The Parking Lots of Winchester, part two

A tour of places no longer there

This is part two of a three-part series.

Central Kentucky Natural Gas Co.

The build­ing (with the arrow point­ing to it) at the north­west cor­ner of Wall and Cleveland was erect­ed before 1886.  City direc­to­ries indi­cate that the Central Kentucky Natural Gas Company occu­pied this build­ing from 1907 through 1958.  The com­pa­ny, incor­po­rat­ed in 1905, ser­viced cus­tomers in Central Kentucky from their nat­ur­al gas fields in Menifee and sur­round­ing coun­ties.  The fields were exhaust­ed by 1919, and the com­pa­ny began bring­ing gas in from dis­tant sources and stor­ing it in their vacat­ed reser­voirs.  By 1963 the com­pa­ny offices had moved to 123 West Lexington Avenue, at which time they were known as Columbia Gas of Kentucky.  The site now pro­vides park­ing for Traditional Bank.

The Broadway Grocery

This hand­some three-sto­ry brick build­ing at the north­east cor­ner of Broadway and Wall Alley was put up between 1886 and 1890.  The ground floor held two com­mer­cial spaces, 17 and 19 West Broadway, and the upstairs was used for res­i­dences.  City direc­to­ries indi­cate that a gro­cery occu­pied one side of the ground floor until after World War II.  Samuel E. Pruitt oper­at­ed the Broadway Grocery from 1895 to 1911 and per­haps longer.  He was fol­lowed by John G. Parrish, A. C. Green and Ura A. Haggard, the last in 1947.  The build­ing housed a liquor store for three decades and then a beau­ty salon.  The build­ing was vacant in 2009.  The fol­low­ing year, the coun­ty pur­chased the prop­er­ty and razed the build­ing for a park­ing lot.

Clark County Jail

The old jail was torn down in 1993 after the new Clark County Detention Center was built.  The Clark County Jail was a house-like struc­ture erect­ed in 1912 at a cost of $22,000.  The build­ing was list­ed on the National Register of Historic Places.  In order to meet strin­gent new stan­dards for jails, a new facility—the $4.6 mil­lion Clark County Detention Center—was opened in 1992.  The Fiscal Court looked for ways to pre­serve the old build­ing, but ren­o­va­tion was said to be imprac­ti­cal, and it was torn down in 1993 to pro­vide a park­ing lot for City Hall.

Fairfax Church of Christ

In 1887, J. W. Harding and fif­teen mem­bers of the Court Street Christian Church left the con­gre­ga­tion in protest over the intro­duc­tion of musi­cal instru­ments.  The group formed a new con­gre­ga­tion, and in 1891 they erect­ed a building—Fairfax Church of Christ—at the cor­ner of Maple and Fairfax Street (now Lexington Avenue).  The grow­ing con­gre­ga­tion pur­chased a lot on Boonesboro Road for a new build­ing, which they moved to in 1984.  The old church was sold to Clark County Bank and razed.  The lot now serves as park­ing for the CVS Drug Store.

M. G. Taylor House

This old house sat on two town lots pur­chased by Dr. John Irwin in 1810 and 1812, respect­ful­ly.  Doctor Irwin, an army sur­geon, died in the mas­sacre at River Raisin dur­ing the War of 1812.  When Irwin’s heirs sold the prop­er­ty in 1828, it was described as “hav­ing there­on a large brick build­ing & oth­er build­ings and at present occu­pied by Thomas F. Harrow.”  Thus, the house must have been built by the Irwin fam­i­ly some­time between 1812 and 1828.  Succeeding own­ers were Harrow, Walter Preston, Alexander M. Preston (mar­ried Doctor Irwin’s daugh­ter Elizabeth), Henry Grant, Thomas H. Moore, and Mrs. Ann Poston, and Mary Laura Taylor.  Mrs. Taylor’s hus­band, Martin Gibson Taylor, was a grand­son of Clark County’s pio­neer leader, Hubbard Taylor.  After her hus­band died in 1887, Mary Laura placed the fol­low­ing notice in the newspaper: 

“I will sell pri­vate­ly my brick res­i­dence on East Fairfax Street con­tain­ing ten rooms and kitchen, brick sta­ble, ice house, and all nec­es­sary out­build­ings.  Cistern and well in yard, large gar­den, etc.  This is with­out doubt one of the most attrac­tive and desir­able res­i­dences in Winchester.”

The large home was added onto and used as a school—Winchester Female College—and board­ing house for many years.  First Baptist Church pur­chased the house and demol­ished it to make a park­ing lot in 1979.

First Presbyterian Church

The First Presbyterian Church in Winchester, orga­nized in 1813, has met in five dif­fer­ent loca­tions begin­ning with the old Winchester Academy on Hickman Street.  They then built a small church at 245 South Main before mov­ing two blocks north into a new build­ing that lat­er served as the Clark County Public Library.  In 1893 they built the love­ly church (pic­tured here) at 121 South Main that burned in May 1972.  After they moved to a new build­ing on Windridge Drive in 1975, the old church was razed.  The site now serves as a park­ing lot for Tom Goebel & Company.