Shoes Were Manufactured Here until 1974

Tweet

Curtis & Jones began its operations in the 1880s with a small workforce and quickly grew to become a major local employer and manufacturer of children's and women's shoes, with factories in Bernville, Robesonia, and Richland. In 1940, the company became one of the makers of official Girl Scouts of America shoes, which it produced until the mid-1960s, when the Girl Scouts ceased sponsoring official footwear. Beginning in the late nineteenth century, southeastern Pennsylvania became a major center of shoemaking, particularly children's and women's shoes, with numerous small and moderately-sized operations that fit well into the highly diversified economies of the southeastern part of the state. The factory on North 8^th Street was the company's primary factory and company headquarters.

Curtis & Jones was started by Frederick W. Curtis and Frederick S. Jones, who arrived in Reading from Massachusetts in the mid-nineteenth century. They became partners in 1883 and began a small business on Penn Street making and selling children's shoes. In 1889, they built a factory at 5^th and Court Streets; at this time they had 25 employees and claimed to make 500 pairs of shoes daily.

By 1901, the company outgrew the Fifth and Court Street factory and the owners purchased a lot on North 8^th Street, across from the Reading Iron Company. The following year they demolished a brick house and barn on the lot in order to build a four-story mill building.

The Reading Eagle printed a lengthy article on the opening of the new factory:

The article goes on to note that blowers and dust collectors on the roof were connected with the various work rooms, and there were toilets and washrooms for men and women on each floor.

There is some confusion as to the architects. The 1987 Pennsylvania Historic Resource Survey Form for the "Big Mill" identifies the architect for the 1902 building as A.J. Fink, who was affiliated with the Beard Construction Company, but the 1902 Reading Eagle article describing the new building identifies the architect as A.F. Smith, "the well-known architect of this city." In 1908-09, the fifth and sixth floors were added to the building, and in 1911-12 another addition was constructed. The builder of the 1902 building and the 1908-09 addition was the George W. Beard Construction Company. The firm of Muhlenberg Bros. Architects of Reading, designed and built the 1911-12 addition.

According to the Reading Eagle, at the time the factory moved to North 8^th Street in 1902:

The 1904 Sanborn map indicates that storage and the sole cutting operations were in the basement, making and finishing on the second floor, and stitching on the third floor. The 1932 Sanborn map also notes "sole cutting" in the B [basement], "box fac. & printing" on the first floor, "off. & packing" on the second floor, "healing dep't" on the third floor, and fitting on the fourth floor.

The 1911-12 addition doubled the capacity of the factory. The company opened another factory in Richland Borough, Lebanon County, c. 1917, which was enlarged in 1919; that plant had 146 employees. By 1922, the company had two additional Berks County plants; Robesonia with 40 employees and Bernville with 29 employees.

Employment levels at the Curtis & Jones Reading factory dropped in the 1920s, from almost 900 in 1919 to about 400 in 1925, and remained roughly stable at about 300 for the next four decades. In 1928, the company merged with an Allentown firm and reincorporated as Curtis-Stephens-Embry Company. In his enthusiastic 1948 compendium Pennsylvania Titans of Industry, state historian S. K. Stevens includes a section on the Curtis-Stephens-Embry Company, which he identifies as "among the leading manufacturers of juvenile footwear in the United States." Unfortunately, he provides no documentation or bibliography to support this assertion. In the 1940s through the early 1960s, the company had a contract as one of the official makers of Girl Scout shoes. The company slowly declined in tandem with the decline of industry in the city and the general migration of industry out of Pennsylvania, first for points south, and then to Asia. In 1973, the Curtis-Stephens-Embry Company was sold to the Cannon Shoe Company located in Baltimore, Maryland, who closed the Reading factory in 1974. When the "Outlet Era" began in Reading in the mid-1970s, the factory was renamed the "Big Mill 10" and operated from 1974 to 2001 with several outlet retailers located within the building. The outlets in this building closed in 2001, with the remainder of the outlet center closing in 2003.

