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Ochiltree
County Historical Markers
Plainview Hardware Company Building,
Perryton
(National Register Listing)
Plainview Hardware Company Building, Perryton
Address: 210 S. Main St.
Architect: Berry, Joseph Champ
Architectural Style: ART DECO
Historic Function: COMMERCE/TRADE
Narrative: The 1930 Plainview Hardware Company Building
is a 2- story, masonry Art Deco commercial building with
a rectangular plan and a flat metal-covered roof.
Constructed of reinforced concrete frame and floors, the
building has a steel trussed roof. A veneer of dressed
limestone on the front and common-bond brick on the sides
and rear finish the exterior of 25 by 140 feet enclosing
more than 10,000 square feet of floor space. The building
fronts east onto South Main Street in the central
business district of Perryton, Texas.
The area surrounding the Plainview Hardware Company
Building exhibits topographical features characteristic
of High Plains settlements. Incorporated in 1919,
Perryton has a strict rectilinear street plan and is
generally flat with little variation. The commercial
district juts south from the railroad, which is on a 45
degree northeast to southwest angle, and roughly forms a
T-plan town. Two blocks south of the railroad, the
Plainview Hardware Company Building is centered in a
commercial block. Directly to its north is the 1-story
Perryton Furniture Company Building, built in 1919.
The Plainview Hardware Company Building's Art Deco style
is emphasized with a shallow stepped front facade that
has carved limestone with teas relief detailing. The
facade's carved motifs and patterns create angular
geometric forms, some squares and some floral motifs,
that highlight verticality. These stylized sculptures
relieve the simple cubic forms and flat surfaces on the
building.
The central front entrance features an Art Deco styled
terrazzo floor that identifies the property as the
"Plainview Hardware - Furniture Co." The
basement originally extended 10 feet under the sidewalk,
and glass blocks set into the sidewalk allowed natural
light into the front part of the under structure; this
front portion was covered with a new sidewalk in the late
1970's, eliminating the glass lights. Exterior display
windows on both sides of the front entrance are elevated
18 inches off the ground with Belgian black marble bases
inset with four bronze grates, adding to the Art Deco
embellishments. The display windows have copper frames. A
small awning projects above the display windows. Copper
flashing and four frosted glass transoms with copper
fittings are above the awning. Originally small, square,
frosted glass tiles filled the transom area above the
display windows. Four 1/1 double-hung frosted glass
windows define the second story.
The oak front door and its hardware are original. The
transom immediately above the door and the sidelights is
glazed with original leaded glass. Metal glazing within
the window forms a low relief angular design, another
typical Art Deco element. Glass in the door itself, the
transom, and two of the sidelights has been replaced with
replica pane.
A neon Plainview Hardware Company sign at the center of
the facade was probably added in 1939 to mark and
visually separate the newly divided hardware store and
furniture store, when the latter moved next door. The
sign was removed from the building in the early 1970's.
In the early 1940's an advertisement for victory bonds
was painted on the upper portion of the north facade.
This sign was restored in the 1970's.
The north and south brick sides of the building each have
seven 4/4 double-hung windows on the second story. The
west (rear) brick facade has three entrances on the first
level, one of which is to the freight elevator. Above
these entrances fenestration is varied: small 2/2
double-hung windows, 4/4 double-hung windows, and 1/1
double-hung windows. The 4-story elevator shaft is at the
back of the building. The roof is cleared with sheet
metal and terra cotta coping covers the roof's parapet
walls.
The rear interior of the Plainview Hardware Company
Building has stairs and a freight elevator that connect
each of four levels: a full basement, a main display
floor, a mezzanine, and a second full floor. Wrought iron
railings with oak banisters line the stairs and
mezzanine. The original electric Otis freight elevator
continues to service all levels of the building and the
alley.
An interior stairway accesses the basement, which is
unfinished storage space with exposed brick walls. In the
basement a large boiler, coal chute, and two radiators
denote the original steam heating system that Howard
Holt, a local plumbing and heating contractor, installed.
The interior masonry walls and 16-foot ceiling of the
main level and mezzanine are sand plastered. On the main
level, the front display window areas have oak parquet
flooring divided by oak veneer and glass partitions. The
back walls retain a delicate, decorative hand painted
design that enhances the building's Art Deco architecture
as do two decorative metal strips, that resemble picture
molds, running around the walls of the main level. The
display window areas ceilings have Arts and Crafts styled
oak plywood paneling and original light fixtures of glass
reflectors that hold regular incandescent bulbs.
The mezzanine, at the rear of the building, has oak
veneer and glass partitions separating two offices. The
offices have their original oak doors with hardware
intact; one door has frosted glass, the other clear
glass. A mezzanine-level bathroom has its original
fixtures intact. "Battleship" linoleum covers
the mezzanine floor.
The second level, accessed by both stairs and the
elevator, is unfinished storage space with exposed brick
walls.
During the 1988 rehabilitation, necessary exterior work
was minimal, although interior work was extensive.
Exterior replacements were made for the leaded glass in
the front door, two sidelights, and the transom
immediately over the door; for the jambs and sills on the
transom windows; and for the back doors. Exterior and
interior metal elements were cleaned, and copper was
lacquered to preserve its finish. All interior wood was
stripped and varnished, including rails and banisters on
the mezzanine and stairs, the office partition's veneer,
and the front door. Plaster was repaired and walls were
repainted. Removal of false walls in the display windows
revealed the hand painted back walls. Removal of a
mezzanine level wall revealed the staircase to the top
floor.
