Two stories about Syracuse ... the son of the bass player in our band was attending Syracuse med school ... Fred said that when he went to see his son, he would make this turn and see a huge cloud - he knew Syracuse was under that cloud ...

When the company I worked for was considering relo out of NY city, supposedly Syracuse was one of the finalists as a new location ... some relatives of my mom's who lived there were visiting and I mentioned the possibility of moving there ... they said "you will love it" ... Having read that Syracuse averaged bout 65 sunny days a year, I responded "but how is the weather/" ... the answer was "Oh the weather is terrible, but you will love it there" ... ?!?
I think Syracuse was put in as an option to make RI more appealing ...