The Labor and Industry Museum in Belleville Illinois.

I visited the Belleville, Illinois, Labor & Industry Museum several times. It was an excellent little museum with many Belleville-made stoves, heaters, industrial machines and memorabilia. I was invited to sit with a couple of old guys as they slurped down their coffee and take part in a history lesson about how the Military men that came home from the Black Hawk War of 1832 banded together some years later and headed for California, to find a fortune in gold (Before the official gold rush in 1848). News articles were coming out of California and Oregon, and apparently, after panning for gold, some men returned to Belleville after a couple of years... Filthy Rich... but complaining was the most demanding work they ever did. I sat there, mesmerized. After looking at my watch, I saw that two hours had passed. Here is a little about the Museum and the Beautiful building it is in, the Conrad Bornman House, with my personal photographs.

THE LABOR AND INDUSTRY MUSEUM
The Labor & Industry Museum is the only public institution devoted to the history of the labor and industry of Belleville and southwestern Illinois. Belleville was one of the most important centers for the growth of the Illinois industry, which ranked third in the nation in the late 19th century. The Museum's mission is to chronicle and interpret the area's rich cultural heritage of labor and industry. Belleville contributed significantly to the industrial movement by establishing some of the earliest and largest manufacturing establishments in the burgeoning United States.

The Labor & Industry Museum is based in the Conrad Bornman House on historic Church Street in Belleville. This 1837 building, rescued from the wrecking ball by the Belleville Historic Preservation Commission, witnessed the enormous development of the 19th-century industry. The building, which has undergone extensive renovation, houses permanent and unique exhibition galleries, an educational center, and archives.

THE CONRAD BORNMAN HOUSE
The building which houses the Labor & Industry Museum has four building dates beginning in 1837. Conrad Bornman, believed to be the first German immigrant to Belleville, purchased the lot at the intersection of North Church and East B Streets in 1837.

The Conrad Bornman House.

The 1881 History of St. Clair County relates that Conrad Bornman, a blacksmith and strawberry farmer who became interested in brick making and the art of bricklaying, and a fellow blacksmith named Small, were the first German immigrants to Belleville. They were the vanguard of the largest German migration to the State of Illinois. Their fellow Germans contributed significantly to the 1830s building boom and the foundry/industrial "Gilded Age" of Belleville and the Belleville area.

By 1837, Conrad Bornman was 20 and had lived in the new world for 19 years. That year, he built a house at 123 North Church Street in Belleville - two blocks from the Public Square, and it is now the home of the Labor and Industry Museum.

When it was boarded up and slated for demolition in 1995, the Historic Preservation Commission noted that it was the last remaining German Street House in the original town of Belleville, as platted in 1814. 

Bornman built his 2½-room house in the classical severity of the "Klassizimus" Style popular in Germany in the 1830s and 1840s. The brick street house is 1-½ stories, with gabled side walls and a cornice of brickwork across the front. The original entry was a single door with sidelights and a transom overhead to catch the summer breezes. The windows are evenly spaced, and the wood lintels are original. The house's interior has log lintels with the bark still on them. There is a trap door to the cellar, worn pine thresholds and the original stairway and floors.

Bornman sold his street house to Charles Born in 1840. Born had emigrated from Germany in 1839 and was a shoemaker by trade -- the 1860 Street Directory lists Born Boot & Shoe Dealer in the first block of North High Street. He also served as a city alderman and city marshal.

Like Bornman, Born changed careers and opened a machine shop with two sons, John Charles and William F. They lived and worked at 123 North Church Street, and the original house was expanded twice before they built a new machine shop at 222 East B Street in 1885. John Charles was the patent holder of six inventions of steam pumps, polishing lathes, and grinders. Charles Born died in 1896, and in 1920 J.C. Born Machine Co. was sold to Columbia Manufacturing Co.

In 1913, the Born family sold the North Church Street building to Charles Beck, who expanded it to house his cigar and tobacco manufactory.

Charles Beck (1867-1933) learned cigar making from Louis Kaemper, a cigar maker at 228 East Main Street. By 1901, Beck had a shop at 208-210 West Main Street. According to his grandson, Beck fashioned all the equipment used in making cigars, chewing tobacco and pipe tobacco, including a stripping machine, humidor and oven. The giant zinc-lined oven remains in the basement of the museum. The last cigar was made in the building in 1957.

