General Edmund B. Hayes (15 May 1849 – 19 October 1923) was an American engineer and businessman who built bridges and manufactured autos.

He attended Dartmouth College intermittently because he needed to earn sufficient tuition by working at farms or teaching.

Lackawanna was looking to move away from Scranton because of increases in union labor cost and lack of railroad access to the company's newly emerging markets in the West.

In March 1899, while Hayes was in Jekyll Island, the Company's executives met with Albright, Milburn, and Rogers in Buffalo and explored several sites, ultimately choosing the undeveloped shoreline on Lake Erie in what was then the western part of the Town of West Seneca, New York.

[7] Hayes, along with Albright and Stephen Merrill Clement, had invested in William A. Rogers’ "Rogers, Brown & Company" subsidiary, "The Iroquois Iron Company," in South Chicago, Illinois, which owned a plant containing two blast furnaces.

[8] In 1904, Rogers invited Hayes, Albright and Clement to accompany him on one of his periodic visits, as they had not seen the property before.

Purportedly, Frank H. Goodyear, another Buffalo businessman, heard of the trip and offered the use of his private car for the occasion.

The Union Ship Canal's continued to be used as an industrial waterway until January 1982 with the closure of the Hanna Blast Furnace.

[9] After moving to Buffalo, he was introduced to his business partner’s (George Field) sister in-law, Mary H. Warren whom he married in 1878.

[2] For much of his later life, he was called "General Hayes," an honorary military title he acquired from the time he served as chief of the engineering division of New York State.

In 1891–92, Hayes and his wife had Green & Wicks design a home for them at 147 North Street, two doors from the Metcalfe House (built in 1882 by McKim, Mead & White and demolished in 1980).

[11] He served on the board of the Buffalo Fine Arts Academy and, in 1892, gave $5,000 (equivalent to $170,000 in 2023) to assist the school in offering classes.

[2] In 1923, when he died he left the following bequests: Upon his wife's death, the remainder of their estate was to be divided between the University of Buffalo and Dartmouth College.