Category Archives: Kingsport TN ephemera

The Downtowner Motor Inn

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downtowner

Architect’s rendering of the not-yet-quite-built Downtowner Motor Inn, corner of Center and Shelby Streets in downtown Kingsport.  It was announced in the Kingsport Times-News in 1960 and was probably open for business in 1961. Having a Downtowner was a big deal at the time.  The only other one in Tennessee was in Memphis.  This one lasted until the early 1990s.  At some time in the 70s, I took my mother to the restaurant there to have breakfast.  I found a cockroach in my biscuit.
The Downtowner corporation began in 1958 in Memphis.  At one time, it was owned by Perkins
Pancake House and then changed hands several times until it mostly went belly up in 1993.
When I first came to Kingsport in 1956, this lot was empty.  You could look out the back door of the Kress building and see the old City Hall on the west corner of Shelby and Center.  Hinch Gilliam had a cab stand up on the Market-Shelby corner on this lot.
There must be hundreds of copies of this card.  They’re all over the web for sale at prices ranging from $10 to $24 each.  I probably paid a buck when I bought this one a decade or so ago.

Borden Mills

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bordenmills

Look at all the windows!  This E.G Kropp (Milwaukee) post card carries a Kingsport postmark for July, 1937.
It was mailed to Eccles, WV. The message, in a somewhat cramped script:

Hello! Honey! Read your last letter yesterday. We came to Norton last Friday. Sue, M.F. and my-self came to Kingsport Tuesday.  Sue & M.F. have (something, something…I’m working on it – the script is hard to read).  Will go  home Monday.  Will write a letter then. Love, Mama

The Last of the Big Store

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bigstoreburn

In November, 1985, the building that once housed The Big Store burned down.  The Big Store was an all-in-one place; even the Post Office was there.  It was said you could go from birth to death at The Big Store.  J. Fred Johnson’s, which is now a furniture store on the west corner of Broad and Center, was a spin off, as was Hamlett-Dobson Funeral Home.
Judging from the shadows, I must have gotten there early in the morning, but it appears the firefighters had everything pretty much under control by then.

Midnight Sun

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midnightsun

Forty-six years ago, I began the first permanent rock show on WKPT-AM.  John Dotson had “Sounds of Summer” the previous year, but it ended when he went back to school or left town or something.  It was a good show and broke the Easy Listening hold on that staid, NBC-affiliated station.  So, I swooped in the next year, ditched “Teenage Terrace”, (which I had been on when I was in high school, from 5:00 to 6:00 pm, as I recall, with Marty running the board and we students, when we showed up, sitting at the table in the news studio) and had the 6:00 pm to midnight slot all to myself as “The Midnight Sun”.
Since this was before 8-track tapes in cars became widely available, I was a success, as it were, with the kids cruising Broad Street.  Then, the tapes came and I eventually moved into the afternoon Drive Time slot.  The fact that, for the most part, I had to buy my own records for the show and management had the nerve to put something like this cloth sticker out helped me leave it behind.  “Like it is”, my ass.  The phrase was a joke by this time.
The ellipse is 4″ on the horizontal axis and 2-1/2″ on the vertical.

The Famous Rotherwood Farm

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thefamousrotherwoodfront

“The famous Rotherwood Farm at the junction of the North and South Forks of the Holston River”   bottom: “Kingsport, Tenn. in the distance”

This is one of a series of cards published by T.J. Stephenson, Kingsport, Tenn.
I have 20 unduplicated cards of this series and I know there are more.  The earliest postmark I’ve found is 1925 and the latest is 1942.  They were around for a while.
The cards were printed in Cambridge MA under the “Tichnor Quality View” name.

Here’s the back:

thefamousrotherwoodback

The plate numbers on the cards I have run from 121027 to 121042 (I don’t have all of that run).

Downtown Kingsport

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dwntownkpt

This Duotone card’s picture was taken, I think, around 1915 or 16 from about halfway up Cement Hill.  The street to the left is Shelby, with the Big Store on the left.  The bank, the building with the columns, is on the corner of Broad and Main. Note there’s no Church Circle, but there is the old school and the old Presbyterian Church just to the right of where Shelby ends at Sullivan.
It looks as if someone at the publishing company (CT – Curt Teich –  in Chicago) inked in some of the fainter lines of the buildings in the background, which makes it harder to identify them.  However, I think the building I live in is there.
This card was “published by Kingsport Drug Store”.  Standard double-back for the time.  Typical penny postcard.

Kingsport Pulp Corp.

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kptpulpco

Since this shows the facility in the process of being built, I think one could safely date this picture to around 1915.  This plant went on line in 1916 and was acquired by Mead in 1920.

I have a couple of these blue-tint cards.  Surprisingly, there is absolutely no photo or publisher credit anywhere on them.  These are divided back, white border cards which were in vogue between 1915 and 1929.

Piercy – Baker Realtors

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cherokeeboatco

cherokeeboatcoback

Piercy – Baker opened this office in 1953.  It was at 1701 Ft. Henry Drive at Brooks Circle.
Behind it are, as you may have noticed, Cherokee Boat Company and Motor Sales Company of Kingsport, both presided over by Myrtle C. King, with Clifford V. Bryant Sec Treas.  John L. Mitchell was in charge of boats, motors and fishing equipment at Cherokee, while Mrs. Anna A. Hester was asst. sec trucks at Motor Sales.  That building is listed as being on Eastman Road. The Pot O’ Gold, then just a delicatessen, presided over by James A. Brockman, was at 1713 Ft. Henry Drive.
The postcard picture was taken by Fred W. Stanley of Johnson City, printed by our old friends Dexter Press on West Nayak NY.  Inventory number 73775.
Interestingly, it appears that Kingsport was recovering from a snow storm when this picture was taken. Note the wet asphalt and, to the left, what appears to be leftover snow.

Skoby’s

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skobysfrontside

skobysbackside

I picked this card up at a flea market recently for 25 cents.  it was published by Creed Studios in Bristol and measures 8-3/4″ by 3-1/2″.  This had to have been published before 2005, when Skoby’s left the Barger hands.  The card was printed by Dexter Press in West Nyack NY.  ID number is 78651-D

I miss Skoby’s.  I didn’t eat there often, but I always enjoyed it when I did.  The Back Room was rather a middle-class dive, but the restaurant’s food was excellent.

I miss the old Peerless, too.  At one time, it was in the same class as Skoby’s.