Snapshots of life through the decades abound in historic Dewey Avenue spot

By Laura Summers ?

The simple brick building in the 300 Block of Dewey Avenue touched all walks of life through the years in more than a century downtown.

Now undergoing a renovation that is reviving its energy, the rooms at 309 and 311 Dewey are looking to the next chapters to be written here even as the hints of the past reveal themselves in this truly historic structure. DNA Properties is working to put into place apartments upstairs and mixed use commercial space on the first floor. It is a plan similar to what was in place back in the early days when city leader and businessman John Johnstone owned the building.

Newspaper stories and advertisements through the years and decades tell colorful stories of the storefronts and apartments, which played important roles in each era from providing groceries for area families to selling band instruments for local students to offering a much-needed meeting place for soldiers during World War II.

“They are just a little better than the ordinary – the Palace Rooms – all modern and with outside exposure located at 311 Dewey Avenue,” according to a July 11, 1908 advertisement in “The Weekly Examiner” for the 20 upstairs flats. The apartments were rented to short-term and long-term tenants, including some with commercial interests.

?A Feb. 13, 1910 advertisement in “The Morning Examiner” encourages anyone in need of help with virtually any issue to visit “A Lady of Mystery” in the top floor apartments.

“She brings Success, Health, Power, Wealth and Happiness to you – a queen of seers, a natural born clairvoyant, and palmist by the endorsement of Paris, France School of Palmistry…” the Morning Examiner declares. ”She has paid several visits to Bartleville in the past 10 years and in her profession is pronounced by all and the press as being the most noted clairvoyant and palmist that has ever paid this city a visit. Readings ?on all affairs of life. Hasten your call to see her. Come now. You need her advice.”

Another colorful chapter in the building’s history came in 1911 when Dr. J.W. Berry set up shop in the second floor apartments, which now were known as The Oxford. The doctor apparently performed “bloodless surgeries” on a platform set up at the corner of Third and Dewey during evenings to showcase his skills and treated patients in his office at 311 Dewey during the day from April until June when he was arrested on an allegation he was working in the medical field without a license. He protested the arrest and continued seeing patients until moving onto another town. Dr. Berry, who appears to have worked in various communities in Oklahoma and Texas over several years, claimed to treat cancers, appendicitis and several ailments, curing patients without surgeries. In each city, he would set up public demonstrations on a street corner and then treat patients either in a building he rented or in a hotel.

While colorful tenants were living and working in the upstairs spaces, the downstairs retail spaces at 309 and 311 Dewey spent many years focusing on food with various grocers and meat markets, along with restaurants located there.

One of the earliest tenants in 309 Dewey was J.W. Allen’s Pool and Billiard Hall. It was a popular and well-run establishment, according to “The Bartlesville Daily Enterprise,” which gave a favorable business review in an April 20, 1915 edition of the newspaper.

“Mr. Allen is making a success of his place,” the newspaper states. “There are several pool and billiard tables, boisterous conduct or improper language is barred and a good class of people patronize him. He conducts his hall in just the right way and you are in a good place when you drop in here for an hour or so.” A barber shop was added to the pool hall by 1916 and it remained in operation in 1917.

In June 1917 some men living in the apartments at 311 Dewey were among those receiving draft notices published in “The Washington County Sentinel and Weekly Enterprise” which proclaimed all whose names were listed in the newspaper are “Washington County men who will go when called to fight in the trenches somewhere in France or wherever Uncle Sam calls them.”

By 1918, the era of shopping for groceries on Dewey Avenue was launching into full swing. Ideal Bakery and Home Meat Market started serving food at 311 Dewey in 1911 followed by Reed Basket Grocery, which transitioned into a broader market with fruits and vegetables in the storefront from 1915 into the 1920s. J.D.H Reed operated the 311 Dewey store for many years before turning it over to his son Darwin.

M.A. Gash bought out the market later in 1929 and operated his grocery store at 311 Dewey until 1943. The trend of having a grocery store in the building continued in the 1940s with Doerr’s Market operating on the site before it became Chazin’s Uptown Market.

