{"nrhp_refnum":"80002608","name":"Lafayette High School","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"370 Lafayette Ave.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Buffalo","county":"Erie County","state":"NY","lat":42.92080699300004,"lon":-78.88450510199993,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1980-12-03","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Lafayette High School is a public secondary school building at 370 Lafayette Avenue in northwest Buffalo, Erie County, New York, built 1901-1903 and enlarged in 1921, designed by Esenwein and Johnson.","why_significant":"The nomination presents it as a largely intact, representative example of Beaux-Arts classicism and a leading work of the Buffalo firm Esenwein and Johnson. It is also described as Buffalo's oldest continually operating secondary school and the city's oldest public high school still used for education.","narrative":"Lafayette High School occupies 1.92 acres in a residential part of northwest Buffalo, just west of Colonial Circle, part of the Olmsted-designed parkway system. Built between 1901 and 1903, the three-and-one-half-story building combines red brick, red Medina sandstone and light terra-cotta detailing in a Beaux-Arts classical design. A fifteen-bay front facade is centered on a projecting entrance tower with an octagonal roof and elaborate dormers. The architects, Esenwein and Johnson, also designed a 1921 north addition containing a swimming pool, gymnasium and a larger cafeteria. Inside, the auditorium rises three stories and has a carved wooden proscenium arch. Some changes have occurred, including replacement of the original windows with aluminum sliding units and removal of the tower cupola in 1963. The nomination values the school as an intact example of early twentieth-century public architecture and as Buffalo's oldest continually operating secondary school, built to serve a growing neighborhood.","period_of_significance":"1900-","architect_builder":"Esenwein and Johnson","architectural_style":"Beaux-Arts classicism","criteria":[],"status_note":"Occupied and in use as a school; windows replaced with aluminum sliding units and the tower cupola removed in 1963.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:50:41.613978-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_NY/80002608.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/80002608/8cfbd2cfbe-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/80002608/8cfbd2cfbe-1600.webp","licence":"CC0","author":"Fortunate4now","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lafayette_High_School2.JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Fortunate4now</a>, <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/deed.en\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lafayette_High_School2.JPG"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/75317656","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lafayette_High_School_(Buffalo,_New_York)","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q6471423"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/new-york/erie-county/lafayette-high-school-80002608/"}