There are times when you look at history and never see it. For years I have seen the photograph shown above at the Pine Street house. It is a large photo about the size of a old style wall calendar. However it is very faded and I have only given it a quick glance or two thinking it was just another look at the old Howard House. Then I picked it up and took a real look at it, and then realized what a fantastic image this really is. I took it to a skilled friend who could scan and darken it and try to bring out the details. This is one of the oldest images that I know about from the village.

The typical view of the Howard House is this postcard image was taken around 1910. It shows us the three story hotel with a balcony for each floor. The corner towers served as water tanks.

The February 4, 1948 newspapers carried the news that the old hotel had burned. However what burned was described as a small brick section of the hotel that had been converted into apartments. In 1916 much of the building had been torn down to make a room for a garage. The town had gone dry and hotels were no longer making money, and those new automobiles were the wave of the future.  You can see what was left in this 1938 image of the village.  What bugged me was how they were able to carve off a small section of the old hotel to make these apartments. The new image explains it nicely.

The Howard House began around 1863 as the Western Hotel and was purchased by the Howard brothers around 1873. The 1884 the Sanborn Fire maps show it as the large building we see it in the postcards. An auction notice from 1896 gives us details about the business. The most notable point is that the hotel had 40 rooms with steam heat and that it was part wood and part brick.

 

This new look at an old photo explains it all. The wood section of the hotel was extended over to the brick building next door. This was known as the Kendrick Block or building. Stewart Kendrick died in 1880 and the building was sold. The Howard brothers basically wrapped their building around the Kendrick building and added the side porches and water towers. If you count windows and doors you can see the brick building on the right side. So after the wood section was removed the old Kendrick Building was exposed. And this is what burned in 1947.

 

This also helps us to date this photo. Look for the Howard House in the left center. We can now say safely say that this image is around 1880.