Frederick Curtis and Frederick Jones began their business just as the second industrial revolution was gearing itself up to realign the American economic landscape, not only in industrial production, but in the overall organization of goods and services and the accompanying transformation of the nation's capitalist culture. Curtis & Jones exemplifies the emerging consumer economy, with a product catering to the desires of the vastly expanded and newly comfortable middle classes. As the ideal of the nuclear middle-class family (and of "childhood" as a distinct and precious time of life) took shape in the late-nineteenth century, retail marketing of an enormous array of consumer goods dedicated to the comfort and adornment of individuals became a major sector of the economy; fashion design also emerged as a primary driver of consumer taste. Shoes, especially children's and infants' shoes, were ideal consumer products, because they were relatively inexpensive, they were subject to rapid replacement as children grew quickly, and they were highly sensitive to changing fashion tastes.

The Annual Report of the Secretary of Internal Affairs for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, which was published in 1901, devotes a lengthy discussion to the history and design of shoes around the world, and favorably compares the quality and design of American-made shoes, which the writer considered superior in design, materials, variety, and comfort. The report includes a discussion of the fashion requirements of the modern American woman's shoe wardrobe, which included special shoes for walking, horseback riding, golfing, gardening, wet and snowy weather, formal events, and everyday wear, all in designs appropriate for younger women, as well as "Old Lady Footwear." The list for men was equally detailed. The writer considered that American children's shoemakers were uniquely capable of producing shoes that were "particularly suited to the lifestyles of the rollicking American 'youngster'" - shoes for play, dress, and lounging, all made to foster proper foot health. In the writer's opinion, American-made children's shoes were the "masterpiece of shoemaking art," as described in detail below:

From its beginnings, the company, first as Curtis & Jones and then as Curtis-Stephens-Embry Company, took particular interest in promoting the retail sales of its products. It maintained a direct retail connection to shoe and department stores until about 1906, when it turned exclusively to wholesale distribution. However, it always actively promoted its brands and offered retailers advertising copy and newspaper mats. The company's sales policies reflected its awareness of the importance of merchandising and of style in the consumer economy. In its 50-year anniversary pamphlet, the company devoted five pages to a discussion of merchandising and style, including a full-page discussion of "Fashion and the Foot" for children, a portion of which follows:

In order to protect its product branding, the company became involved in litigation in the 1950s when it unsuccessfully sued another company for trademark infringement. The other company made roller skate toe protectors called Pro-Tek-Toe, which the Curtis-Stephens-Embry Company considered too close to its own trademark-registered Pro-Tek-Tiv brand name. The industry shoe fashion journal The Boot and Shoe Recorder in 1965 listed brand names manufactured by Curtis-Stephens-Embry Company, including its own brands "Little Sergeant" and "Pro-Tek-Tiv," and brands of design houses such as Miss Pappagallo.

Shoe making

Like other production processes for consumer goods, the practice of shoe making underwent considerable mechanization in the late-nineteenth century; however, the process never became automated. The innovations in the shoe industry began in 1845 with the introduction of a rolling machine, which pounded sole leathers to compact the fibers and increase wear. When the sewing machine appeared, it was immediately adapted to the shoe making process. Just in time for the Civil War, an entrepreneur named Gordon McKay bought the patents for a machine that sewed shoes' soles to the uppers. He initiated the practice of leasing rather than selling his machinery, which reduced the risk and cost for shoemakers and considerably sped the adoption of the new machines. McKay's machines stitched the upper directly to the sole of the shoe, creating a ridge that rubbed the wearer's foot. The McKay-sewn shoe at first produced rougher, cheaper grades of shoes, partly to meet a high demand for workingmen's footwear partly because of the early machinery. Later refinements in the machinery and growing demand quickly brought better quality McKay-sewn shoes. Fabrication of welted shoes remained strictly a non-mechanized operation. In the mid-1870s, Charles Goodyear, Jr., developed machines for welting and stitching shoes. In this method, a strip of leather, called a "welt," was sewn and/or cemented to the sole of the shoe and the upper was then attached to the welt. This method of manufacture created a smooth inner surface and allowed the shoe to be resoled multiple times. Goodyear also developed machines to make welted "turn" shoes, in which the shoe was assembled inside-out and then turned right-side out, a method that made the production of soft infants' shoes especially easy.

