{"id":9375,"date":"2014-11-11T23:36:24","date_gmt":"2014-11-12T04:36:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/?p=9375"},"modified":"2022-12-20T15:22:52","modified_gmt":"2022-12-20T20:22:52","slug":"50-things-you-probably-didnt-know-about-rochester","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/2014\/11\/50-things-you-probably-didnt-know-about-rochester\/","title":{"rendered":"50 Things You Probably Didn\u2019t Know About Rochester"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Ok, here we go, from the real estate listing site Movoto.com \"external<\/a> comes the top 50 things you PROBABLY didn\u2019t know about Rochester… or did you?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"50<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

1. The man who invented the \u201ccalculating machine\u201d\u2014now more complex and known simply as “the calculator”\u2014he was from Rochester.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2. Rochester has the least expensive real estate market out of all major New York cities, with a median housing price of only $83,000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

3. The inventor of breakfast cereal, James Caleb Jackson, is from the Rochester area. His masterpiece was called Granula and it had to be soaked overnight to be eaten.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

4. There\u2019s a potential $25 fine for flirting anywhere in the state, including Rochester.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

5. Marshmallows were first commercially produced in Rochester.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

6. Graham crackers were also developed by a local businessman, completing the S\u2019more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

7. eBaum\u2019s world is based in Rochester, creator Eric Bauman\u2019s home town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

8. The Buffalo Bills hold their annual summer camp at the nearby St. John Fisher College.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

9. In 1889, the voting machine was invented in Rochester.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

10. The first gold tooth was made by a Rochester dentist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

11. Rochester the highest deaf population per capita in the nation, largely because they\u2019re home to the National Technical Institute for the Deaf.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

12. Two-time Super Bowl champion coach of the New York Giants, Tom Coughlin, started his career in Rochester teaching physical education and coaching the varsity football team at Rochester Institute of Technology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

13. Rochester got ranked the \u201cmost livable city\u201d in America by the Places Rated Almanac a few years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

14. It\u2019s against the law to throw a snowball towards someone\u2019s head in Rochester.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

15. Lake Ontario is the 14th largest lake in the world, but the smallest of the Great Lakes by surface area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

16. While Lake Ontario is the fourth deepest among the Great Lakes, its average depth is much greater, putting it at second. Who really knows what\u2019s hiding down there?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

17. Rochester was once known as the \u201cFlour City\u201d due to the large number of flour mills on the Genesee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

18. It was then known as the \u201cFlower City\u201d as the local industry moved towards the nursery business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

19. The geography of Rochester was formed by sliding ice sheets, which stopped at the southern border thus creating a line of hills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

20. Over 2,000 people participated in the \u201cworld\u2019s largest human flower\u201d at this year\u2019s Lilac festival, confirmed by Guinness World Records.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

21. Rochester gets a ton of snow due to the \u201clake effect,\u201d in which moisture coming off Lake Ontario freezes in the cold air and gets dumped on nearby land.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

22. Xerox was originally founded in Rochester under the name \u201cThe Haloid Company\u201d in 1906.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

23. There are 500 professional firefighters in the Rochester Fire Department, responding to 40,000 calls annually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

24. The local \u201cwhite hot\u201d is white due to lack of smoking and curing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

25. Rochester has six sister cities around the world, including one in France, Germany, Italy, Israel, Poland, and Mali.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

26. When French\u2019s mustard company was in Rochester its address was 1 Mustard Street. It was the first company to have widespread mustard sales.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

27. Browncroft neighborhood was built onto top of the Brown Brothers nursery grounds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

28. While Labatt is often marketed as a Canadian beer, some of its products are actually made by Genesee Brewing Company in Rochester.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

29. The man who hit the first home run in a professional baseball a man from the Rochester area, Ross Barnes, in 1876.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

30. The Xerox Tower is 443 feet tall and it\u2019s often called \u201cToner Tower\u201d due to its grey color and history of occupants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

31. The Lilac Festival is the largest of its type in North America, attracting 500,000 people each year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

32. A lab at the University of Rochester is home to the second most energetic fusion laser in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

33. Francis Tumblety grew up in Rochester and is one of the main suspects of the Jack the Ripper murder spree, making frequent trips back and forth between America and England during the timeline of the murders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

34. Rochester is the largest metropolitan area in America that does not have a university playing at the NCAA Division I level in all sports. The only teams that do are RIT\u2019s hockey squads.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

35. Rochester is named after the city\u2019s founder Colonial Nathaniel Rochester when it only had a population of 15.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

