The Heritage Area Visitor Center is located in the Partridge Building, an outstanding local landmark due to its association with Erastus Partridge, a mid-19th century community leader, banker and industrialist. It was constructed in 1891, after the ‘great fire’ of 1890 destroyed the former building along with eighty-six other buildings within downtown Seneca Falls. The earliest maps of Seneca Falls show a sawmill on this site. A later 1836 map of the area displays the Old Arnett Mill, a flourmill, at this location. Research has shown that portion’s of the mill’s bearing walls have been retained and incorporated into the construction of the present Partridge Building.
Throughout the late 1890s and into the mid 1900s, the Partridge Building had many tenants including a wide array of bookstores, clothing, dentists, lawyers, newspapers (the Courier from c. 1891 - 1940), beauty shops and citizens clubs. A central clock tower adorned the roofline, which lit a large portion of the village. In April 1991 the building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a contributing feature within the Seneca Falls Village Historic District.
In March of 1988, a fire once again gutted the Partridge Building. The fire destroyed the roof, and damaged much of the top floor and south wall of the Partridge Block. The remaining portions of the building suffered appreciable water damage from the fire. Portico Properties purchased the property in 1988 and undertook a complete restoration of the building. The Seneca Falls Heritage Area Visitor Center (former Urban Cultural Park) was then located on the lower level of the building and opened in 1990.