After this, specialized machines for each step of the process proliferated. There were machines for cutting, shaving, and shaping sole and upper leathers; shaping and attaching heels; attaching soles and uppers with thread, cements, wooden pegs, or copper screws; smoothing and fine finishing the bottom and edges of soles; attaching buckles, eyelets, and buttons; and numerous other tasks for creating a stylish, comfortable, or durable shoe.

By 1900, shoe making had become a highly complicated business. The process had been broken down into about 175 processes involving over 200 steps, each of which had a specialized machine to complete. No machine could serve more than one or two functions and in the Goodyear welting process, about two dozen actions still could not be mechanized. Innovations in machinery in the early twentieth century sped production, allowed consistent high-quality products, and enabled manufacturers to respond quickly to the rapid changes in style and taste. However, shoe making always remained a labor-intensive process, since the machines were operated and controlled by the workers one task at a time, and the assembly of the many pieces of the shoe still required well-trained hands.

Developments in the fabrication process were matched by similar efforts in the treatments of shoe leather, so that by the turn of the twentieth century, consumers could choose shoes in a wide array of softened, gilded, dyed, pierced, embossed, or otherwise decorative leathers, in addition to rubber, canvas, cork, and other materials.

In 1899, the shoe making machinery business was consolidated by the United Shoe Machinery Company, which bought the McKay, Goodyear, and other patents, and became the world's controlling licenser of shoe making equipment until it was broken up in the 1940s. The United Shoe Machinery Company adopted the strategy of leasing rather than selling shoe making equipment. This practice enabled the organization of numerous shoe making companies to begin manufacturing shoes at relatively little capital cost, and fostered its rapid expansion outside of New England after 1900.

Shoe making in Pennsylvania

In the geography of shoe making, New England led the nation. By the turn of the twentieth century, other clusters of shoe making emerged, taking advantage of available labor and the new machinery-the Mid-Atlantic region of New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania, a cluster roughly centering on Cincinnati, and in the Midwest centering roughly on St. Louis. Massachusetts led the nation in shoe production, number of workers, and value of product through the Second World War, accounting for almost 60 percent of the value of the shoes produced in the nation. Pennsylvania and New York vied for fifth place, behind the New England states. According to the 1901 Annual Report of the Secretary of Internal Affairs, the manufacture of children's and infants' shoes formed an important sector of Pennsylvania's shoe industry. In 1905, Pennsylvania had 179 shoe making establishments with a labor force of 9,908. Women's and children's shoes accounted for about half of total production. In 1923, there were 130 establishments with 13,100 workers; and in 1927, the state had 107 establishments with 11,029 workers. In 1914, the state produced 22 million pairs of shoes, 11 million of which were women's and children's shoes. In 1919, 23 million pairs of shoes were produced, 10 million of which were women's and children's shoes. In 1927, shoe production was at 18 million, with women's and children's shoes accounting for 7 million. In 1940, it was estimated that shoe making ranked 49^th in importance among the state's industries.

The shoe industry fit well into the highly diversified industrial economy of eastern Pennsylvania, while it lasted, along with textiles, food processing, furniture making, machine works, and the numerous other manufacturing and processing activities that functioned extremely well in small-scale operations with workforces as small as half a dozen up to several hundred. Between 1860 and 1920, Reading developed a strong light industrial base with foundries and hardware, knit goods, and tobacco products being the largest in terms of number of workers and value of products, buttressed by some iron and steel production, and the Reading Railroad (whose yards in Reading were second only to the Pennsylvania railroad yards in Altoona). In 1923, the city had a population of over 100,000, with 392 industrial establishments, employing 29,000 workers, and a total product value of over $134 million.