Beck was active in the Cigar Maker's Union's affairs and was its vice president. He was instrumental in forming the Belleville Trades and Labor Assembly in 1891 and served as that organization's first treasurer.

Beck's son, Sonny, closed the cigar business in 1957, and the building was sold to Everett E. Sakasko, who operated Ed's TV Repair Service. Sakasko's wife, Geraldine, was the proprietor of the "The Lady Orchid" Beauty Salon.

In 1995, the East-West Gateway Coordinating Council purchased the North Church Street building, and the property was to be demolished to provide parking for the St. Clair County Transit District. However, with the cooperation of the City and County Government and the Historic Preservation Commission, the City of Belleville Planning Department was given six months to find a use for the building.

Since Belleville did not have a visitors center then, the city determined that that would be a good use for the building. Funds were garnered from Downtown Development & Redevelopment, Belleville Tourism, and the Historic Preservation Commission to purchase the building from the Transit District. Additionally, funds would be raised from the public and private sectors to restore the building and house a Labor & Industry Museum. The museum would center on Belleville's Gilded Age, 1865 - 1929.

In 1998, an official board was formed to restore the building and develop the museum. The restored building was dedicated in December 2000. Almost 1,400 people attended the Grand Opening on August 10, 2002.

Ideal Stencil Machine Co., 102 Iowa Avenue, Belleville, Illinois (1911-2002). Two of the world's four stencil machine factories were in Belleville, and the others were in St. Louis. The Ideal Stencil Machine Company, perhaps the best equipped, receives its castings from the Excelsior Foundry located in the same block. Its annual production was about $150,000 (Today, $3,866,975.00), employing 24 people.

VIDEO

Ideal № 1 Stencil Cutting Machine (1911) Tutorial.

Auto Stove Works, New Athens:

Auto Stoves and Ranges for 1935-36; Catalog № 17. (pdf)

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Did a Cook County Illinois Sheriff Arrest, Resurrection Mary in Justice, Illinois?

The Legend of Resurrection Mary
A young man went out dancing at the Willowbrook Ballroom in Willow Springs, Illinois and meets a young, attractive polish girl with long flowing blond hair in a beautiful white dress. The man asked her to dance. She wasn't very talkative. He took her hand guiding her to the dance floor, thinking she felt quite cold to the touch but there is something about her that is both exciting and mysterious.

The Main Gate of Resurrection Catholic Cemetery & Mausoleums on Archer Avenue in Justice, Illinois.

Toward the end of the evening, he asks her how he can contact her. She takes a cocktail napkin off the table and writes her address on it. He puts the napkin in his jacket pocket without looking at it. A little while later he offers the young lady a ride home, she accepts. On the way to her house, the girl becomes very anxious and signals to the man to drop her off right as they reach Resurrection cemetery. The guy hesitates because it is late and there doesn't seem to be any residences nearby but because she is so persistent and agitated he reluctantly pulls over. The young lady jumps out of the car and runs toward the locked gates of the cemetery where she seemed to just pass-through the cemetery gates and promptly vanishes into the darkness.

The next day he remembers that he has her address in is pocket. He drives to her house to ensure that his date made it home safely. An older woman answeres the door. he asks for Mary. He is invited in and takes a seat on the sofa. The young man notices photographs on the credenza and immediately recognizes one picture as the woman that he had danced with the night before. The old lady told him that her daughter was killed by a hit-and-run driver coming home from a night of dancing some years ago.

Commentary
The above legend is a conglomerate of stories told about the "vanishing hitchhiker" along Archer Avenue known as "Resurrection Mary."  Some eyewitnesses have reported seeing a young blond girl in a white dress steps out in front of their car only to disappear. Some have seen "Mary" hitchhiking along Archer Avenue near Resurrection Cemetery only to have her disappear on second glance.  Others still have had very vivid recollections of actually dancing with her. Mary has been a rite of passage for youthful drivers on the southwest side of Chicago, especially on Halloween, for many years and one of the most beloved spirits of the Chicagoland area.

