Fifty years ago today, the City of Lockport lost the up-and-coming regional icon the Union Station Restaurant to an unsolved fire.
In the early morning hours of Dec. 17, 1974, all firefighters employed by the city — about 70 — responded to the blaze.
But by the time the flames had been extinguished, the former train station, which was renovated three years before to become the Union Station Restaurant, was only “charred ruins.”
Roger Barone, a police officer, said he was walking his beat when he came upon the fire. He had eaten at the restaurant a few times and said it was becoming a destination that people were coming to from all over the area. It was cozy, he said, a nice place.
But on that night he wasn’t concerned about the food. When he saw the fire, he asked Thomas Groff, a bartender at Groff’s Tavern across the street, if there was anyone left inside. Groff replied, “No one but the mynah birds.”
Fifty years later, Barone recalled braving the fire and saving the birds.
“I got them out of there,” he said.
Barone isn’t the only one left to remember the historic fire. Charlie Quagliano and Michael Sansone were both members of the fire department.
Quagliano said that he was just a rookie, but he lived close by to the fire on Chestnut Street. It was the first big fire he’d ever seen in his career.
“It made a big impression,” he said.
Quagliano also said that he’d only eaten at the restaurant a few times, and thought it was a real “ritzy,” nice place. Roxanne, his wife, said as a kid she would play in what was the abandoned train station all the time.
Quagliano thought for sure that Roxanne would be watching the fire from their home after he got called in from sleeping, but as it turned out she slept through the entire fire.
“I said, I can see my house from there. I was sure she was watching me,” Quagliano said.
Sansone, who went on to work in a Beverly Hills emergency room and met a few stars before coming back to Lockport, said he’d only eaten in the old Union Station once and considered it “too fancy.”
He did remember the fire, though, and said he and the first firefighters on the scene tried to go in, but only got as far as the foyer in the building. It was much too hot and there was no way of knowing if there were any holes in the floor.
“There were flames all over the place,” he said.
At that time Sansone had been in the department for two years.
The Union Station Restaurant was dowsed with water until about 3:30 a.m. In reports on the blaze from the time, the owner, David Goldstein said, “I can’t say anything,” when asked about the fire. In that morning’s edition, he was described as being in a “state of shock.”
The cause of the fire has never been determined.
The train station was built by the Vanderbilts family — owners in the railroad industry — and were the same that built Grand Central Station in New York City. Lockport’s building was constructed between 1888 and 1889 and between 10 and 35 passenger trains passed through Lockport every day into the early 20th century.
However, as times changed and the rise of the automobile came forth, the station was abandoned and vandalized. It was sold to John Saraf Jr. in 1967, who had an idea of a Victorian-age interior, for $34,000.
The plan caught the interest of John Tarantino who put $250,000 into the project and the restaurant opened in December of 1971.
Over the years, different owners, including the City of Lockport, have grappled with what to do with the structure, according to the Niagara County Historical Society. Many have planned to rebuild it as a restaurant but none of those plans has ever come to fruition. In 2006, the property was purchased by Mark Davidson of Los Angeles. Davidson, who now lives in the Western New York area, has worked for many years to maintain the property. A new not-for-profit organization, New York Central Train Station, Inc., was recently established to raise funds to restore Union Station by applying for grants, accepting donations and holding special events. The project is expected to take years to complete and cost $4.5 million.
Davidson said he saw something in the station’s ruins almost 20 years ago in 2006.
“I’m trying to give the respect the building deserves,” he said.
Since owning the property, a movie crew shot parts of the 2023 film “Assault on Hill 400” among the wreckage which modeled well as a bombed-out French church during World War II.
Davidson said that such young men were seen at the Lockport terminal in its hey day, going off to fight for our freedom in both world wars.
“There are people who fought for our freedom — World War I, World War II — seen at the terminal. They’re dressed up and leaving their families at the station,” he said.
Currently, Davidson said he was told some old blueprints of the second floor of the station are in Medina and intends to get copies of them. He noted that volunteers are needed to get the word out for fundraising and awareness events like the Trunk or Treat event that happened over Halloween this year.
“The reason I’m doing this is because nobody else is doing anything,” he said. “People don’t realize the significance.”
More information can be found at www.newyorkcentraltrainstation.org.