Fort Ontario State Historic Site

Visitors to Fort Ontario State Historic Site today will see the star-shaped fort dating to the early 1840's with 1863 to 1872 improvements. There are two guardhouses, a powder magazine, a storehouse, enlisted men's barracks, an Army office building, an unfurnished officer's quarters, videos, exhibits and windswept ramparts featuring magnificent views of Lake Ontario and underground stone casemates and galleries to tour.

The fourth and current Fort Ontario is built on the ruins of three earlier fortifications which were the site of three French and Indian War and two War of 1812 battles.  It was occupied by the U.S. Army through World War II.  From 1944 to 1946 the fort served as the only refugee camp in the United States for mostly Jewish victims of the Nazi Holocaust under an Executive Order from President Franklin D. Roosevelt.