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George Eastman invented roll film in Rochester in 1884 and built Kodak into the dominant photography company of the 20th century, making the city wealthy and employing tens of thousands at its Kodak Park factory complex. The George Eastman Museum on East Avenue -- housed in Eastman's restored Colonial Revival mansion and a modern research wing -- is the world's oldest photography museum and archive, holding 40,000 photographs and a technology collection that spans daguerreotypes to digital. Eastman himself, who was philanthropically transformative for Rochester, died by his own hand in 1932 leaving a note that read: 'My work is done. Why wait?'

Frederick Douglass chose Rochester as his base after escaping slavery, publishing The North Star newspaper from 1847 onward on Sophia Street, not far from where he and his wife Anna lived near the lake.

The underground railroad operated through Rochester's Black community, and Harriet Tubman used the Douglass network. The Frederick Douglass and Susan B. Anthony statues in Maplewood Park commemorate two reformers who spent significant years here, making Rochester's civil rights history earlier and more layered than most northern cities acknowledge.