The Wickedest Street in the World

Along with the Canal District’s business stature came infamy. The burgeoning industry and waves of migration attracted criminals, conmen, and illicit entertainment. The area was notorious and Canal Street became known as the “Wickedest Street in the World.”

Travelers were often faced with immigrant runners who were also known as solicitors. Immigrant runners ranged from being overzealous salesmen to con artists. Runners used hard sales techniques to gain customers for steamships, railroads, and hotels. Some runners robbed travelers or sold them fake tickets.

Scandalous entertainment such as gambling, saloons, burlesque dance, eye-gouging fights, and houses of ill-fame was in abundance. These establishments catered to the many visiting lake and canal workers. The district was a dangerous place where a visitor might face drunken brawls, assault, riots, and if the tales are true, barkeeps who poisoned customers to steal their belongings.

As railroads began taking substantial business from the Erie Canal in the 1880s, the Wickedest Street in the World turned into an Italian quarter. It was at this time when the greatest wave of U.S. immigration began and thousands of Italians chose to settle in Buffalo. Because of the impact of railroads on the canal, many buildings became vacant and their use was changed to tenement housing. It was mainly Sicilians, who immigrated to escape rural poverty that settled in the Canal District. Canal Street became a center of Italian business and it was renamed Dante Place in 1909. Most Italians in the district worked as day laborers, fruit peddlers, grocers, gardeners, and barbers.