Browse Perinton City Directories

Perinton City Directory Collections

Perinton research draws on more than one shelf. The digitized Rochester collection supplies selected volumes, while the Central Library Local History and Genealogy desk maintains longer Rochester and suburban runs. The Perinton Historical Society adds a local business and residential directory series. Each is a dated publication or collection, not a current resident list. Check the exact volume before treating a Perinton, Fairport, Bushnell’s Basin, or Egypt entry as part of the same geographic area.

The digitized sequence is not a promise of annual coverage. The Central Library describes suburban holdings from 1930, but whether a particular book covers a Perinton address must be checked volume by volume. The Society’s stated span also does not establish that every year survives. Record the edition year, the page, and the locality heading with every finding.

Perinton Directory Desks and Databases

Fairport Public Library Local History brings together the library’s material with Perinton Historian, Perinton Historical Society, and Rochester Public Library resources. Its Information Desk can direct researchers to local-history stacks and indexed pamphlet files. Fairport High School yearbooks, historian columns, local reference books, and street or house files give a directory hit useful context.

The library is at 1 Fairport Village Landing and can be reached at 585-223-9091. Ancestry Library is available onsite during library hours. HeritageQuest is available remotely to Fairport and Perinton residents through the library database route. Those databases can support a dated family search, but access is controlled by the library. They do not turn a historical listing into proof of a person’s present location.

Central Library Local History and Genealogy is the deeper regional desk. It is on the second floor of Rundel Memorial Library, 115 South Avenue in Rochester, and its phone is 585-428-8370. Its listed resources include Rochester directories, local newspaper indexes, clipping files, microfilmed census, the New York State Vital Records Index, digitized local directories, maps, newspapers, and books. Use the Central Library when a Fairport shelf search does not resolve a surname, street, or date.

That division of work is useful. Fairport’s desk is the nearby route for local stacks, pamphlets, yearbooks, historian material, and the library’s databases. Central Library supplies broader Rochester and suburban directory depth, plus microfilm and index tools. A phone or reference inquiry can confirm whether a specific edition, street section, or reel is available before a research visit. Preserve the collection name with the citation because similar titles can describe different copies or formats.

1885 Perinton Directory Evidence

The digitized 1885 Rochester and Monroe County directory is especially useful for Perinton because its gazetteer names householders and other town residents, describes land owned or leased, gives post-office references, and identifies town officers. The Perinton section treats Fairport, Bushnell’s Basin, and Egypt as localities. It is a period source, not a roster for the town today.

A visible Perinton sample joins civic role, locality, and town description. That supports a precise citation such as the Perinton section and page, but it does not support importing later directory conventions into this volume. The inspected sample does not establish spouse notation, work information, ownership symbols, boarder marks, or a separate abbreviation key. Read the exact page rather than filling in fields from another publisher’s book.

Perinton Directory Localities

Perinton’s record geography is layered. A printed heading may use Fairport as a post-office or commercial center while the land and local government record is tied to the Town of Perinton. Egypt and Bushnell’s Basin can be better historical search terms than the modern town name. Keep the spelling printed in the volume, then compare it with the street, county, and date before deciding that two entries describe the same household.

Rochester’s directory publishing history also changes the search. The Rochester City Directories Online map identifies C. C. Drew and Drew Allis & Co. volumes for 1870 through 1915 in the selected years, followed by Sampson & Murdoch Co. volumes for 1922 and 1925. A publisher and a year are useful citation details, but neither one guarantees suburban coverage. The book itself supplies that answer.

Note: A Fairport mailing label, Perinton town record, and a directory locality heading may all describe related but different geographic facts.

Reading Perinton Directory Entries

Read a Perinton historical entry as a snapshot. Start with the printed name, place, street or post-office reference, and edition year. Compare the page against its contents list and any publisher notes. If the book has a street section, a second pass can test whether the same address is listed there. Do not assume that a surname alone proves identity, especially where several localities used the same postal city.

Criss-cross method

An address-to-name approach using a street section when the volume arranges streets alphabetically with house numbers and names.

Householder listing

A listing that identifies householders where the particular book says it does. It does not prove every person at the address.

Abbreviation key

A publisher’s explanation of shortened terms, usable only when the exact volume actually prints one.

Street sections appear in some books, often toward the back, but they are not a separate database for every year. Central Library staff and the suburban-directory holdings are the sensible in-person route when a scan lacks the needed street or page. Modern parcel and ownership questions belong in the Perinton street directory lookup, where the record chain is different.

Tracing Perinton Directory Households

A family-history trail improves when every appearance is dated. Use the first directory hit as a starting point, not a conclusion. The next book may show a move, a different locality heading, or no listing at all. Pair the directory year with census material, a local newspaper item, or an obituary file. When a person disappears, a move, death, changed spelling, unlisted address, or a gap in the collection are all possible explanations.

1. Write the name exactly as printed and note the year, page, locality, and address wording.
2. Search an earlier and later directory for the same surname, street, or post-office place.
3. Use a street section only when that volume includes one, and preserve the house number as printed.
4. Pair the dated listing with the closest available census, newspaper, obituary, or cemetery clue.
5. Confirm a land connection through a deed or assessment record when names are common.

The final confirmation can be modest. A directory address plus a newspaper date may support a historical presence; a deed answers a different title question. Keeping the sources separate avoids calling a directory occupant a legal owner or calling an owner a household member.

Perinton Directory Companion Sources

Newspapers and yearbooks can tighten the interval between directories. Fairport Public Library lists digitized Fairport Herald runs from February 1873 to March 1889, April 1890 to December 1895, and 1896 to April 1925. It also lists Fairport Herald-Mail for May through December 1925, Fairport-Perinton Herald-Mail for 1980-1992, and Monroe County Mail for 1885-1893 and 1896-1979.

The Historical Society adds Fairport High School yearbooks from 1926-2002, census material from 1800-1915, and obituary holdings from 1980 onward. The Society’s research and archives listing also names photographs, cemetery tombstones, plat and property material, and Fairport Sanborn maps. These are companion evidence. A newspaper notice or yearbook does not replace a directory edition, deed, or vital record.

Perinton Town Document Index

The Perinton Town Document Index, 1813-1890 is an unusual local finding aid. It came from a 1939-1941 project sponsored by the Historical Society and Town Board, and a copy is also on file at Fairport Public Library. It can point toward early town documents and names that predate later directory coverage.

The index is not a digitized collection of every underlying document. Treat it as a lead: preserve the indexed name and date, then ask the library, Historian, or relevant custodian about the original file. For an early address, combine the index with plat or property material, a cemetery source, a newspaper item, and the county deed trail as the period permits.

Perinton Archives Routing

For a historic court naturalization question, the New York State Archives naturalization pathfinder explains that state-court proceedings generally go to the county clerk where the court sat, while federal proceedings route to the federal district clerk or National Archives. For an ordinary Perinton directory search, local libraries and Monroe County repositories are the better starting points.

The State Archives reference is a routing aid, not a local directory collection. Its research guidance says the Archives does not hold such collections, so use the library and local-history shelves for printed directory work.