Old Mentz Heritage Center

10/11/2026

https://obits.silive.com/us/obituaries/auburnpub/name/david-dixon-obituary?id=62718482

View David H. "Sparky" Dixon's obituary, send flowers and sign the guestbook.

09/29/2026

Bill Hecht shared this AI colorized postcard image of Montezuma and some canal traffic. This was taken from the towpath bridge over the Erie looking toward the "downtown" area of Montezuma. The boats are turning onto the Cayuga Seneca Canal. The VanDetto Coal barn is on the corner and the footbridge is the High Street crossing. Today, this site is the High Street trail head of the wonderful Montezuma Heritage Park. Montezuma Heritage Park Friends

09/29/2026

https://obits.silive.com/us/obituaries/auburnpub/name/margaret-smart-obituary?id=62629770
Mother Goose has passed away. This just came through on the feeds.

View Margaret Rose Smart's obituary, send flowers and sign the guestbook.

09/21/2026

The Empire State Library Network is offering a couple webinars that cover the use of their digital newspapers. This is the introductory level course and another in October will be a bit more advanced.

NNYLN: An Introduction to NYS Historic Newspapers [NNYLN]
Wednesday, September 30⋅10:00 – 11:15am

The New York State Historic Newspapers project provides free online access to a wide range of newspapers chosen to reflect New York’s unique history, features over 15 million pages, and includes content covering 300 years. It’s a vital tool to support research on genealogy, local history, and more.

Join Chuck Henry, manager of the NYS Historic Newspapers project, for an overview of this robust resource. This one-hour session will be a straightforward tour of search functions, tools for documentation, and tips for printing, followed by Q&A. It is intended for users new to the resource. Workers from all types of libraries, researchers, genealogists, history enthusiasts, and anyone interested in learning about the resource are welcome.

The session will be recorded, and the recording will be sent to all registrants. Contact Amy ([email protected]) with questions or to request a specific accommodation.

Link to website / registration:

09/16/2026

Here are some of the sites we visited today at the Genealogical Gatherings.
https://www.irishgenealogy.ie/
https://www.johngrenham.com/
https://www.rootsireland.ie/
https://web.archive.org/web/20170531215106/http://www.cayugacounty.us/Departments/Real-Property/Assessment-Rolls/Historic

Cayuga County Government seated in heart of the Finger Lakes in the City of Auburn.

09/13/2026

Our September Genealogical Gatherings is coming up this month at the Port Byron Library, Wednesday the 16th at 2:30. Kathleen Shaw Decker will give her update on what's new and exciting, we will talk about the Cayuga County tax rolls available by way of the Wayback Machine, and more. Bring your brick wall questions and let us help you.

08/31/2026

https://old-mentz.org/montezumas-mystery-girl/

Our friend Bill Hecht sent around a colorized version of a 1910 postcard that showed a young girl sitting by a finger sign in the hamlet of Montezuma. First off, it has to be noted that the use of AI to colorize an image is not like the old days when people did it with […]

08/15/2026

The mystery of the young girl from Montezuma continues but we know where the sign was thanks to Kathleen Shaw Decker and her family postcard collection. You can see the sign at the east end of Erie Drive in this postcard that is dated 1910. There are some new mysteries as the sign looks to have lost one panel and it looks like the house had electricity. But the R.S&E.RR (the trolley) opened between Port Byron and Rochester in Dec 1909, so it likely that the photo of the girl is from 1910 and the photo of Erie Street is later.

08/13/2026

Our next Genealogical Gatherings will be August 19 at 2:30 at the Port Byron Library. I recently found out about the Arrears Act of 1879 in regard to those great Civil War pension files we all hope to find, so we will talk about that for a bit. We also get updates from our crackjack researchers, Leanne and Kathy.

06/18/2026

We will be closed this afternoon due to storm warnings. Be safe and see you next week.