36. Olympic swimmer Ryan Lochte is a Rochester native.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

37. Rochester man, George Baldwin Selden, patented the concept of the automobile. While he didn\u2019t make many cars, the people who did had to pay him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

38. Late Actor Philip Seymour Hoffman was born in Rochester.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

39. Much of the popular band \u201cGym Class Heroes\u201d are from the Rochester area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

40. Captain America wouldn\u2019t be around if not for Rochester native Joe Simon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

41. If Captain America doesn\u2019t make Rochester patriotic enough, The Pledge of Allegiance was written by native Francis Bellamy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

42. The University of Rochester is the sixth largest employer in the state of New York with over 20,000 employees at all of their locations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

43. Buffalo Bill\u2019s children are buried at the Mt. Hope Cemetery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

44. The Rochester Red Wings participated in the longest professional game of baseball ever, 33 innings in 1981.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

45. Rochester students lined up 1,036 tacos in attempt to break the record for longest string of edible tacos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

46. America\u2019s only antique carousel in its original location is at Ontario Beach Park.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

47. George Eastman, the founder of Kodak, donated over $100 million towards higher education, most of which was distributed locally in Rochester. That\u2019s the equivalent of $2 billion today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

48. America\u2019s first thermometers were manufactured in Rochester in 1851 by David Kendall and George Taylor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

49. The first dentist\u2019s chair was designed in Rochester.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

50. James Cutler of Rochester invented the mail chute in 1889 for a skyscraper he was working on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I know the headline says “50 Things You Didn’t Know,” but because you’ve been so well-behaved, here are two more as a bonus…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

51. Known as the voice of Lord Farquaad in \u201cShrek\u201d and the ruthless Trinity Killer in \u201cDexter,\u201d John Lithgow is from Rochester.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

52. RIT once had a real Bengal tiger as their mascot. He was named Spirit and roamed campus on a regular basis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And there you have it. So what are your favorite fun facts about Rochester? Did they miss any? Drop a comment below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ok, here we go, from the real estate listing site Movoto.com comes the top 50 things you PROBABLY didn\u2019t know about Rochester… or did you?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10717,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[1293,15,788],"tags":[2915,1314,2926,2902,2896,2919,2930,2936,2901,2900,2903,923,740,2925,2913,1058,1042,2921,2931,2899,2908,2928,2923,2897,2932,2937,2916,2910,1673,779,2927,2933,2898,2301,2895,2914,2904,2906,2929,2922,2907,2920,53,915,355,920,151,1405,2917,2934,2938,2911,2924,2905,2918,2935,2894,167,2912,2909,691,379],"class_list":["post-9375","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reader-submitted-stories","category-rochester_history","category-old-photos-of-rochester-ny","tag-brown-brothers-nursery","tag-browncroft","tag-buffalo-bill","tag-buffalo-bills","tag-calculating-machine","tag-colonial-nathaniel-rochester","tag-david-kendall","tag-dexter","tag-ebaums-world","tag-eric-bauman","tag-first-gold-tooth","tag-flour-city","tag-flower-city","tag-francis-bellamy","tag-frenchs-mustard","tag-genesee-brewery","tag-genesee-brewing-company","tag-george-baldwin-selden","tag-george-taylor","tag-graham-crackers","tag-great-lakes","tag-guinness-world-records","tag-gym-class-heroes","tag-james-caleb-jackson","tag-james-cutler","tag-john-lithgow","tag-labatt","tag-lake-effect-snow","tag-lake-ontario","tag-lilac-festival","tag-longest-string-of-edible-tacos","tag-lord-farquaad","tag-marshmallows","tag-mount-hope-cemetery","tag-movoto-com","tag-mustard-street","tag-national-technical-institute-for-the-deaf-ntid","tag-new-york-giants","tag-ontario-beach-park-carousel","tag-philip-seymour-hoffman","tag-places-rated-almanac","tag-rit-tigers","tag-rochester","tag-rochester-fire-department","tag-rochester-history","tag-rochester-institute-of-technology-rit","tag-rochester-ny","tag-rochester-red-wings","tag-ross-barnes","tag-shrek","tag-spirit-the-rit-tiger","tag-the-haloid-photographic-company","tag-the-pledge-of-allegiance","tag-tom-coughlin","tag-toner-tower","tag-trinity-killer","tag-trivia","tag-university-of-rochester","tag-white-hot","tag-worlds-largest-human-flower","tag-xerox","tag-xerox-tower"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9375","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9375"}],"version-history":[{"count":24,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9375\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14256,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9375\/revisions\/14256"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochestersubway.com\/topics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}