COLUMN: Viewed from on high, downtown changes easy to spot

Having family in the hospital, I spent a lot of time lately looking out of the top floors of the McLeod Regional Medical Center buildings.

A veteran Florentine, I recalled that part of downtown between Ravenel and Dargan streets, it’s easily viewed from the tower, that has disappeared. I think that the downtown remaining along Evans, Dargan and Irby streets is less than half of the downtown Florence once had.

Most of the west side of the 100 block of South Dargan has fallen to “progress” as has most of the 200 block of North Dargan. Both of those were solid downtown blocks. The entire 100 block of East Evans is the biggest casualty.

There was more round-the-clock activity on the 100 East Evans block than any where else downtown. The Sanborn Hotel and Hotel Florence were there, putting people on the street 24 hours a day. Soft goods department stores on the block were Belk and McCown-Smith. The Smoke Shop, then a newsstand, tobacconist and soda fountain, was connected to the Hotel Florence.

The Smoke Shop, Western Union, the Morning News, which generated round-the-clock activity, and a pool hall occupied storefronts in the Williamson Building, which in the early 1940s housed insurance offices and a government agency on its second floor. There were WPA offices on the third floor until the agency was shut down. I think some rooms later were rented as residences.

Perhaps the crown jewel was the First Presbyterian Church, a stately building with big columns behind a small lawn and semi-circular driveway. In the early ’50s it was “improved” into about 35 parking places, and the congregation moved to Park Avenue.

(A written history of that church says for its 1905 groundbreaking, the pastor had a tramp do the honors, a symbolic statement, I guess, that the church was for everybody. Reaction of the congregation is not recorded.)

Among other businesses were the P&M Café, Kafer’s Bakery and a couple of auto agencies. Since that whole block was demolished, there now is no front entrance on the 100 block of East Evans, only back and side doors of buildings fronting on Cheves and Baroody streets.

At the Evans Street railroad crossing was a two-story tower for the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad from which traffic into the railroad yard and passenger station was controlled. A neighbor worked in that tower, so as a kid I got to see the equipment and the view the crew up there had of tracks entering town. Seven tracks once served the passenger station on Day Street. Now one track serves Amtrak passenger trains.

Shortly after World War II the 200 block of East Evans between the ACL and Church Street was nearly all business buildings. A Super X filling station, the State Theater and Salvation Army were among things located there. Also, there was a small neighborhood A&P food store at Evans and Church. That was back in the days before the big supermarkets replaced small A&Ps.

Except for a couple of vacant lots, the East Evans block between Church and Ravenel had solid business buildings, the Eat More Lunch occupying one. The much revered Eat More site now is a parking lot. More business buildings mixed with residences on the block of Evans east of Ravenel.

Fronting on the 200 block of Ravenel with a back entrance on Church was the city’s first YMCA. A McLeod campus building is on about the same spot. The 100 block of South Church once was nearly solid commercial buildings. So was the 100 block of South Ravenel which now is part of the McLeod campus.

Cheves Street between Irby and the railroad once had nearly a block of the old McLeod Infirmary buildings, four auto dealerships, a couple of old residences and several miscellaneous commercial buildings. Now it includes part of the Performing Arts Center site and parking lots.

Numerous commercial buildings once on Cheves east of the railroad and on South Dargan and South Irby are gone.

There is a special feeling on streets where one can walk a sidewalk past wall-to-wall storefronts. Today’s commercial buildings, each with its own parking lot, are a poor substitute for that urban atmosphere.

Somehow, we need to keep, repair and renovate those we still have. It’s unlikely we will have more.

Thom Anderson is the former editor of the Morning News. Contact him THIDBIT@aol.com.