Leicester, NY

Leicester is a village in Livingston County, New York, set in the center of the larger town that shares its name. Beards Creek marks the village's northern edge before it runs toward the Genesee River, and U.S. Route 20A meets State Routes 36 and 39 at the local crossroads. The village incorporated in 1850 and had 468 residents in the 2010 census. That combination—creek, crossroads, and town-within-a-town geography—does most of the work of orienting a newcomer.

Leicester's rail history is still easy to connect to the present map. The Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad Station, added to the National Register in 2005, sits near the village's old transportation story, while Mount Morris Dam and the north end of Letchworth State Park are about three miles south. Leicester has a town historian, historical reports, a business directory, and a gazebo concert series in the same small civic orbit. The local scoop is a compact Genesee Valley village where old rail infrastructure, state routes, and Letchworth's nearby gorge country meet at one county crossroads.