The Law Enforcement Officer's Story
A Cook County Sheriff was on patrol in the early 1980s and was across the street from Resurrection Cemetery in Justice, Illinois parked next to and chatting with a Justice police officer. The Justice policeman was keeping an eye on the cemetery entrance that night because it was so close to Halloween, to discourage vandals and curiosity seekers from entering the cemetery after dark, while it was closed.

As they were talking, a car pulled up to them at a high rate of speed and a female jumped from the vehicle. She looked terrified and was screaming that they had just seen "Resurrection Mary!" along Archer Avenue near the Fairmount Cemetery. 

Fairmount Cemetery is within eyeshot of The Willowbrook Ballroom which is one of the locations associated with the legend of "Mary."

Both officers looked at each other and rolled their eyes, but because the woman was so visibly upset and serious, they decided to check things out.

As they passed the Willowbrook Ballroom, they said they actually did see a glowing figure disappear into the woods near the Fairmount Cemetery. He was actually a little bit startled at seeing this and pulled off the road to investigate. 

The Willowbrook Ballroom, formerly the "Oh Henry," where Mary allegedly danced.

He started to walk into the woods with his gun drawn, chuckling, because he didn't know how his gun was going to protect him from a ghost!

He caught another glimpse of the figure in the woods and it was quickly gone again!  He walked in the direction of where he last saw the glowing figure and he couldn't believe that he could see a figure wearing a glowing white dress behind a group of trees!  His voice cracking, he identified himself as a police officer and ordered the figure to come out from behind the trees. The figure moved and started walking toward him. What he saw next was... well shocking! As the figure came closer he could see that it was actually a male figure wearing a white dress and blonde wig. The male subject had covered the dress in the liquid from numerous glow sticks causing it to glow in the dark.

This is the censored version of what the Justice policeman said to this individual. "What the heck do you think you are doing out here!" The individual explained that he had been dressing up like "Resurrection Mary" for the past 10 years in the 1970s-1980s and scaring people along Archer Ave as it got close to Halloween.

He asked him if there was anyone else in the woods and the guy yelled to a number of his friends to come out. They were hiding with video cameras and lights. Of course, now it was funny and other police officers were showing up to get a gander at "Mary" and it started taking on a kind of "circus atmosphere." Some officers had taken Polaroid pictures standing next to and putting their arms around "Mary."

They finished by deciding to extend "Mary" and her friends some grace and let them go with a stern warning to cease their ghostly activities or face prosecution for startling motorists and possibly causing an accident.

The next day it was apparent that "Mary" had not heeded their advice and it was also painfully apparent that the Cook County Sheriff's Police did not find his antics as amusing as the local authorities did. The glowing drag queen, in handcuffs and being "assisted" into a Cook County Cruiser, he thought that this would be a really cool booking photo!graph!

A Visual Aid

By Ray Johnson
Edited by Neil Gale, Ph.D.

The Shocking Story of Chicago's first and only Crucifixion.

On Friday, March 9, 1945 (not Good Friday, March 30, 1945), a couple of men were walking on Clybourn Avenue when they heard loud groaning. They followed the sound to the alley, under the 'L' line, behind 1627 North Clybourn Avenue in the Ranch Triangle neighborhood of the Lincoln Park community of Chicago. They just couldn't believe what they saw!

In the shadow of the 'L,' they found a man, later identified by police as 46-year-old Fred Walcher, hanging on a wooden cross by spikes driven through his hands, wearing a crown of thorns and bleeding from his side.

An ambulance was called, and Walcher was taken to the hospital. There, he told police his story.

Fred Walcher was an Austrian who rented a room in the basement of a bar located at 1638 North Halsted Street in Chicago. He was an Optician by trade. Walcher believed in universal brotherhood and was worried about the state of our civilization. His concern had caused him to start a movement for world peace called the "American Industrial Democracy."

In his statements to police, he said that three men had awakened him in his rented room last night. The men told Walcher that they would crucify him but that it wouldn't hurt, so he didn't put up a fight. They led him to the place under the 'L' where a cross of varnished 6-inch planks had been prepared. He was not alarmed until the men took out five metal spikes and a hammer.

Walcher said he had offered no resistance. The men nailed Him to the cross, carefully attaching a rope to his limbs so the weight of his body would not tear his flesh. They then put a crown of thorns on his head and left.

