Want to Visit the Real Bedford Falls?Was the Upstate New York village of Seneca Falls Frank Capra’s inspiration for the design of Bedford Falls in the movie It’s A Wonderful Life?

Karolyn Grimes, the actress who played Zuzu, one of the children of George and Mary Bailey (James Stewart and Donna Reed) in the American movie classic, thinks it was.

“When I came around the corner and saw [Seneca Falls’] main street, I gasped and said, ‘This is Bedford Falls!’” Grimes then saw the steel bridge that flows over the canal: “It is nearly a replica of the same bridge that George Bailey had grown up with all his life.”

Physical similarities between Seneca Falls and Bedford Falls are striking. In addition to the architecture along the main street and the steel truss bridge, Seneca Falls has many Second Empire Victorian homes (like the large, old house George and Mary owned in the movie). Both towns have a canal. In 1945, when the movie was shot, Seneca Falls was a mill town, just like Bedford Falls. Seneca Falls had the globe street lamps seen in the movie and even had a median on a portion of its main street.

There were also similarities in the towns’ characters. Both had a large Italian community and both had a neighborhood where people of modest means could live comfortably, courtesy of the generous terms of a community leader. In the movie it was “Bailey Park,” named in honor of George Bailey’s family building and loan; in Seneca Falls it was “Rumseyville,” named after the owner of one the town’s large pump manufacturers.

It is documented that Capra was in New York City in November 1945 trying to talk Jean Arthur into the female lead in It’s A Wonderful Life. A check of historical maps shows that the most direct route in the ’40s from New York to Auburn, where his aunt reportedly lived, would have been west across NY Route 17 and then north when he got to the southern Finger Lakes region – a route that would have taken him through Ithaca and then Seneca Falls.

Seneca Falls’ town leaders are so sure it served as Capra’s inspiration that they have created an It’s A Wonderful Life festival. This year’s event is December 7-9 and will include a screening of It’s A Wonderful Life, during which featured guest Karolyn Grimes will discuss her experiences shooting the movie. 
(Her character closes the movie with the famous line, “Look, Daddy; teacher says, ‘Every time a bell rings, an angel gets his wings.’”) The downtown will be decorated with replicas of the Christmas lights of Bedford Falls, and the shops and restaurants will serve up It’s A Wonderful Life fare. 

Bedford Falls might just be a composite of small towns across America, set in Upstate New York. But the fact is no town in Upstate New York has as many similarities to the town in It’s A Wonderful Life as does Seneca Falls.

Either by design or extraordinary coincidence, when Frank Capra created Bedford Falls, he replicated Seneca Falls. There are too many similarities!

  1. Seneca Falls and Bedford Falls are both mill towns.
  2. Seneca Falls had a grassy median same as the one George runs down in Bedford Falls with a movie theater located off to the side.
  3. Both communities boast Victorian Architecture and a large Italian population.
  4. The location is perfect: George’s sister-in-law’s father owns a glass factory in nearby Buffalo, New York.
  5. Bailey’s friend Sam wants to build a soybean processing plant outside of Rochester.
  6. The bank examiner wants to get back to Elmira, NY on Christmas Eve.
  7. The train ran through Seneca Falls just as it did in Bedford Falls.
  8. The Bedford Falls High School was dedicated in 1927–the same year as the old Mynderse Academy was dedicated. 
  9. In the film, the Bailey’s Savings and Loan Association builds low cost housing called Bailey Park. In Seneca Falls, 19th Century factory owner John Rumsey helped immigrant workers by lending them money and building low cost housing. It is still known as Rumseyville today.
  10. A local businessman named Norman J. Gould owned Gould Pumps, and was one of the richest men in town. He drove his car with license number NJG1. Norman Gould also had great control over politics and economics of the area… much as Mr. Potter did in the movie. Norman could send someone to fight in the military or retain them for his factory– just like Potter.