industry · Erie County
McDougall White Lead & Kellogg — Elk Street
Buffalo
Historic paint industries near Elk and Babcock Streets are linked in a cleanup report to buried pigment waste. This field stop examines the white-lead history within and beside the later refinery complex covered by the atlas's broader Buffalo Terminal entry.
The documented story
What happened here?
The alternatives analysis reads 1900/1917 Sanborn maps as showing McDougall White Lead, McDougall Paint, McDougall Varnish, Buffalo Oil Paint & Varnish and Kellogg Paint & Varnish within or beside the investigated northern area. It describes white-lead production as conversion of metallic lead into lead-carbonate pigment.
OU-2 East covers approximately 33.45 acres across all or portions of 503/623/625/635/677 Elk Street. This modern cleanup boundary is not the footprint of a single historic paint factory.
Chronology in context
Turning points in the public record
1892
Standard Oil acquired most of the wider refinery operation, according to the periodic review.
1981–2005
Refining had ended by 1981; ExxonMobil terminal use continued until 2005, when Buckeye acquired the remaining active facilities.
Environmental record
Documented impacts
- At SB-107, investigators recovered predominantly white paint-like material with broken wooden casks, rubber plugs and metal cans. Laboratory microscopy and elemental analysis identified lead oxide and lead carbonate, matching the pigment produced by the historic white-lead industry. Together with the mapped manufacturing locations and documented production process, this physical and chemical evidence supports the alternatives analysis report's conclusion that wastes from the historic paint industries were the most likely source.
- Keep the paint-pigment evidence distinct from the site's petroleum history; overlapping industrial footprints do not establish a common source for all contaminants.
Response
Cleanup and controls
- The 2024 review reports an intact cover and groundwater results supporting effective in-place stabilization. Remaining contamination requires site management and an environmental easement. These are dated findings, not a new inspection or unrestricted-use clearance.
Then and now
The site today
Field stop: navigate to the 500–600 block of Elk Street near Babcock Street. Document frontage and the scale of the industrial landscape from public streets. Do not enter industrial property; river access is not established by this entry.
Historical-map overlays will be more informative than expecting buried waste or former production rooms to remain visible.
Atlas connections
Connected places
These collections explain documented material, facility, waterway, ownership, or cleanup relationships. Inclusion does not imply that every place shares one contaminant source or plume.
Elk Street: paint industries and the later refinery complex
Overlapping industrial histories require separate source attribution; the paint stop lies within and beside the broader terminal investigation area.
Focuses on the mapped manufacturers and buried white-lead evidence discussed in the OU-2 alternatives analysis.
Wider petroleum complexExxonMobil Buffalo TerminalProvides context for the larger refinery, terminal and multiple cleanup units.