Now, at the hospital, police thought something didn't smell right. Walcher's friends were interviewed, and Walcher was given a lie detector test.

Fred Walcher (center) is being examined.

Walcher's Cross.

One of Walcher's friends, Dr. Emil Bronner of 5652 South Christiana Avenue, had a possible explanation for the event. Bronner told police that Walcher had started acting strangely at American Industrial Democracy meetings and became increasingly agitated with what he thought was lethargy on the part of others in the movement. Bronner said that Walcher considered most people stupid and ignorant and needed something to wake them up. Something like a crucifixion.

"I believe that some men who heard him say these things got so worked up they decided to crucify him," another friend claimed. "I don't mean they were angry with him—they probably didn't understand that he didn't intend to be the victim."

The truth (or the closest thing to it) eventually came out, and it was determined that Walcher had orchestrated the whole crucifixion affair as a publicity stunt. Walcher wanted to spread the word about his idea for a worldwide peace based on a new world order that was run by the middle class and that peace could be gained by a series of "mental attacks."

Of course, immediately following this discovery, a psychological exam was ordered by the courts, and aside from all of the above, the municipal court psychiatrist, Dr. David Rotam, stated that Walcher behaved like any average person would in his preliminary testing.

Walcher at the Police Station.

As the police investigation wrapped up, it was discovered that Walcher was sympathetic to Bund, a U.S. Nazi group. His American Industrial Democracy movement was nothing more than a vague plan to build a Fascist society.

Walcher was fined $100 ($1,450 today) for disorderly conduct. Nothing more was heard of the American Industrial Democracy.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D. 

Anthony Overton (1865-1946), a banker and manufacturer, was the first Negro to lead a major American business conglomerate.

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In historical writing and analysis, PRESENTISM introduces present-day ideas and perspectives into depictions or interpretations of the past. Presentism is a form of cultural bias that creates a distorted understanding of the subject matter. Reading modern notions of morality into the past is committing the error of presentism. Historical accounts are written by people and can be slanted, so I try my hardest to present fact-based and well-researched articles.

Facts don't require one's approval or acceptance.

I present [PG-13] articles without regard to race, color, political party, or religious beliefs, including Atheism, national origin, citizenship status, gender, LGBTQ+ status, disability, military status, or educational level. What I present are facts — NOT Alternative Facts — about the subject. You won't find articles or readers' comments that spread rumors, lies, hateful statements, and people instigating arguments or fights.

FOR HISTORICAL CLARITY

When I write about the INDIGENOUS PEOPLE, I follow this historical terminology:

• The use of old commonly used terms, disrespectful today, i.e., REDMAN or REDMEN, SAVAGES, and HALF-BREED are explained in this article.

Writing about AFRICAN-AMERICAN history, I follow these race terms:

• "NEGRO" was the term used until the mid-1960s.
• "BLACK" started being used in the mid-1960s.
• "AFRICAN-AMERICAN" [Afro-American] began usage in the late 1980s.

— PLEASE PRACTICE HISTORICISM —

THE INTERPRETATION OF THE PAST IN ITS OWN CONTEXT.

 

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Anthony Overton

Anthony Overton, the son of Anthony and Martha Overton, was born in Monroe, Louisiana. At some point, after the Civil War ended, his family moved from Louisiana to Topeka, Kansas. His father had been born into slavery and was among the slaves emancipated by Abraham Lincoln. His father ultimately became a small business owner and made sure young Anthony had greater opportunities. Anthony attended Washburn College in Topeka, and after graduating with a degree in Chemistry, he studied law, earning his law degree from the University of Kansas in 1888. He briefly worked as a lawyer and became a judge in Shawnee, Kansas.

By the late 1890s, he had entered business, opening his own grocery (not liquor) store in Kansas City, Kansas. Anthony established the Hygienic Manufacturing Company in 1898, which produced several goods for drug stores and groceries. The products included the nationally known "High Brown Face Powder," which was "the first market success in selling cosmetics for black women."

In 1911, he moved his Business from Kansas to Chicago, where he established the Douglass National Bank in 1929, the second nationally chartered black-owned bank in the United States.

