Latest Structures Page 94

American Chicle Company Building, New Orleans Louisiana

American Chicle Company Building, New Orleans Louisiana

The building was constructed for American Chicle Company, a New Jersey firm that manufactured chewing gum from a substance called chicle. The company previously was located in the New Orleans French Quarter at 425 Decatur. A building permit for the present structure was reported on September 1, 1911, and the 1912 city directory lists the firm at the Carrollton address. One presumes the reasoning behind constructing such a strongly styled utilitarian building was to create a handsome symbol for the firm, corporate pride. Regardless of the reason, the American Chicle Building is indeed ornamental, being strongly articulated for a building of this type, from its striking towers to its many decorative details. While New Orleans was never a manufacturing colossus, it

Bosco Plantation House, Monroe Louisiana

Bosco Plantation House, Monroe Louisiana

Piers and concrete cones support the main block structure and its five-bay gallery. The gallery's outlining entablature is supported by six columns (which differ from the surviving period corner engaged pilasters) that were put in place during a 2008 re-creation of the gallery's porch. Unfortunately, the original gallery porch and columns were lost due to heavy deterioration over the previous century. During reconstruction of the gallery's porch, houses of the same period and styling were studied by the present owner. Installing appropriate period-style columns matching the surviving comer pilasters is a definite plan for the future. The main block's foundation sills are notched as done in log construction. Six-by-six timbers have replaced original sills under the main block's gallery. The gallery

O'Neil's Department Store, Akron Ohio

O'Neil's Department Store, Akron Ohio

The M. O'Neil Company was Akron's largest department store chain and was the first company to build a major department store in downtown Akron. O'Neil's downtown store was the company's flagship store, with 780,000 square feet of floor space. It served as an anchor for the southern end of Akron's Central Business District. Construction of this six-story building was completed in 1928, at a cost of $3.1 million. Its construction and the subsequent business success of the O'Neil's department store played a leading role in influencing the expansion and development of Akron's Central Business District. The M. O'Neil Company dates to the last quarter of the nineteenth century when Akron's Business Center was concentrated in its Howard-Market Street area. In 1877,

Richman Brothers Company, Cleveland Ohio

Richman Brothers Company, Cleveland Ohio

The Richman Brothers Company building on E. 55^th Street in Cleveland, Ohio housed the Richman Brothers Company administrative offices, production facility, warehouse, and distribution centers for the retail and mail order segments of the business, as well as a cafeteria, hospital, recreation rooms and locker rooms for employees. The Richman brothers, Nathan G. Richman (1868-1941), Charles L. Richman (1872-1936), and Henry C. Richman (1876-1934), assumed the leadership of the company when their father retired in 1904. It was under the brothers' leadership that the company began to grow and continued to prosper, resulting in the need for a new building. Ground was broken at the E. 55^th Street site in 1915, and the Richman Brothers Company occupied the new building from

Joseph and Feiss Clothcraft Shops, Cleveland Ohio

Joseph and Feiss Clothcraft Shops, Cleveland Ohio

At the turn of the 20^th century, Cleveland ranked fourth amongst cities vying for supremacy in the garment industry. New York City dominated with Philadelphia, Baltimore, Cleveland, and others trailing behind in terms of total employment numbers. In Cleveland, the garment industry provided a significant percentage of employment opportunities and was only second to iron and steel in terms of total employment numbers. Garment production was often categorized depending upon whether the firm produced men's or women's garments. In 1916, Cleveland ranked fourth in the production of women's garments. It had many successful firms devoted to this area of production, including H. Black & Co., Printz-Biederman, and Bobbie Brooks. In Ohio, Cleveland ranked first in terms of employment at women's garment

Mather House, Convent Louisiana

Mather House, Convent Louisiana

The Mather House is among a limited number of French Creole residences in St. James Parish, which once had many more examples. It is also among the oldest Creole homes in the parish and displays rare surviving construction techniques. The early history of the Mather House is not completely clear. The property on which it stands was part of a plantation purchased by Charles Breaux in 1795, but one cannot be certain that the house existed at that time. Breaux died in 1811 and his heirs sold the property. The document recording the sale makes clear that a house then existed and, as mentioned above, the architectural evidence indicates that the original portion of the current house could be the building

Live Oaks Plantation, Rosedale Louisiana

Live Oaks Plantation, Rosedale Louisiana

Live Oaks Plantation House is an example of early Louisiana plantation architecture with its upper and lower galleries, unbroken roofline, and internal architectural details forming a prototype for later, more elaborate, and more refined plantation homes. The brick slave chapel, the remains of the combination servant quarters and smokehouse, and the evidence of the combination kitchen and servant quarters provide an insight into the domestic arrangements of influential people of the period. Charles H. Dickenson was a part of the family that owned a great deal of Iberville Parish, his guardian was the most extensive property owner in the Parish. Captain Joseph Irwin had become Dickenson's guardian in 1805 when Charles' father was killed by Andrew Jackson. The senior Dickenson and

