%2C750 1035w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=1200%2C869 1200w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=1333%2C966 1333w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=1476%2C1069 1476w, https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/buffalonews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/1b/11b640e6-f2cf-11ed-bec5-b34076e239fa/6461a4777a047.image.jpg?resize=1691%2C1225 2008w)
Partial map of the Pan-Am shows the East Amherst Gate along Delaware Avenue.