Experience the best of Jamestown

Jamestown lies in the hills of south-western New York, near the Pennsylvania line and the outlet of Chautauqua Lake. Swedish immigrants built a furniture industry here in the nineteenth century, and the city was known as the Furniture City; Swedish names and traditions persist. Lucille Ball was born in Jamestown in 1911, and the Lucy-Desi Museum and the National Comedy Center, which tells the history of American comedy, are the main attractions of the old downtown.

Chautauqua Lake, a narrow lake nearly thirty kilometres long, has beaches, boating and fishing, and the Chautauqua Institution on its western shore has run summer lectures, concerts and classes since 1874. The bird artist Roger Tory Peterson was born in Jamestown, and an institute in his name shows wildlife art. Panama Rocks, a scatter of mossy boulders, lies to the west, and the Lake Erie shore, with its vineyards, is to the north.

Friday fish fries are a western New York tradition, served in church halls and taverns, and Concord grapes from the Lake Erie shore end up as juice and wine. Winters bring heavy lake-effect snow, summers are mild, and the autumn leaves are bright.