Mer Rouge High School, Mer Rouge Louisiana

Mer Rouge High School, Mer Rouge Louisiana

Like rural Louisiana on the whole, public education was in its infancy in Mer Rouge at the turn of the twentieth century. Information is sketchy for this early period, but it is known that the first public school in Mer Rouge proper, apparently in the 1890s, was conducted in a rambling one-story frame residential-looking building. The school remained in this location until 1912, when the school district passed a tax to buy property and construct a new school building. The 1913 school, two stories and of brick construction, represents a definite chapter in the history of public education in small Louisiana towns, the arrival of modern brick schools in the early years of the twentieth century. The long demolished, almost square

Myrtlewood house, Pineville Louisiana

Myrtlewood house, Pineville Louisiana

This Mansion was Built by a Businessman that Brought Prosperity to this Small Town

Local businessman Hiram Bradford built and lived in Myrtlewood. Hiram F. Bradford was born to James A. Bradford and Mary Jane (Cotton) Bradford at upper Fish Creek in Grant Parish in 1873. Before the Civil War, James Bradford, Hiram's father, had large land and cattle holdings but all was lost as a result of the war. After the war, he eventually recouped his losses. Hiram Bradford grew up working on his father's farm and for a while clerked in a mercantile establishment in Georgetown, in Grant Parish. Entrepreneurial from an early age, by the 1890's he had become a serious businessman in his own right, establishing the Bradford-Kees Lumber Company in Winn Parish. (Bradford-Kees supplied the pilings and wood that went

Old Commercial National Bank, Shreveport Louisiana

Old Commercial National Bank, Shreveport Louisiana

When built in 1910 and for over a dozen years, the building was the tallest structure in Shreveport. It remained the tallest building in the City for 14 years until 1924 upon the completion of the 17-story Slattery Building, also by the architects Mann and Stern. The occupants were among the most powerful and wealthy in the City, which was then experiencing boom years brought on by the discovery of oil and gas in Northwestern Louisiana. However, the most famous person associated with the building was not an occupant. In the early 1920s, at the onset of his political career as Governor and Senator, Huey P. Long, as a private lawyer represented a former vice president in litigation with the Commercial

Mangham State Bank Building, Mangham Louisiana

Mangham State Bank Building, Mangham Louisiana

The Mangham State Bank (1909) is a two-story brick commercial building with classical details located in the central business district of the small town of Mangham. It has received one easily reversible exterior alteration and has suffered some interior deterioration. The Mangham State Bank Building has an angle corner entrance that leads to a large banking hall with a cast-iron vault, The building also contains a dry goods store which is set behind the banking hall on the east side, The staircase ascends from the southwest corner to a hallway and offices upstairs, As in most two-story commercial buildings, the staircase is entered from the outside. The exterior features segmentally arched openings, plate glass windows, corbel brackets, and a cast-iron column

Poplar Hill Grade School, Fayette Mississippi

Poplar Hill Grade School, Fayette Mississippi

The Poplar Hill Grade School is a local example of a rural school built between c.1923 to serve the African American community of Jefferson County, Mississippi. This school remained open from about 1923 until September 1957. Poplar Hill Grade School is the only surviving two room school house in Jefferson County, Mississippi. Mississippi began public education in 1821 by an act of the Mississippi Legislature. This legislative act also established a Literacy Fund to provide school tuition for indigent children. Under this legislation, education was only for those of the White population. African American children were not given the opportunity to receive a public education until after the Civil War. The Mississippi Constitution of 1868 was the first legislation that provided

Evergreen Plantation, Grenada Mississippi

Evergreen Plantation, Grenada Mississippi

Evergreen was built ca. 1855-59 for Robert Mullin (1818-1885), a native of Belfast, Ireland, who came to America as a child and first lived in Ohio and Kentucky. He was attracted to Mississippi in 1838 because the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek (1830) opened up the north-central part of the state for settlement. Establishing himself as a tailor in the now extinct Yalobusha River town of Troy, he soon engaged in other business interests such as shipping cotton. Mullin married Mary Walton in May, 1843, and the couple eventually had nine children. According to an 1890 reference, About 1859 [Mullin] purchased the place that he afterward named Evergreen plantation, consisting of twenty-two hundred acres of the choicest land in the county,

Peter Gregory House, Union Kentucky

Peter Gregory House, Union Kentucky

The Gothic Revival style was one of the picturesque design modes which developed in the mid-nineteenth century as a stylistic alternative to the more formal Greek Revival. While Boone County has retained a variety of Greek Revival and Italianate homes, such has not been the case for homes executed in the Gothic Revival style. Most of the residences erected by Boone County's small proportion of wealthy and sophisticated nineteenth-century citizenry were built at the county seat of Burlington, along major thorough-fares, or, in the case of the Gregory House and the Berkshire House at Petersburg, in close proximity to the Ohio River. The classic Gothic Revival-style cottage exhibits a symmetrical three-bay facade with a centered doorway, tall chimneys flanking the central