This is a surviving national $5 currency note from the Douglass National Bank of Chicago. Note the handwritten signatures on the bill. The Bank (Charter #12227) issued the following types of bills: 1902 $5 Five Dollar Bill; 1929 $10 Ten Dollar Bill; 1929 $20 Twenty Dollar Bill; 1929 $5 Five Dollar Bill.

He went on to develop a highly diverse conglomerate, including the Great Northern Realty Company and the Victory Life Insurance Company. 

The Spingarn Medal

In 1927 The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) awarded him its Spingarn Medal for outstanding achievement by a Negro. That same year, he was also given the prestigious Harmon award's first award and Gold medal in Business. He was a member of the Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity. In addition, an elementary school in Chicago is named after him.

Anthony Overton's Business Conglomerate History.
Overton began with the Overton Hygienic Building at 3619-3627 South State Street in the heart of the Bronzeville neighborhood in the Douglas community of Chicago's Southside.

Overton Hygienic Building at 3619-3627 South State Street, Chicago, Illinois.

In 1922, Overton commissioned architect Z. Erol Smith to design and build the Overton Hygienic Building, which became the community's prime business address for many years. Supported by a reinforced concrete frame, the Overton Building has street facades of dark red brick with extensive trim in white-glazed terra cotta. An impressive terra-cotta plaque in the center of the fourth-floor façade proudly carries the name "Overton Hygienic Company." In addition to his successful cosmetics enterprise, Overton would later operate the Chicago Bee newspaper franchise, Victory Life Insurance Company, Douglass National Bank, and Northern Realty Company from this business facility and his second building, The Chicago Bee Building.

The Chicago Bee Newspaper and Chicago Sunday Bee are weekly newspapers operated by predominantly female staff. (1926–1946)

Overton founded the Bee in 1926. The Chicago Bee was a weekly newspaper for Blackscompeted with the "Chicago Defender," then the largest black-owned newspaper in the United States. The newspaper was unusual because one of its managing editors was a woman, Olive M. Diggs.

Anthony Overton wanted a publication that would replace his then-defunct "Half-Century Magazine," a home and homemaker publication targeting Black women who consumed his products. Overton had used Half-Century Magazine to promote his line of black-oriented cosmetics for men and women, and he envisioned a similar role for the Bee. 

Overton also felt the Defender promoted sensationalism, gimmickry, and exploitation of the fears and prejudices of its readers. Overton promised a more sedate newspaper in tone and content that would adhere to professional journalistic standards and appeal to middle-class, conservative black Chicagoans. Overton pledged to readers of the Bee, a newspaper that would dedicate itself to "higher education for Negroes, cordial relations between the races, civic and racial improvement, the promotion of Negro business, and good, wholesome and authentic news fit for any member of the family." 

In 1929, Overton hired Southside architect Z. Erol Smith to design a new building for the newspaper's operations and, eventually, his manufacturing business. The three-story, nearly block-long Art-Deco edifice was completed in 1929 for $200,000 and named the Chicago Bee Building at 3647 South State Street.

The Chicago Bee Newspaper building is an Art Deco structure that stands as a beautiful icon of the Bronzeville neighborhood in the Douglas community of Chicago.

Overton meant the building to be a symbol of a successful Black enterprise. In fact, one Chicago Bee editor, James Gentry, coined the term "Bronzeville" to describe the skin color of the newly arriving Blacks from the South and the then vibrant Southside neighborhood that was the center of black Business and culture in the city. 

To accomplish this aim, Overton hired Chandler Owen, cofounder of the socialist publication "The Messenger," as the newspaper's managing editor. Owen and Overton clashed over politics, but Bee's owner recognized his managing editors' remarkable newspaper skills and instincts. It should also be noted that for most of its existence, during the Great Depression and World War II, the paper was staffed mainly by women. 

Despite his grand desires, Overton's Chicago Bee never took off as he had hoped. It achieved a readership of only about 50,000 at its peak in the mid-1930s, far less than its rival, the Chicago Defender. Moreover, the Great Depression took a toll on many of Overton's other businesses, which closed because of the economic downturn. Their failure indirectly starved the newspaper of vital capital it needed to expand. Although not directly related to the decline of the Bee, the black business center of Chicago moved to 47th and South Parkway by World War II, and the Bee and its building were no longer viewed as symbols of the possibility of black capitalism. Overton managed to keep the Chicago Bee running until he died in 1946.

