This was the location of Kingsport’s B. F. Goodrich store in the 1940s (it’s now Anchor Antiques). B. F. Goodrich was a very early company to put rubber on the road.
When I was a kid, B. F. Goodrich was on the corner of New and Cherokee Streets, 324 Cherokee, the former home of Kroger. I bought my Schwinn bike there after my second-hand English bike rattled its last transmission.
I have posted before on the Downtowner Motor Inn but I recently ran across this matchbook listing the amenities of this place, corner of Center and Shelby Street.
It went up in 1960 and lasted under various names (“Port o’ Kings”, “Motor Inn”, Kingsport Inn”) before being demolished in the early 90s
This is a solid glass paperweight 2.75 x 4.25 x .75. It is recessed on the back so a photo or other flat memorabilia can be pressed in. In this case, it is a black and white photo, taken from the train station clock tower, of a festive, patriotic event in the 1920s in downtown Kingsport. My guess is some July 4th celebration. Btw, these molded glass paperweights may still be purchased. Check Behrenberg Glass website.
This building, at 519 Holston Street, housed one of the first clinics in Kingsport. It was also the home of Charlie Deming, the man who helmed “The Gloomchaser” morning show on WKPT-AM from the early 1940s to 1973. This was taken in 1991. The building has long since been demolished.
This rather shopworn ice scraper was issued sometime before 1995, when the North American Numbering System assigned the area code of 423 to parts of East Tennessee (Tennessee had originally been assigned 901 in 1947, then in 1954, 901 went to West Tennessee and the rest of us Volunteers had to make do with 615). Old 247 prefix was CIrcle-7.
If you can’t find a pen when you need one, don’t blame the advertising specialty companies!
Kingsport used to have several, individually owned book stores, like this one:
Google didn’t turn up anything when I searched for this club, but I did see an article from 1965 in the Kingsport Times-News that indicated about 4,000 people filed in to attend a Kingsport Riding Club Horse Show at J. Fred Johnson Stadium.
From the 1941 Maroon and Grey annual
This is from the Kingsport Times-News 02/27/1955. J. Mack Ray (1910 -1968) was from Cocke County. He moved to Kingsport to start this restaurant.
He was also a three-term state Senator.
What’s a Potato Toffenetti? Read all about it here
Bob Lawrence's Kingsport 