Collect historical items from the businesses in traditional commercial districts

Image from Peter Sefton.

Last week I posted an image from Peter Sefton of the Kavakos Confectionery at 727 H Street NE. This business predated the Kavakos Grill, Club Kavakos, and the CoCo Club. Peter acquired the piece, and a high-quality scan is viewable here.

After this (I actually need to be hit over the head sometimes with ideas) it occured to me that I should go talk to Walter Ross, proprietor of Ross' Upholstery at 508 H Street NE, to see what emphemera he might have. I remembered a girlie calendar from the 1960s, imprinted with the name of a then extant H Street business, hanging on the wall of his office, and figured that he might have other good items.

So I went to talk to him, and he told me that when his building was "renovated" (really, little of substance was done, which I wrote about in testimony about the use of Community Development Block Grant funds in DC in 2003 and 2004) he "threw all that junk out."

The lesson here is there are legacy businesses in your commercial districts, GO ASK THEM, NOW, if they have such documents, and get them to donate such materials or allow you to scan the items. What's priceless to us, or to historians, can be just junk to someone else.

I detest smoking, but I'm glad there are people out there collecting matchbooks... Image from Peter Sefton.

Index Keywords: historic-preservation