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Rochester & B + L To Relight Lomb Memorial

City of Rochester

Rochester officials and residents will gather Monday night at an historic landmark in the city.

Mayor Lovely Warren and representatives of Bausch + Lomb will be at the Lomb Memorial at Upper Falls Boulevard and St. Paul Street to re-dedicate and re-light that 48 foot tall obelisk.

The memorial was dedicated in 1932 on Memorial Day as a tribute to Captain Henry Lomb, the co-founder of Bausch and  Lomb,  for his love of humanity including the citizens of Rochester and employees of his company.

It hasn’t' been illuminated for more than 30 years, and the city's northeast service center administrator, Pamela Reese-Smith the memorial will stand as a beacon to highlight a gateway to the city's northeast neighborhoods.

"Thousands of people come through this quadrant every day and hundreds of children live in the neighborhood and families so it is a gateway and it is a place where we're trying to, (bring) a vibrancy and also hopefully bring new businesses and bring new hope for the northeast gateway."

Reese-Smith says they're not quite sure why the memorial has been unlit all this time. 

"We've been trying to figure that out, we think that maybe it could be cost, electrical cost, because it was the old electrical system, now we're fortunate to have LED and solar lighting so that's something that's played a role in the re-establishment of it, but we're not really sure."

Amy Vena is the archivist for Bausch and Lomb and she says this project is important to the company's ties to Rochester. 

"We are supporting this project, we believe in its legacy, we believe in this community, we have over 985 employees still in Rochester, so we are here and this is part of our legacy so we're proud to support it."

The ceremony starts at 7:30 p.m. on Monday

Randy Gorbman is WXXI's director of news and public affairs. Randy manages the day-to-day operations of WXXI News on radio, television, and online.