The three-story Chicago Bee building was one of the most picturesque in the neighborhood, designed in the Art Deco style of the 1920s. Overton's enterprises shared this building until the early 1940s when the newspaper went out of Business. The cosmetics firm continued to occupy the building until the early 1980s. The building initially had upper-floor apartments. It also housed the offices of the Douglass National Bank and the Overton Hygienic Company during the 1930s. The Overton Hygienic Company was nationally well-known as a cosmetics firm for Negroes.

Overton Hygienic went out of Business in the early 1980s. In the mid-1990s, the City of Chicago purchased the building, now the Chicago Bee Branch of the Chicago Public Library system. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 9, 1998.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.

Shoppers World Discount Store, Community Discount Store, Zayre, Super K Center (Kmart) and Home Depot all occupied 6211 Lincoln Avenue at McCormick Boulevard and Devon Avenue in Chicago, Illinois.

Shoppers World Discount Stores was founded in March 1956 with a single store by two ex-New Englanders, Alvin D. Star and Jerome Spier, who worked as buyers for Boston’s legendary Filene’s department store chain. Eager to go into business independently, they first considered opening a chain of ladies’ specialty stores, according to Robert Drew-Bear’s book Mass Merchandising. Upon visiting the super-successful Ann and Hope discount outlet in Cumberland, Rhode Island, they reset their sights on the world of discounts.

After scouting several locations in the greater Boston area, Star and Spier decided to pull up stakes and plant their flag in Chicago instead, where Star’s brother lived. The first store was opened at the intersection of Milwaukee, Foster, and Central Avenues. Shoppers World Number-Two opened in Cicero some months later, followed by a third store in 1958 in Melrose Park. By 1960, a Highland, Indiana store and two more Chicago locations had been added. 

The Lincoln, McCormick, and Devon store was in the West Ridge community of Chicago, across the street from Lincoln Village Shopping Center, which opened on August 15, 1962.

The 77 Chicago Communities.

Pandemonium broke out in this 1962 grand opening of the brand new Shoppers World Discount Store at 6211 North Lincoln Avenue in Chicago.

Similar to the Devon Avenue entrance to Shoppers World.

The stores sold clothing, housewares, small appliances, and toys. In their early years, like several discount chains, including E.J. Korvette Department Stores, Shoppers World ran afoul of the era’s “fair trade” laws, which allowed manufacturers to set a floor below which prices of certain items could not be set. The company found itself blacklisted by several well-known vendors but seemed to find a creative way around that by setting up a unique “wholesale” organization under a different name to buy from those vendors, then putting the items on sale in the Shoppers World stores. Fortunately for Shoppers World and the rest of the discount store chains, most fair trade laws went the way of dinosaurs by the early sixties.

In 1961, Star and Spier sold their six-store chain to Chicago-based Aldens, the fourth largest catalog retailer in the United States. The new parent company invested heavily in Shoppers World, growing the chain to 14 stores (ranging from 40,000 to 120,000 square feet each). There were no stores in these Chicago suburbs - Mount Prospect, Niles, Oak Lawn, Chicago Heights and Gary, Indiana, as well as downstate Decatur, Illinois and one store in more distant St. Paul, Minnesota.

Aldens itself was acquired at the close of 1964 by Gamble-Skogmo, Inc., owner of several retail chains -Gambles, Skogmos and Tempo, among others, with most of their locations in America’s heartland, and Clark’s and Maclean’s in Canada.

The Shoppers World story wound down quickly from there, with Gamble-Skogmo’s sale of the still 14-store-strong chain in 1967 to Community Discount Stores, whose name the stores took on. 

The Lincoln Avenue store became a Zayre after Community’s demise. The Zayre chain closed in 1990 after several years of financial losses. 

Next came a Super K Center (Kmart)  store, which features a garden center, a video rental store, a branch of a local bank, an arcade, a portrait studio, a Jackson Hewitt tax center, a pharmacy, a grocery store and usually a deli cafe or Little Caesars Pizza station. This store, one of the 326 stores, closed in 2002 and 2003 from a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing.

Home Depot razed the structure at Lincoln Avenue and built a new retail building using one of the standard Home Depot store blueprints. Home Depot is still open at this location.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.