The shoe making industry in Pennsylvania consisted of small- to moderate-sized operations, most of which sold their products through jobbing wholesalers or through their own salesmen to individual retailers. The process of shoe making was consistent across all companies because the machinery was leased from one entity and was uniform across the industry. Distinctions in company products largely depended upon the quality of the materials and design of the shoe. Pennsylvania shoe making firms produced a broad range of footwear in leather, rubber, wood, cork, and other materials; in styles for work, dress, sports, and other uses; for men, women, and children; and of a wide range of quality. Factories could employ anywhere from half a dozen to several hundred employees, although the trend over time was toward smaller work forces, especially around the First World War when the labor force of almost all shoe companies reported in the Industrial Directory of Pennsylvania permanently dropped by one-third to one-half. The reason for this is unknown and was apparently not discussed in the trade journals. After 1920, few factories employed more than 400 workers.

Many makers of children's and women's shoes in Pennsylvania developed brand logos and special brand lines. For instance, Curtis & Jones (after reincorporation as the Curtis-Stephens-Embry Company) had its "Little Sargent" shoe line for toddlers; the Bachman Shoe Company in Middletown, Dauphin County, had its "Busy Toes" shoe line; and A.S. Kreider Shoe Company had its "Rob Roy" shoe line for boys.

The published Census returns and the Industrial Directory of Pennsylvania (Directory) do not break out shoemakers by the type of shoe produced. The Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission's (PHMC) Cultural Resources GIS (CRGIS) database identifies 14 shoe factories including the Kreider Shoe Manufacturing Company factory in Elizabethtown, the Eby Shoe Corporation factory complex in Ephrata, and the Landis Shoe Company in Palmyra. The Eby Corp. factory in Ephrata began operations in 1914 and operated into the mid-1980s. The Eby Corp. was the largest employer among the shoe businesses in Lancaster County; its physical plant was also substantial, consisting of six buildings to house the many functions of shoe making.. The Landis Shoe Company in Palmyra was the oldest of the three, beginning under another name in the late 1880s; however, it was a small operation and did not survive the Great Depression. The longest-lived shoe company in Pennsylvania is probably the Kepner Scott Shoe Company, a company still in operation, which was founded in 1888 in Orwigsburg and transitioned from the former shoe company of Haeseler, Kepner & Company.

Based on the reports in the Directory, there seems to have been only one other long-term maker of shoes in the City of Reading, Fein and Glass Shoe Company (Fein & Glass). Fein & Glass first appear in the Directory in 1925 and statistics are recorded through 1959. The company had employment levels similar to those of Curtis & Jones, but no other information could be discovered regarding the company. The location of the company is given as 11^th and Marion Streets in Reading, although the only industrial building in that neighborhood is the Grimshaw Silk Mill.

In Berks County, the Keystone Shoe Company and the Saucony Shoe Company in Kutztown both appear in the Directory. The Keystone Shoe Company, Inc., 1884, made "children's, misses', and growing girls' Goodyear welts". The Saucony Shoe Company was organized in 1889 and made children's shoes; at some point in its operations, it began also making adult walking shoes. The company continued through the 1960s, although it always remained a small operation. It was acquired by the A. D. Hyde Shoe Company of Massachusetts in 1968, which moved production from Pennsylvania.

A shoe making firm close in character to Curtis & Jones was the A.S. Kreider Shoe Company (Kreider Company), based in Lebanon County. The Kreider Company produced women's and children's shoes and had five factories in Lebanon, Lancaster, and Dauphin Counties. The Kreider Company began its operations in 1894 in Palmyra (a factory owned by the W.L. Kreider Shoe Company was already operating in Palmyra in 1891). A new plant was constructed in 1895 in Annville, and Annville remained the location of the company's headquarters. In 1905, its largest plant was built in Elizabethtown, Lancaster County. A third plant was built c. 1909 in Middletown, which operated until 1925. Another plant was opened in Lebanon around 1919 and this plant closed c.1950. The A.S. Kreider Shoe Company dissolved in 1959.

