Seneca Falls, NY, claims link to 'Wonderful Life'

[alp227]

SENECA FALLS, N.Y. (AP) — Did George Bailey live his wonderful life in upstate New York?

Folks in the quaint town of Seneca Falls think so. Or more precisely, they say Bailey's make-believe hometown of Bedford Falls in "It's a Wonderful Life" was heavily inspired by Seneca Falls.

Seneca Falls has a nice broad main street like Bedford Falls', and there's a steel truss bridge. The film also is loaded with references to nearby upstate cities.

full: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/seneca-falls-ny-claims-link-wonderful-life

[BainsBane]

1. It's more important claim to fame is the first convention on women's rights in 1848

The Seneca Falls Convention was an early and influential women's rights convention held in Seneca Falls, New York.[1] It spanned two days: 19 July 1848 and 20 July 1848. New York women, upon the occasion of a visit by Philadelphia-based Lucretia Mott, a Quaker famous for her oratorical ability, planned the event. Mott's oratorical ability was rare for this era during which women were often not allowed to speak in public. Female Quakers local to the area organized the meeting along with Elizabeth Cady Stanton, a skeptical non-Quaker.

The meeting had six sessions, included a lecture on law, a humorous presentation, and multiple discussions about the role of women in society. Stanton and the Quaker women presented two prepared documents, the Declaration of Sentiments and an accompanying list of resolutions, to be debated and modified before being put forward for signatures. A heated debate sprang up regarding women's right to vote, with many including Mott urging the removal of this concept, but Frederick Douglass argued eloquently for its inclusion, and the suffrage resolution was retained. Exactly 100 of approximately 300 attendees signed the document, mostly women.

The convention was seen by some of its contemporaries, including featured speaker Mott, as but a single step in the continuing effort by women to gain for themselves a greater proportion of social, civil and moral rights,[2] but it was viewed by others as a revolutionary beginning to the struggle by women for complete equality with men. Afterward, Stanton presented the resulting Declaration of Sentiments as a foundational document in the United States woman's suffrage movement, and she promoted the event as the first time that women and men gathered together to demand the right for women to vote. Stanton published the History of Woman Suffrage between 1881 and 1922 which identified the Seneca Falls Convention as the start of the push for women's suffrage in the United States.[2] By 1851, another convention was organized, called the National Women's Rights Convention, in Worcester, Massachusetts, the issue of women's right to vote had become a central tenet of the United States women's rights movement.[3] These conventions became annual events until the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seneca_Falls_Convention

http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/trr040.html

[JustAnotherGen]

2. I always thought it could be there

Or some place like Fredonia or Ithaca. Precisely because of the references to Roch and Buff. I lived in the Rochester are for 30 years - and it's always been a close connection between Buff to Roch to Syracuse and everything in between. Seneca Falls makes sense.