A few weeks ago we had a speaker at Rotary who educated us on the intricacies of the three historical districts in this town. There are historically significant residential neighborhoods east and west of Main Street, and then more recently we got our downtown recognized as holding its own place on the National Register. We have landmark buildings that date as far back as the 1870s, but it’s hard to date anything accurately before 1910, when the records building burned.
JC Penney had his first store here—a butcher shop. It wasn’t a smashing success, and as we all know, he eventually got out of the meat business. The original butcher shop location is now a really good gluten free bakery (crazy delicious cinnamon rolls). Penney started his department store business elsewhere. It eventually came back to town, and until the 1980s it was located on Main Street, across from the butcher shop and down a couple blocks. I learned the history of that location today, and its current incarnation was just as cool to me.
Today was Rotary Day Out. What that means is the church where we meet is hosting vacation bible school, so we had to find someplace else to be. This happens every summer. A handful of businesses volunteer to host us, give a presentation about what they do, and they feed us. The location I chose was in a building that is listed as being built in 1910 (the year of the fire), but had water tap permits filed from 1908. A fellow Rotarian and his daughter/business partner have recently opened a specialty kitchen store. They hold cooking classes in a demo kitchen in the back of it. We met there for a lunch of prosciutto wrapped asparagus, salad Niçoise, and brownies. (Wish I could have had a brownie.) There was some amount of chef instruction included, but honestly there was also a lot of chatting at the tables, and I don't remember much about the lesson.
The building owner talked about what the building used to be, like a grocery store, an auto parts store (and there was oil spilled on the original wood floor because of it), the long-term location of the JC Penney's, and until recently, a music store. To put in the kitchen store, they completely gutted the building. He was particularly proud of their decision to remove the built-out walls, and chip away ALL of the mortar skim coat covering the original brick walls. They were indeed lovely. They repaired the wood floors in some key places, but left enough of the squeak in the boards to keep that 100+ year old building feel. He showed off the basement that had a selection of goods from his hardware store, so that people who live downtown don't necessarily have to drive anywhere to pick up a broom or duct tape. He had quite a few things to say about the downtown development authority, city codes, and engineering issues, especially with fire access in the storage area, and how close his three apartment units upstairs in the building were to not being able to have windows at all (for the building being right on the lot line). I love old buildings, and it was hard not to be creepy and stay for hours asking about every little detail.
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