Bergen, NY

Bergen is a Genesee County village within the larger Town of Bergen, where the area's first road was cut through the Northwoods in 1801 on the way from LeRoy toward Lake Ontario. Early stores clustered along the crossing roads. Nearby Bergen Swamp, a glacial wetland, became a National Natural Landmark in 1964 and holds cedar swamps, fens, rare flowers, and the endangered eastern massasauga rattlesnake. Bergen is western New York with a village at the edge of a much older wetland story.