Upper Monroe, Rochester NY

The history of Upper Monroe

Upper Monroe was part of the Town of Brighton until 1874. In 1841 Charles F. Crosman, who had started his seed business in Rochester in 1838, bought 30 acres on the south side of the Rochester to Pittsford State Road, today’s Monroe Avenue, and the area grew up around his seed farm. Under Crosman and his sons the business became, by 1902, the largest seed house in the world. Its headquarters building from about 1880 still stands on Monroe Avenue at Laburnum Crescent.

The hill at the neighborhood’s southern edge, Pinnacle Hill, is a ridge of sand and gravel left by retreating glaciers and was long described as the highest point in the city. From 1838 its slopes held St. Patrick’s Cemetery. After Holy Sepulchre Cemetery opened in 1871, some burials were moved there, the last burial on the hill took place in 1900, and the remaining graves were moved to Holy Sepulchre in 1935.

In 1874 Rochester more than doubled its size in a single ’omnibus’ annexation, which brought this part of Brighton into the city. The horse-drawn streetcar line was extended out Monroe Avenue to Field Street in 1881, and electric streetcar service began on Monroe Avenue in 1891, which set off rapid house building.

Several tracts were laid out around the same time. The Crosman family subdivided part of its land to create Crosman Terrace and Shepard Street before 1900, the Avondale Lawn subdivision opened north of Monroe Avenue, and the Monroe Avenue Homestead Association tract took in Rosedale and Alliance streets. Most streets were fully built by 1910, though Crosman Terrace filled in later, mostly between 1908 and 1926. The seed company moved to East Rochester in 1927.

Between about 1902 and 1915 there were repeated calls for the city to buy the ’pinnacle hills’ between Cobbs Hill and Highland parks for parkland, but they never succeeded. Cobbs Hill Park took shape next door instead, from a 1905 gift, with a reservoir on top and Riley Lake in the old widewaters basin below. In the late 1990s a coalition campaigned to save open land on Pinnacle Hill after about five acres were sold to a developer.

The Culver Road Armory, designed by Lewis F. Pilcher, went up in 1916 and 1917 with stables, a huge indoor drill hall and barracks for the National Guard’s mounted troops; the 121st Cavalry was based there from 1921. The Guard left in 2008, and the building was renovated around 2010 and 2011 for offices, shops and restaurants.

The homes in Upper Monroe today

Mostly houses, townhouses and apartment buildings from the 1890s through the late 1920s: single-family homes, side-by-side half doubles, some row houses and brick apartment buildings, with Colonial Revival and American Foursquare among the common styles. Monroe Avenue itself has a notable run of early apartment houses and townhouses, and some of the most unusual houses sit on oddly shaped lots cut into the slope of Pinnacle Hill.

Landmarks and parks

• Crosman seed company headquarters, Monroe Avenue at Laburnum Crescent (905 Monroe Avenue) - built about 1880 for what became the world’s largest seed house
• Crosman Terrace and Shepard Street - laid out by the Crosman family before 1900
• Culver Road Armory - 1916-17 armory designed by Lewis F. Pilcher, reused for shops and offices
• Pinnacle Hill - glacial ridge on the neighborhood’s southern edge, site of St. Patrick’s Cemetery from 1838 to 1935
• Monroe Avenue - the old Rochester to Pittsford road, electric streetcar line from 1891

Buying a home in Upper Monroe

Fall for the house, then do the homework. These are the first things we check here, on top of the usual inspection:

• Half doubles and multi-unit houses: verify the legal unit count through the City’s Certificate of Occupancy records, and for rentals ask about the City’s rental inspection status.
• Party walls and shared systems: for half doubles and row houses, ask how the shared wall, roof and any shared utilities are handled.
• Lead-safe condition and disclosure: nearly every house here predates 1978, so ask for the federal lead disclosure and consider a lead inspection, especially for painted porches, windows and trim.
• The full city, school and county tax bill for the exact parcel
• School assignment for the exact address, confirmed with the Rochester City School District

The bigger picture on city taxes, lead rules, two-family homes and the City’s homebuyer grant is in our City of Rochester guide.

Selling a home in Upper Monroe

Buyers who search for Upper Monroe are often looking for exactly what makes it Upper Monroe: the homes, the history and places like Crosman seed company headquarters, Monroe Avenue at Laburnum Crescent (905 Monroe Avenue). We put that story in the marketing, price the home against true comparables, and launch it to draw a crowd. How we sell · What is my Upper Monroe home worth?

Upper Monroe FAQ

Sources

• Landmark Society of Western New York and Bero Architecture, Rochester Historic Resources Survey, Phase 1 (southeast quadrant) report
• Rochester Business Journal, Upper Monroe neighborhood (2002)
• Rochester History, Vol. XI No. 1 (1949), An Historical View of Rochester’s Parks and Playgrounds, by Blake McKelvey
• Monroe County NY Genealogy, local history videos (St. Patrick’s Cemetery, Pinnacle Hill)
• Rochester Public Library archives, Hugh Mitchell collection, Coalition for Pinnacle Hill Park
• NY State Military Museum: Culver Road Armory
• 585 Magazine: All in the family (Crosman Seed)
• Neighborhood names and boundaries: Celebrate City Living, a City of Rochester partnership

We describe neighborhoods by their history, homes and landmarks, never by who lives there. For school or safety questions, use the official sources so you can decide for yourself.

More Rochester neighborhoods: Cobbs Hill · Highland Park · Monroe Village · Neighborhood of the Arts · Park Avenue · South Wedge · Swillburg · Upper Mount Hope · 19th Ward · Beechwood · All 35 Rochester neighborhoods