The Pride of Aberdeen
A new brick business block on Heron Street marks a milestone in Aberdeen’s development.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Toklas & Kaufman, with their well-known and successful mercantile operations in Olympia and Spokane, have established a large and lasting home in Aberdeen. Their new brick building is the handsomest and most substantial one in town, and its fine stores present a truly magnificent appearance. This is the first brick business block built on the Harbor, it is one of the largest in the city, and is the pride of Aberdeen. It is 60x90 feet, two stories high, fronting on Heron Street on the corner of G, and cost, as it stands, $10,000. The whole front may be said to be one continuous show window of massive plate glass beautifully arched, and attracts the attention of the passer-by by day, and also by night when the whole establishment is brilliantly lighted by electric lights aggregating 875 candle power. Two stores—one for ladies’ and the other for gentlemen’s goods—are partially separated by pillars, and shelves, but with connecting arches at either end and in the center. The finishing of the shelves, counters and cash desk are of native spruce and cedar, highly polished.
“The whole front may be said to be one continuous show window of massive plate glass beautifully arched.”
This 1891 report highlights the era's civic boosterism, where the construction of a single brick building on Heron Street was seen as a transformative moment for a burgeoning timber town. Today, that same corridor remains the heart of the city's historic core, though the 'massive plate glass' and electric light displays of the 1890s have long been replaced by the ongoing struggle to revitalize those legacy storefronts.
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