On Wednesday, October 14, the New York State Canal Corporation closes the Erie Canal for the 2026 season. The Spencerport Depot & Canal Museum is already closed for the year, and its restrooms and showers for canal travelers stay open only through that same Wednesday. Two nights later, on Friday, October 16, small groups will start gathering outside that building again. They're there for the Ogden Historical Society's 11th annual Spirits of Spencerport Ghost Walk.
The Society says its actors tell tales "of history or mystery that may or may not be true." The building where every group starts has a fully true story. It's a leftover from a railroad that disappeared in 1931, and it has been picked up and moved twice since.
The building at 16 East Avenue outlived its railroad
The museum isn't a replica. It's the actual Spencerport trolley station, built in 1906 for the Buffalo, Lockport and Rochester Rail Road. That was an interurban electric trolley line, and its service began in 1908. The company later went through financial trouble and came back as the Rochester, Lockport and Buffalo Railroad. The building has lived several lives since then:
- 1931. The trolley line closed, and the station sat empty where it was built.
- The 1930s. A local resident, George Ballard, moved it about a quarter mile west onto a house lot, planning to live in it.
- The decades after. A family bought the property and moved in, without changing the building much.
- 2002. Another local resident bought it and donated it to the Village of Spencerport on the condition that it "be used for the good of the community."
- May 23, 2005. Volunteers moved it again, this time to its current spot on the bank of the Erie Canal.
- 2007. It opened as a museum, visitor center, and lending library.
So for roughly seven decades, the Ghost Walk's starting point was a private home. Today the main floor holds collections on the Erie Canal, transportation, communication, and local history, and the lower level has restrooms for canal boaters. The museum follows the canal season and runs mostly on volunteer effort. That explains the timing this month. The canal closes, the museum's year winds down, and the Ghost Walk brings people back to the building once more.
Where the trolley actually ran
The station started out somewhere else, and the records don't fully agree on where. A 2003 local-history column in Westside News places it at West Avenue and Union Street, where an electric substation stands today. A 2005 Town of Ogden history guide says the depot was moved from a spot on East Avenue. Both streets were part of the route. The museum describes the trolley leaving the canal near Trimmer Road, following West Avenue across Union Street, and continuing along East Avenue. In Ogden, the line generally ran beside the canal on its south side, west toward Adams Basin.
The same 2003 column describes what riding it was like. Fares were based on distance. Riders could buy books of 500 miles for $10, and a round trip from Spencerport to Rochester cost 40 cents. The column also recounts a school commute by trolley.
The writer ended at the intersection where the station once stood:
"If you close your eyes you can almost hear the wheels of the trolley and the warning bell as you stand at West Avenue and Union Street in Spencerport."
What may still be under West Avenue
The trolley isn't completely gone from village streets. The Ogden Historical Society's online scavenger hunt asks which Spencerport street has the old interurban tracks buried under its asphalt. The answer is West Avenue. The 2003 column put it the same way, writing that the only reminder of the tracks shows up "if you look closely at the pavement on West Avenue." Both sources are a few years old, and streets get repaved, so treat any visible trace in 2026 as something to look for, not a sure thing.
The same scavenger-hunt route points out two other things in the village that were reused instead of torn down. A Fairfield Cemetery cannon misfired, split, and ended up as a hitching post on Bowery Street, north of the canal and east of Union Street. And the old New York Central Railroad station on Martha Street, a separate building from the trolley depot, houses Expressions of Dance By Lisa.
Farther west on the same line, Brockport dedicated a marker in May 2022 at 36 Erie Street, where that village's Buffalo, Lockport & Rochester trolley depot once stood. Spencerport still has its station building, which now sits a short walk from where it started.
The walk itself, this year
The Ghost Walk is a stroll through the village while local actors tell their tales. This year's lineup, as announced, includes a cold-case murder solved by a Spencerport boy in Maine and a ghost "frozen in time." A Guest Ghost will tell the story of a local doctor who pushed for women to get higher education and taught classes on what organizers call a "hush-hush topic" to teens and their parents. Studio 19 dancers will perform, and Russ Young will appear with what the announcement calls "his ghostly entourage." The announcement doesn't name the people behind these stories, so the walk is where you'll hear them.
| Detail | 2026 Ghost Walk |
|---|---|
| Dates | Friday, October 16, and Saturday, October 17 |
| Start | Spencerport Depot & Canal Museum, 16 East Avenue |
| Departures | Every 15 minutes, 6:45 to 8 p.m. |
| Length | About one hour of walking or standing |
| Weather | Held rain or shine |
| Tickets | $5 per person at ogdenhistoricalsociety.org |
| Age and pets | Not suitable for children under 16; no pets except verified service animals |
Each time slot has a limited number of tickets. Any left over are sold at the museum the night of the event. The Ogden Historical Society's Ghost Walk page still listed last year's October 2025 dates when we checked, so go by the 2026 schedule in the Westside News announcement when picking a night.
The fundraising fits the building. The Society uses Ghost Walk money to restore artifacts and buy materials to preserve its collection. A $5 ticket goes to the same kind of volunteer preservation that kept the trolley station from being lost.
Where the Society keeps the rest of the story
The Depot is the starting point, but the Ogden Historical Society's home is the Colby-Pulver House at 568 Colby Street, and it lists its public museum season as June through October. The Society describes itself as an all-volunteer nonprofit. Exhibits include an early settlers' cabin, a Victorian parlor, a Great Depression display, military artifacts, early farm tools, and a canal watch tower. The grounds have a historical daylily display recognized by the American Daylily Society, along with a Rainbow of Daylilies garden, a butterfly garden, and an herb garden.
One face shows up in the Society's Ghost Walk photos. An image on that page is labeled with the name of Claire Luce. The Democrat and Chronicle describes her as an actress and dancer who grew up in Spencerport and Rochester before her Broadway and international career.
If you go on October 16 or 17, the history starts before your group heads out. Your group sets out from a station that carried passengers from 1908 until 1931, spent about seventy years as a house, and has stood on the canal bank since May 23, 2005.
The stories behind Spencerport's buildings are a big part of why I love helping people settle into this village. If the Depot has you wondering about the history of your own street, or of an older home you're curious about, Lalla Fitzpatrick would be glad to talk it through with you. Let's Connect.
