By: Stan Jordan
I have shown this picture of this corner before, but it was never this good or clear.
A little in review, this corner, until 1930, was Tom Foster Clothing Store, it was sold and torn down. Sometime between 1930 and 1936/37, this white building was built on this corner and I assume this photo by Mr. Ehrhart was taken in 1939 or 1940.
This restaurant was operated by Eddie Gordon. You will see a sign on the post about Equity Ice Cream, well Sam Griswold owned an ice cream store in Payne called The Equity and Eddie married one of Sam’s daughters, all very nice people. Now, the girl on the chair might be Dorothy or Helen, Eddie’s sisters, as they worked for Eddie. Sometime later as the war was on, Eddie moved to Edgerton, Indiana and had a good garage business.
After the end of WWII, Carl and Wilbur Langham had a Chrysler/Plymouth dealership and auto repair here on this corner. After Carl passed away, Wilbur operated this corner and a body shop down on the corner of Cleveland and Archer Drive for many years. After the building was torn down, a Standard Oil Station was in there for years, then a couple of car dealers and some other shops and West Bend News has been on this corner since 2005.
This first big building was Schilb’s Furniture for years, then that alley and the wooden building was June’s Beauty Salon, June was June Donat West. After a few years that building was torn down and a new building was put up right next to Schilb’s and the alley was moved to the north.
The brick building was a meat market for Harry Ely for years. The next building, on the ground floor, was the Bee-Argus paper and the second floor was Ehrhart Studio. Then the studio was moved south on Main Street sometime in 1941. For years the temporary Lutheran Church occupied one of those three buildings.
The next store has been a number of restaurants, The Green Pantry, The Sugar Bowl, maybe a card room, a spa, etc. The little lower building was the Gordon Hardware for years, but was sold to the Gaisford brothers, then in February of 1941 it was destroyed by fire.
The last store is the grocery store of Frank Reeb, but over the years a number of men owned and operated it. After WWII or in the early 1950’s that became the home of The Bee-Argus. The last car has an outside built-in trunk and then the spare tire and wheel. I have no idea of the make of that car or the year.
It just goes to prove to a lot of people, I don’t know everything.
See ya!