Building Description

The Curtis & Jones Company Shoe Factory (Curtis & Jones) is located on the corner of North 8^th, Oley, and Nicholls Streets within the City of Reading, Berks County, Pennsylvania. This industrial building is located between the railroad tracks on the west and the densely constructed residential neighborhood on the east. Small industrial buildings are located to the south and southeast, with a large industrial complex located several blocks over to the northeast. This six-story, brick masonry industrial building was designed without an architectural style by an unknown architect, and was initially constructed by the George Beard Construction Company in 1902, with the fifth and sixth floors being added in 1908-1909. A second addition, designed by Muhlenberg Bros. Architects, was constructed in 1911-1912 onto the south elevation. The building was operated as a factory until 1973, when it was converted to Reading Outlet Center 10 (ROC 10) in 1974. The building was used for retail purposes until 2001.

Detailed Description

The building is located on the eastern edge of an industrial corridor, in an area known as the Outlet District, and parallels the Reading Railroad Shops. To the west of Nicholls Street are the rail yards and line; to the north and east of North 8^th Street is a densely built-up residential neighborhood of three-story, masonry row houses; and to the south are small-scale industrial buildings. Between 1958 and 1971, the rail yards were being transformed into the current Reading Station Outlet Center on Spring Street. In the mid-1970s, the immediate area surrounding Curtis & Jones was transformed into the Reading Outlet Center, with a number of small adjacent industrial buildings converted to retail uses. As a result, a number of these adjacent buildings were demolished to provide for parking lots immediately adjacent to the ROC 10.

The building site slopes slightly from east to west, so that the first-floor windows that are partially below grade and are barely visible on the North 8^th Street facade, are completely visible on the Nicholls Street elevation. The building is set back from Oley Street, approximately 10 to 15 feet, with several trees planted in the setback. A Second Empire residence was situated in this location and was demolished between 1978 and 2006. A fire stair was used to exit from the third floor, south elevation into this area, but was removed sometime between 2011 and 2013.

The Curtis & Jones building was originally constructed in 1902 as a 17-bay wide by 10-bay deep, four-story, polygonal brick masonry industrial building with a rectangular open courtyard (Courtyard #1) in the central core that was connected to the west elevation on Nicholls Street via a tunnel. A two-story masonry loading dock with a small one-story addition was attached to the northwest corner of the building. Surrounding these docks were one-story sheds. Sometime between 1908 and 1909, two additional floors were added on top of the building so that the building was now six stories tall. Three years later, between 1911 and 1912, Muhlenberg Bros. Architects, Wyomissing, Pennsylvania, designed a second addition, which was an eight-bay wide by 11-bay deep, six-story, U-shaped brick masonry building added onto the south elevation of the main building. The design of the addition was intended to be seamless with the original building and its additional top two floors. It is hard to determine on the south elevation where the second addition is actually located. The only key is found in the first-floor windows. The original first-floor windows have a very small top sash. In the addition's first-floor windows, the top sash are much larger.

The construction of this second addition between 1911 and 1912, resulted in a second square, referred to as Courtyard the original two-story building and sheds were removed and replaced with a garage for six autos and a one-story, brick masonry garage was added to the northwest corner of the north elevation. The entire building was operated as a shoe factory until 1973. From 1974 until 2001, the building was known as the Big Mill or ROC 10 and was operated as a retail outlet center. The outlet center closed and the building has been vacant since 2001. After the roof collapsed into the center of the main building, a new roof was installed in 2006. At an unknown time between 1987 and 2006, the boiler house was removed from the interior of Courtyard #1.

Characteristic of industrial architecture, the architectural style of the Curtis & Jones building is expressed primarily through its pilasters, window detailing, and corbelled cornice, which are common in early industrial buildings. This rhythm is reinforced by the use of a repetitive fenestration pattern on three major elevations. The pattern is further emphasized by the continuation of an elaborate brick belt course in the second addition. The building is constructed of brick masonry and is supported structurally by wood column beams with cast iron beam seats. The roof is flat. The building's interior is typical of the site and period, with painted brick exterior walls, finished wood floors, and beam ceilings. Within the centerline of the main building and its addition is a central or regularly spaced column line in order to allow the maximum amount of space available for use.

