Hello, Dobyns-Taylor Warehouse. In some places on the current building, the old sign is beginning to show through. This is a T. J. Stephenson postcard. A Tichenor printing, plate 12140. It’s postmarked on the back: Kingsport Tenn. July 11 3-pm 1935.
The postmark covers some of the message. “spent night in (unreadable) we’ll spend night in Tenn. then head for home. Krepps”
Addressed to: Mrs. M. Valentine & Family Keymar Carroll (?) 6 (?) 0 Md.
The card was published in the late 20s.
For ages, this sign would have been right in front of you if you were coming off North Eastman Road onto Lincoln.
I took this in 2011 and it was fading rapidly at that time.
This is one of my favorite cards. It was mailed in Kingsport, probably at the Big Store, July 25, 1910.
On the front, in ink, is “add, kingsport Tenn”
Below that: “Main St. Johnson City, Tenn. Pub. by The Bee Hive”
(you can still see The Bee Hive sign in downtown Johnson City)
On the back:
It’s addressed to Mrs. Claud Jolly, Rockmart Ga
The message:
Dear Mrs Jolly
How are you we are well. I suppose you are in Rockmart by now. Our chickens are all o.k. Mother is with us again. We are getting along fine. Hope you will be able to visit some time. There isn’t much here yet, but building. just 28 houses here now. Answer soon. Love to you all also the ?mother?. Mrs. L. E. Mahan
Yeah, it’s hard to read, but check it out yourself. This is on West Stone Drive, more or less in front of the fire station. I know of two of markers like this, the other is on West Sullivan Street:
The inscription on both reads:
at top: The Great Indian War Path (with an arrow pointing left)
below: Placed by the Long Island Chapter D.A.R. Nov. 11 – 1934
The Liberty Cafe, managed by Charles Joseph and Stellis Mallis (Mallis is an old restaurant name in Kingsport…note the name on the building about halfway down the 100 block of West Main Street), was located where “The Pub” is today on Five Points. I vaguely recall the establishment, or maybe just the sign that remained after the restaurant had closed. This 3-1/2 x 4-1/2 card is pretty dingy – I cleaned it up in Photoshop. I don’t have the foggiest idea where I got it. It might have been my stepfather’s…I think he stayed in one of the rooms above the restaurant for a while back in the ’40s.
On the other side is a convenient listing of distances to various other places…most of the distances are still correct, since they seldom move cities around (snicker).
This is a rear view of the building on Netherland Inn Road that once was Cherokee Ice House. It’s been heavily remodeled in the front, but they left this mostly alone. On the left was the ice room. Underneath, through those two openings, were the compressors and brine circulaters.
Ice, for a time, was the intermediate technology, like the cassette tape, in a way. It did the job, but not real well. Then, ice was heavy and always messily changing to liquid water…cassettes didn’t have those problems. They were pretty crappy, though.
This was what today’s Farmers Market area looked like a little over four years ago.
This is Kingsport Fire Department’s No. 1, purchased in 1917. It’s an American LaFrance pumper. I took this in 1979, when I was still shooting Tri-X and processing it myself. At that time, the KFD kept this unit in Station #1 on Island Street. There’s a short history of the KFD right here.
This unit is now in a department-constructed building on the Ft. Henry Drive side of Station #2.
Baker-Clardy Service Station was on the corner of West Sullivan and Roller Streets, where the Funtastics (old Penley’s) building is now barely standing. This picture was taken when the building was brand new, sometime prior to 1929, when Baker-Clardy ran several ads in the Kingsport Times News.
The signs on the station, which are even hard to read in 4k resolution, offer:
Tourist Information
Ladies Rest Room
Standard Gasoline (Standard Oil Company, probably Standard Oil of New Jersey, later ESSO, later EXXON)
Batteries charged installed
Alcohol (huh?)
Standard Motor Oil
Expert Alemite Service (lubrication…the company’s still in business)
Note the dude standing in the background. He’s checking out the photographer.
Years ago, in the early 80s, a lady who knew that I was drawing Kingsport buildings offered me a chance to copy a few pictures of buildings that her father, a contractor, had built. Back then, I didn’t have a scanner, so I put the pictures on a copy stand and shot them with 35mm film.
This is an early Kingsport gazebo, maybe the first. On the right, behind the gazebo, you can see the building with Kingsport Hosiery Mills on the side.
This gazebo was on the lot west of where the Kingsport Post Office now sits. This was also the site where early carnivals were held.
Kingsport Hosiery Mills was active from 1917 to sometime in the 30s, I think. I can’t accurately date this picture, but the other picture I’m posting, Baker-Clardy Service Station, can certainly be dated to 1929. Check that posting for my reasoning.
Thank you, over and out.
Bob Lawrence's Kingsport 