trim from double-hung windows repurposed by kim vrtiska to frame the doors
August 7, 2015
LOTS has been going on, but not so visual. The gray walls did NOT work and so we bit the bullet and began to re-do them in a lighter color. (The "replacement" coat of paint was donated/did not come out of the budget.) The color is much better. Contractor Rich Mezger began the floor refinishing, but we asked him to hold up so we could use the scaffolding to do the painting of the upper walls. Robert Sitzman of Truman, Minnesota did the upper portions of the walls and much of the lower ones. Lifetime member Merilee Stehlik Nord of Ithaca, New York did much of the lower walls, and painted the second coat of a heck of a lot of trim.
repainting the front walls, 17' high
one of the back walls gets its paint
our equipment, waiting for us to finish
july 7, 2015
There has been so MUCH to be done that does not have a visual impact. But now we've made an exciting step -- our second new ceiling. In the back 40' of the room, there is an 8' ceiling that we used a traditional suspended ceiling to hide serious cosmetic issues. We had something else in mind for the front 40' of the room, with its 17' ceiling.
May 20, 2015
The exterior window trim is being "wrapped." The new windows had to have a wider frame between the upper windows and the lower than in 1894. Paul, the installer, and Jack Kalina had a surprise in store. A diamond pattern in the center that reflects the original diamond pattern. (At the top is the original; the bottom (not in the picture) has been reconstructed of wood.) Totally cool!
Coming up soon -- the 17-foot-high cast iron pillars need to be painted. The color is under consideration. Something conservative. Here is one of the two columns: top, bottom, and in between.
We're waiting for a sample of a possible ceiling tile for the front part of the museum (the part with the 17' ceiling). It will be a suspended ceiling with old-fashioned looking tiles. l
On a not-so-fun issue, we still have the problem with a portion of our brick wall (see pictures below).
May 19, 2015
The windows are in!!!!!
A little slide show demonstrates transitions since May.
A two-minute video follows that shows the window installation today.
A little video of today's window installation
The next steps on the outside will be "wrapping" the exterior window trim, painting the diamond decorative panels top and bottom, painting the entryway, stripping and repainting the giant front doors, and painting the 17-foot-high cast iron columns.
May 3, 2015
Uh oh. We removed paneling from the back wall and found a bit of an issue with the bricks. Well, it doesn't get any worse just because we can see it now. Moisture has somehow been findings its way downward and the moist mortar has been dissolving. The wall below this was removed to extend the basement for the bowling alley; the wall is not going to collapse. But a fix is obviously needed.
Construction Day 10, April 29, 2015
Dry wall has been going up! The back windows have been cut down; the dropped ceiling is at a level below the trim.
Construction Day 8, April 25, 2015
Not so much visible going on. But here's a nice look at the outline of the front windows.
Construction Day 7, April 20, 2015
Much of today was spent taking the old glass out of the upper windows and framing them in for the new ones. Note that the exterior trim above the windows is the ORIGINAL. You can see it in the old pictures. Oh -- and our sign got moved off the tin that had been covering the windows and put above on the brick.
A 2-1/2 minute video of some work on April 20:
Construction day 7, april 17, 2015
Detail work going on, not so many dramatic changes.
We ran into a little design issue. We are putting in a dropped ceiling in the back part of the building. It turns out that it is lower than the top of the window and door. Jack Kalina, the window contractor, will be arranging for the trim to be redone. Note that it has a fancy design, same as in the rest of the place.
construction day 6, april 16, 2015
Construction Day 3, April 10, 2015
Construction day 2 - april 9, 2015
construction day 1 - april 8, 2015
the interior just before renovation
The photograph gallery has been removed, the long tables along the east wall removed, and the space prepared for the contractor to move in.
LOTS OF INFORMATION WHAT IS BEING DONE, HISTORY OF THE BUILDING, PICTURES OF THE EQUIPMENT, ETC.
what is being done
Oh gosh, it's happening, thanks to the Herman Bachenberg Trust! The final project plan was submitted to and approved by the Executive Board of the Table Rock Historical Society on Monday, April 6, 2015. On April 8, contractor Rich Mezger began work.
FLOOR PLAN. The walls of the old beauty shop, installed in 1952 I believe Glee Covault said, are gone. The full floor is now exposed. In the front of the building will eventually be a remembering room, without walls, where old newspaper clippings and photographs can be looked at and chatted about. In the back will be a small exhibit room with the barber chairs and beauty shop permanent wave machine.
CEILING PARTIALLY REMOVED. The entire ceiling had been dropped years ago to eliminate the second story of height. That ceiling has been removed to about half way back. The old mezzanine area will be covered by a full wall on the second story.