The primary elevations of the Curtis & Jones building front on North 8^th and Oley Streets, with the front facade (east elevation) facing North 8^th Street. The cumulative effect of this industrial building with its two additions is now a 25-bay wide by 11-bay deep, brick masonry building that was constructed between 1902 and 1912. The building sits on a brownstone foundation. The upper facade is defined by the repetitive pattern of the brick pilasters that extend around the three elevations on North 8^th, Oley, and Nicholls Streets, and it is capped by a brick corbelled cornice and a flat rubber roof. The pilasters were initially four stories in height and were capped with a simple corbelled cornice. When the top two floors were added in 1908-1909, the same detail was added at the top of the sixth floor. The fourth-floor detail now reads as a corbel table along the three main elevations. On each floor between the pilasters are/were wood four over four, double-hung wood sash with flat heads set within a segmental-arched opening. The window openings have brick sills and three courses of brick headers for the lintels. The sills on the fourth, fifth, and sixth floors have metal panning over the sills. Only about 25 percent of the windows remain within the building. On the east elevation, the bays are numbered starting at the northeast corner and proceed from right to left. Most of the window sash, or remnants of the sash, remain on the second and third floors with remaining sash found in Bays 1, 7, 11, 14, 17, 20, and 23. The remainder of the sash and openings are covered with painted plywood.

The first floor (base) of the North 8^th Street elevation is partially below grade with the segmental arches starting from the spring point on the brownstone foundation. Interspersed among the windows are stairs to this lower level, which are located in Bays 5 and 6, 14 and 15, and 22 and 23. The concrete stairs have a concrete curb and metal pipe railings.

The second floor was the main floor with a loading dock and entry doors along the North 8^th Street elevation. Starting at the northeast corner, there is a loading dock in Bay 4, and entry doors in Bays 9, 17, and 25. The ninth bay door is a pair of single-light, metal doors set within a metal frame. Above these doors is a pair of four-light, wood transom with central mullion. The door in Bay 17 is covered by plywood. In Bay 25, a pair of metal, single-light doors is set within a metal frame, which are set within a second wood panel frame. Above the doors are a pair of six-light, wood transom windows with a central mullion.

The second-floor windows are in fair to poor condition with frames remaining, but window sash are missing in Bays 1, 2, 3, and 5. Above some of the windows are gooseneck lights. The frames of former awnings remain in Bays 1, 3-8, and 10-14. Half of the window sash remain on the third floor, and very few window sash remain on floors four, five, and six.

The south elevation is similar to the east elevation in detail and continues the design vocabulary of the original building. This makes it hard to discern between the various additions. The only difference between the two elevations is that the configuration of the corbel table found between the fourth and fifth floors on the south elevation is less detailed. The south elevation is 11 bays wide and six stories tall, with brick pilasters defining each bay. The first and second floors of the first bay are blank and do not have any windows. On each floor within each individual bay, there are paired wood, flat-head frames set within segmental-arched openings. There are brick sills and lintels, with the segmental arches being composed of the three courses of the brick headers. The sills have been covered with a metal panning on floors four, five, and six.

The west elevation is similar to the east and south elevations except the entire first floor is exposed and there are more door openings on the first floor. Starting at the southwest corner and proceeding right to left, door openings are found in Bays 1, 9, 11, 12, and 13. The door openings include doors, a loading dock, and a tunnel that leads to the right courtyard.

The north elevation is primarily brick with six bays of paired, eight-light metal sash with operable awnings/hoppers within the central lights on the third floor; single, paired wood windows on the fifth floor; and five bays of paired wood windows set within segmental-arched openings on the sixth floor. The fifth- and sixth-floor windows are partially covered with painted plywood. Extending out perpendicular at the northwest corner of the elevation is a 4-bay wide, 1-bay deep, one-story loading dock addition that was constructed between 1933 and 1955. Each of the loading dock bays is framed with painted metal iron and has metal garage doors. The door in the first bay has a different color, configuration, and window location compared to the other three doors. A chain-link fence blocks access to the parking area in front of the loading dock. Evidence of the 1908-1909 addition of the top two floors is very evident in the exterior masonry on this elevation.