Ideal Department Store Building, Massillon Ohio

Ideal Department Store Building, Massillon Ohio

This Abandoned Department Store & Bank has been Converted into Apartments

Built from 1918-21 as the City of Massillon's first high-rise structure, the eight-story Ideal Building is an important illustration of Massillon's emergence during the 1910s and 1920s as a steel-based industrial and commercial center. Pre-WWI industrial expansion in the community marshaled in a period of economic prosperity, spurring growth in the city's mercantile and business sectors. Optimism in Massillon's future, along with a desire to take advantage of an expanding retail and office market, caused the Hess-Snyder Company to construct this major downtown department store and office building. The decision to build the Ideal Building in 1918 was an event which both signified and was influenced by the city's emerging industrial status. The Stark County Story by Edward T. Heald, published

Dundas Castle - Camp Eureka, Roscoe New York

Dundas Castle - Camp Eureka, Roscoe New York

Originally named Craig-E-Clair, the castle was built by Ralph W. Dundas, a socially prominent New Yorker, in a remote area in the town of Rockland, in northern Sullivan County, and the neighboring town of Colchester, in southern Delaware County. In 1907, Dundas purchased a 964-acre parcel formerly used as a fishing retreat and began transforming an existing Swiss style country house into a large, rambling estate complex. Its design is believed to have been inspired by late nineteenth-century interpretations of medieval European castles constructed in Scotland in the previous quarter century. The distinctive character of the castle is established by the use of plan elements and forms derived from Victorianized medieval castles and the interplay of features and materials imported and

John McCarty Round Barn, Filson Illinois

John McCarty Round Barn, Filson Illinois

This barn was constructed in 1911 for John McCarty's 160-acre family farm, Linwood. The oak for the barn was cut from an 80-acre wood lot about one-half mile northeast of the farm. The barn was but one manifestation of McCarty's leadership in the agricultural community. As an agricultural student at the University, McCarty wrote a thesis on feeding, was persuaded of the round barn's virtues by the work of Wilbur J. Fraser, and graduated in 1904. His associations with the agricultural school continued for about 30 years. In the 1920s, he was one of the first farmers to raise soybeans, advocated by the school as a means of restoring nitrogen to the soil. Foreign students toured the farm as a model

Ron George Round Barn, Romeoville Illinois

Ron George Round Barn, Romeoville Illinois

The barn has a direct link with Wilbur J. Fraser, Illinois' promoter of round barns. According to the present owner, Fraser encouraged his brother-in-law, Mr. George, to build the barn. The Fraser family apparently lived in nearby Plainfield before Wilbur was employed by the University of Illinois. The barn cost $1,500. This 60-foot diameter barn rests on a poured concrete foundation and is enclosed by verticle wooden siding. It has a single-hip roof with wooden shingles. A central wooden silo of elliptical shape is accessible from a loft and served nine horse stalls on the north side of the ground level. The number of cow stalls, if any, is unknown. A wooden cupola caps the roof which is an estimated 60

Clarence Kleinkopf Round Barn, Colchester Illinois

Clarence Kleinkopf Round Barn, Colchester Illinois

This barn was built by a local carpenter, Dick Carmack, for George Welch; and it is the lone survivor of three round barns built by Carmack within a two-mile radius. This 56-foot diameter barn rests on a poured concrete foundation and is covered with horizontal wooden siding it has a single-hip roof with wooden shingles. The main entrance is on the west side. Secondary entrances are on the south and northwest quadrants of the barn. A centrally located wooden silo necessitates a semi-circular driveway between entrances. A metal ventilator tops the barn 40 feet above grade. The haymow starts at roof level and extends three-quarters of the way round the barn. The barn is in excellent condition. It has all its

Clarence Forehand Round Barn, Vandalia Illinois

Clarence Forehand Round Barn, Vandalia Illinois

On December 15^th, 1992 a strong wind storm caused significant damage to this barn and it was demolished in January 1993. This 60' diameter barn rests on a poured concrete foundation and is enclosed by verticle wooden siding now covered with metal. It has a single-hip roof with asphalt shingles. A central silo is accessible by a ramp through a west side door to the loft from which horses and cows are fed on ground level from a circularly arranged manger standing on a concrete floor. The other main entrance is on the north side. A cupola originally surmounted the roof whose tip is now an estimated 60 feet above grade. It was built for C. E. Cox, a livestock farmer,

Book Title Abandoned America: The Age of Consequences (Jonglez photo books)

Abandoned America: The Age of Consequences (Jonglez photo books)

Book Title Abandoned: Hauntingly Beautiful Deserted Theme Parks

Abandoned: Hauntingly Beautiful Deserted Theme Parks

Book Title Abandoned Malls of America: Crumbling Commerce Left Behind

Abandoned Malls of America: Crumbling Commerce Left Behind

Book Title Abandoned Places: A Photographic Exploration of More Than 100 Worlds We Have Left Behind

Abandoned Places: A Photographic Exploration of More Than 100 Worlds We Have Left Behind

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