WINDOWS OPENED BACK UP. By removing the front portion of the ceiling, the second story windows are exposed to the interior. Why? Because the windows are going to be uncovered! New windows are being installed, but in the same configuration as the old pictures. The "fill" in the front windows will be removed, framing similar to the old framing constructed, and windows the approximate size of the old ones installed.
FLOOR. The front part of the building has an oak floor overlaid on the old floor. Presumably it is from the days that the building served as a cafe. We will be refinishing the oak floor, but leaving the olden floor alone. There are some can lids nailed over mouse holes in the back but they probably won't survive the new dry wall.
WALLS. The brick and mortar are not in great shape, so we are putting up drywall.
a brief history
One of our eight museums, the Argus Museum is housed in an 1894 building on the south side of the square. It was built and used a dry goods store by the first owner and one or two successors. It then was a cafe for many years. In about 1959, the Argus newspaper office was moved from the basement to the ground floor to make way for a bowling alley. After the beloved editor Rudy Senft died in 1974, the building was donated to the Table Rock Historical Society. The museum opened in about 1976.
newspaper equipment in the office
A little history of the building
The south side of the Square before the Argus Museum building was built. The site of the present Argus Museum is here occupied by a frame building on the west side of the Richardson-Kovanda Building. (The Richardson-Kovanda Building is still there; Table Rock Electric occupies it.)
W. L. Taylor's "cash" store, 1894 - 1903
In 1892, William Lindsay Taylor bought the property from the State Bank of Table Rock. He built the building now occupied by the Argus Newspaper Museum.
July 13, 1894: William L. Taylor advertised that he had moved into a NEW and COMMODIOUS building. It was billed as his Cash Store. "Cash Stores" were common at the time; it apparently meant no more than that they did not give credit; they seem to have been dry goods stores.
Records for the National Historic Register for the Public Square Historic District say that the William Taylor Building "is an example of a one-story, one-part brick commercial building, ....a precursor to the restrained style of the 1920 structures that were built in the district soon after the fire. A simple corbelling course atop the parapet is the only ornamentation used throughout the facade."
In 1894, Taylor mortgaged the property for $4,5800, with payments in 1895 and 1897. In 1903, he sold it.
Buestetta & co.
Buestetta & Company obviously occupied the building at some time prior to Nemecek Brothers moved in (1905), because their banner is painted across the front of the building. When is unknown. Taylor may have closed his Cash Store and rented to them at some time before he sold the building in 1903.
Nemecheck Brothers (John O. and William) occupied the building from 1905 to 1911. It can be seen in the foreground in Photo 462.
Detail of the building from Photo 462:
Photo 624, Nemechek Brothers again:
a saloon
At some point after Nemechek Brothers sold the business in 1911, it became a saloon.
We know that from a January 1, 1920 article in the Lincoln Journal reports that Gerald Woods had bought the building that had formerly housed an old saloon. It was on the "southwest corner" of the square, "across the street east of the Odd fellows building." That was the building now housing the Argus museum.
Whether Woods actually used it as a salesroom is unknown. No research has yet been done about ownership between the Nemechek Brothers departure and the advent of Johnny's Cafe in 1948.
By the way, the" big fire -- which the building survived -- was one month after Woods bought the building.
Johnny's cafe
Of those who remember old Table Rock, the oldest memory seems to be that it was the location of Johnny's Cafe. It was Johnny's Cafe for may years. According to Roger Vondrasek, it was opened in 1948. He got that information from his mother, who met her husband Bob at the grand opening.
Here is Johnny's Cafe as seen in this photo from Johny Clark's niece Bobette Vondrasek, designated as Photo 1501.
the table rock argus
The Table Rock Argus occupied a building on the west side of the square for many years.
At some time after 1944, the Argus moved into the basement of the William Taylor building. (The earliest time can be established by a 1944 photograph of Rudy Senft working at a linotype machine in front of a picture window; the Argus could not yet have been in the basement at that time.)
Businessmen in town wanted to build a bowling alley in the basement. Floyd Vrtiska remembers asking Rudy if he wouldn't mind moving to the then-unoccupied ground floor. Rudy said he didn't mind if someone else moved the newspaper equipment. So the equipment was moved. Joe Sochor says of the move, "We were a lot younger than!" The grand opening of the bowling alley was announced in the Argus on May 5, 1960. So Rudy probably moved to the ground floor in 1959.
the argus newspaper museum - 1976 to now
Beloved Argus editor Rudy Senft died unexpectedly in 1974. For another four years, the Argus was printed offsite by the publisher of the Pawnee Republican.
The Argus building's owner donated it to the Table Rock Historical Society, who honored Rudy's memory by converting his office into a newspaper museum.
The equipment is as it was, the last page that Rudy had set still on the press as he left it.
200 people attended the grand opening of the museum in 1976. See a legible copy of the article in the Argus Museum link just above.