So, while many ask about the Kelly of Kelly Island hoping to hear a great Irish tale of a First Ward hero, the truth is a bit more convoluted.

The people of the Ward started calling the place Kelly Island because it was painted on the side of the Kelley Island Lime & Transport plant. KIL&T was named after Kelleys Island, which was named after Clevelands Kelley Brothers.

As far as the spelling, through the years, sometimes theres been an apostrophe and s at the end, sometimes not. Some First Ward tomfoolery comes in with the almost universal dropping of the second e in Kelley.

Kelly is definitely the preferred Irish spelling, and since the name didnt begin to make its way into official documents until after the company closed in 1963, its clear that people just went with the spelling they knew.

A 1968 view of the area that is called Kelly Island today.

The place wasnt officially christened, but about 60 years after KIL&T opened on the Island, the name made it on state and federal appropriation legislation.

In 1977, when Rep. Henry Nowak and the Buffalo Sewer Authority successfully sought federal government help in building a sanitary sewer system, it was referred to in the halls of Congress as The Kelly Island Sewer Project.

While the legislation marks the upgrade from neighborhood nickname to quasi-official designation, the yearslong sewer project also helped delineate what folks thought of as the boundaries for Kelly Island which is now generally accepted as running the length of Ganson Street between the General Mills complex and the Ohio Street Bridge.

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Who is the 'Kelly' that Buffalo's Kelly Island is named for? - Buffalo News