There are two interior courtyards; Courtyard #1 (1902) and Courtyard #2 (1911-1912). Courtyard #1 (right) is polygonal with various brick stair towers and chimneys within the space. The square Courtyard #2 (left) has similar enclosures. A tunnel within the original 1902 exterior wall connects the two spaces. The masonry wall fenestration pattern within the right courtyard varies depending on the elevation. The north elevation has single, wood-framed window openings minus the sash set within a segmental arched opening. The east and west elevations are similar to those on the front elevation, having a repetitive pattern of the brick pilasters that extend the length of the courtyard; however, unlike the pilasters on the front elevation, there is a corbelled cornice. On each floor between the pilasters are paired wood frames with flat heads set within a segmental-arched opening. There are brick sills and three courses of brick headers for the lintels. Courtyard #2 is similar except that it has a corbel table between the fourth and the fifth floors and a corbelled cornice above the sixth floor on its north elevation, as this was the original exterior wall before the 1911-1912 addition was added. It is unknown when the boiler was removed from the interior of the courtyard.

The building's interior structural system is supported by Douglas Fir post and beam, with the posts located approximately 10 to 11 feet on center (varies due to location). The beams themselves are paired joists set within a cast iron beam seat. The beams are through-bolted along the top and bottom cords of the beam to further reinforce its structural stability. The structural system is in poor condition due to excessive moisture deterioration from the roof collapse. The exterior masonry walls and the post and beam structural system on floors one, two, and three appear to have been "cleaned" and have an unpainted surface, though there is evidence of paint in numerous locations. The exterior walls and post and beams on floors four, five, and six are painted white. Where the floors remain, there is wood tongue-and-groove flooring over a wood subfloor.

Within the interior masonry walls of the courtyards are three, masonry enclosed, wood, intercommunicating stairs. Two stairs are located on the interior of Courtyard #1, and one stair is located in Courtyard #2. The interior of the stairwells have whitewashed masonry walls with a solid, tongue-and-groove railing with a rounded wood handrail. The stairs are in various states of disrepair/decay. There are two elevators that open onto the shared connector between the two additions; a passenger elevator is located on Courtyard #1 side while the freight elevator is located on Courtyard #2.

Between 1974 and 2001, the entire building was operated as a retail outlet as part of the Reading Outlet Center. On the exterior, the second-floor windows on the north elevation were replaced with single-light windows and awnings, and gooseneck lights were added over these windows. A large number of the upper-floor windows were covered with painted plywood. On the interior, the post and beam structural system on the first, second, and part of the third floors was "cleaned" by an unknown method. Very little fabric remains from this period except for the replacement front doors and several miscellaneous partitions on the first floor. The resulting feel is long, unobstructed interior spaces.

Sometime in 2001, the roof collapsed onto the sixth floor in the 1902 building, which subsequently collapsed onto the fifth floor. The fifth floor then partially collapsed onto the fourth floor, leaving the structural system intact. Subsequently, all of the deteriorated fabric was removed leaving the structural system intact. Upon further examination, a number of the beams have deteriorated and a number of them have been replaced in-kind. A new rubber membrane roof was installed in 2006.

East elevation (2011)

North elevation (2011)

East elevation, door in Bay 9 (2011)

East elevation, window in Bay 10 (2011)

South and east elevations (2011)

South and west elevations (2011)

West elevation looking south (2011)

West elevation, detail of entrances in Bays 12 to 10 (left to right) (2011)

Courtyard #1 looking north (2011)

Tunnel to west elevation (2011)

Courtyard #2 looking north (2011)

Courtyard #2 windows (2011)

1^st-floor interior looking north (2011)

1^st-floor interior looking north (2011)

1^st-floor interior structural system looking north (2011)

Detail of beam seat (2011)