Monday, January 28, 2013

Strike Up the Band ...

This is a photo I took of a framed sepia-toned picture that hangs in the back room of the Iron Horse Grill* in downtown Brookhaven, 103 S. Railroad Avenue -- where Gregg Woodcox is selling good eats from the old Inez coffee shop location.

This shot is likely from the late 1890s to the early 1900s. Town folks appear to be gathered for a parade of some sort and they've brought out the musical instruments for the occasion.  Note the different style hats and caps and that snazzy plaid clothing on a man dead center of the crowd.

In the background is the old Masonic Hall to the right; mid-street the old Seavey building, which for years housed the Woolworth's that went up in smoke in 1969.  Toward the end of the block, note the long-gone cupola on the old Storm & Sons Building, which is one of the oldest surviving brick buildings in the downtown area.

To the immediate west of the Storm building appears the parapet and awning of Staffler Jewelers, yet another post-Civil War building that is still standing and I believe still operating as Staffler's.  Like the old Masonic Hall, which was torched by a firebug on the night of Easter Sunday in 1951, this smaller building was designed by Capt. A.E. Moreton, the Baltimore architect who met a stranger on a train in 1859 and forever changed the lives of countless people who have since called Brookhaven home.

While it's not easy to detect, on closer inspection, it appears that the newspaper office once called Cherokee Street its home.

*Editor's Note: Iron Horse Grill has since closed.

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