The 1930 Plainview Hardware Company Building is an Art
Deco masonry building, an unusual style for Perryton, a
small town in the Texas Panhandle. Regionally prominent
architect Joseph Champ Berry, of the Amarillo firm Berry
and Hatch, designed the building. It represented not only
a bold commercial investment at the onset of the
Depression but also denoted a major expansion for an
important early Perryton business and partnership. The
building merits nomination to the National Register of
Historic: Places under Criteria A and C for its
historical and architectural significance.
Jacob Henry Neufeld and John Just founded the Plainview
Hardware and Furniture Company in 1910 in Plainview,
Oklahoma, approximately 120 miles northeast of Perryton.
Two other men joined the partnership later. Neufeld's
half brother, Sam Hergert, purchased a five percent
interest in 1911 and B.B. Kent acquired a transfer of
property in 1913. The four partners moved the business in
1913 to Gray, Oklahoma, 16 miles north of Plainview,
where hardware, farming implements, and furniture were
freighted overland from Liberal, Kansas until 1919.
The towns of Gray, Oklahoma, and Ochiltree, Texas, joined
together to form Perryton on August 22, 1919, as the
result of the Santa Fe Railroad's western expansion from
Oklahoma across the northern Texas plains that year.
Eight miles south of the Oklahoma line, Perryton became a
railroad town along the Spearman branch of the Panhandle
and Santa Fe line, and the seat of Ochiltree County. This
development prompted the partners to move the company to
Perryton where the rail system could deliver merchandise
with less expense and greater expediency. The Plainview
Hardware and Furniture Company, two blocks south of the
rail line on Main Street was the first new business
recorded at the Ochiltree County Courthouse.
In the fall of 1919 the company built a 50 by 100 foot
1-story building with an interior mezzanine on South Main
Street in Perryton. A later brick addition to the back of
this building measured 40 by 50 feet. Also in 1919, a
corrugated 50 by 140-foot metal warehouse was erected
across the back alley. Another later addition was a 75 by
140 foot machinery lot. The metal warehouse was recently
demolished.
As the company grew so did the need for more space,
resulting in the 1930 construction of a new Plainview
Hardware Company Building. Combined with the company's
three other structures, the retail store grew to a total
of 28,000 square feet. Plans for the lot to the south of
the 1919 store called for removal of a 100-foot frame
structure that two 2-story buildings would replace. The
new Plainview Hardware Company Building was the first of
the two buildings; the second building was never
constructed.
Joseph Champ Berry, of the Amarillo architectural firm
Berry and Hatch, designed the building. Berry was a
prominent Texas Panhandle architect from 1910 until his
death in April 1952, designing both conventional eclectic
and modern styles. In Amarillo Berry designed the 1930
Firestone Building at 1000 South Tyler, combining Art
Deco and Spanish Colonial Revival details, and the 1917
O.P. Jones House at 1620 South Tyler, with a mixture of
Prairie and Mediterranean influences. The front of the
Plainview Hardware Company Building, according to the
December 4, 1930, Ochiltree County Herald, "...shows
the handiwork and planning of the master designer. The
lines are a gem of modern architecture." The
newspapers estimated the building's cost at $35,000 and
local records show that the builder received cash
payments of $28,185.10.
The building displays typical Art Deco details. The front
facade has detailed limestone with carved teas relief.
The motifs and patterns create angular geometric forms,
mostly a grid pattern, that highlight verticality. The
central front entrance features an Art Deco styled
terrazzo floor and an oak front entrance door with a
glazed transom and sidelights and original leaded glass.
The new Plainview Hardware Company Building celebrated
its formal opening on Wednesday, December 10, 1930,
"...from early morning until late in the
evening," according to the local newspaper. The
company was one of Perryton's largest businesses
employing at least 10 people: Kent as general manager,
Hergert as assistant manager and repair department
manager, Neufeld as manager of farm implements and power
machinery that included McCormick-Deering equipment,
Neufeld's son Clarence as office manager, C.F. Jones as
furniture department manager, Harry Nickel as furniture
department assistant manager, Charley Kent as hardware
manager, Lake Patton as warehouse manager, a shop
mechanic and a field salesman.
John Just moved to Reedley, California, in 1932 and
assumed sole ownership of property that he and Neufeld
had purchased there in the 1920's. Neufeld assumed sole
ownership of their Perryton property. In 1939 Neufeld's
son- in-law became manager of the furniture portion of
the company. As a result, the 1919 building became the
Perryton Furniture Company Building while the newer
building retained its identity as the Plainview Hardware
Company Building. The Plainview Hardware and Furniture
Company remained the parent organization owning and
operating the 1-story 1919 Perryton Furniture Company
Building, the 1919 metal warehouse, the machinery lot,
five Amherst Street lots behind the buildings, and this
2-story building.
The partners' heirs assumed ownership of the company
following their deaths: Kent in 1948, Hergert in 1962,
and Neufeld in 1964. In October 1986 the heirs sold the
company's inventory after 76 continuous years of
business. The partnership officially ended in May 1988
and divided the property among 11 heirs.
The 2-story Art Deco Plainview Hardware Company Building
remains an imposing structure in Perryton's central
business district. The main floor of the building is now
a gift shop and the mezzanine is a tea room. The copper
trimmed Art Deco building retains its structural assets
and maintains an unusual degree of architectural
integrity. The building is a well preserved reminder of
Perryton's early 20th century development.
Texas Historical Commission
http://www.thc.state.tx.us/index.html
Texas Historic Sites Atlas - Search Frames Page
http://atlas.thc.state.tx.us/Atlas/atlas_search_frame.html
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was last updated March 17, 2003.
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