F.E Miller started his own grocery store at 309 Dewey with Miller’s Market opening in Feburary 1918. “Dewey Avenue is becoming a regular marketing street,” the Feb. 1 issue of “The Morning Examiner” declared.

The Dewey Café opened at 309 Dewey in Oct. 1919 with proprietor S.L. Rhodes providing restaurant meals for a time. The space returned to selling groceries again by 1924 when Star Meat Market moved its operations there. Star Market turned into a full grocery store on Feb. 4, 1928 when J.O. Utley purchased the store and expanded the retail offerings.

The Star Market and neighboring Gash Market were both damaged in April 1931, along with apartments in the upstairs of both 309 and 311 Dewey, when robbers started a fire while stealing $1,000 cash from the businesses.

“The theory has been advanced that the thieves broke into the building by removing one of the panels,’ an April 6, 1931 story in “Bartlesville Daily Enterprise” states. “It is believed the fire was started by the thieves to conceal traces of the robbery.

The storefront once again became a restaurant in Jan. 1932 when the City Café was opened by Belle Fender. By August a Chicago restaurant operator, D.R. Vermillion took over the eatery renaming it The Legion Café. By Jan. 1933, 309 Dewey was again a storefront – this time for Packing House Market. The market focused on locally sourced meats often advertising from what farm the turkeys or beef originated. In 1934, White’s Pastry Shop located in the space with the meat market so one could purchase poultry and pies at the same spot.

On March 5, 1936, King’s Cash Grocery and Market opened at the 309 Dewey. Longtime grocer H.G. King, who also owned stores in Coffeyville, offered free coffee all day to get customers through the door for Opening Day of the new market. By early February 1938, King’s decided to end the grocery business at that location. It opened as Western Auto Store where tires, gauges, bicycles and glassware were sold.

A wonderful chapter in the building’s history came in 1943 when a service club for soldiers was opened at 309 Dewey. Bartlesville Army Mothers and Bartlesville Navy Mothers coordinated much of the work to develop a center in the Dewey Avenue building to meet the needs of members of the armed services visiting the community.

“At long last, it appears Bartlesville is to have an exclusive place for servicemen to meet, play and enjoy themselves, since one of the city’s generous pioneer citizens, John Johnstone, has donated his building for this cause,” states the Oct. 16, 1943 ‘Morning Examiner’. “Already many patriotic persons have donated equipment for the club including a piano, stoves and games, but many more articles are needed such as divans, chairs, lamps, tables, card tables, a heatrola, dishes and silverware, and a billiard or pool table say sponsors would come in mighty handy. The Army and Navy mothers are rushing to have the club completed and in good running order by Monday, October 25 when the soldiers from the Independence air base, who will put on the show here that night following the Community Fund dinner, will arrive here and be entertained following the show by the Army and Navy mothers in the new club.”

December found the club organizers making plans to entertain soldiers over the holidays, ??creating a social hour and “holding a popcorn ball making fiesta,” according to newspaper reports. The club in the building continued through April 1944.

By May 31, 1944 there was a song in the air at 309 Dewey as Kreigh’s Music Store opened downstairs. Kreigh’s Music had a large community following from 1946-1963. It was the place where many school band students rented and purchased their instruments. Pianos for local homes were sold here as well. It was also a ticket outlet for various performances held at Bartlesville Civic Center. In March 1949, Kreigh Music announced the opening of Accordian Studios with John Casanova offering lessons to students. That December, just in time for Christmas, the store had a special on electric Hawaiian guitars and lessons for $99.50.

Clothing stores became popular with the storefront at 311 Dewey in the 1950s and 1960s. Young’s Fashions for Men sold clothing there from 1957 to 1960, followed by MD’s Fashions, which opened a women’s wear store on the site in 1963.

Each era of businesses and housing operating within the walls of 309 and 311 Dewey carried the ambiance and politics of the day and of the community at the time. Sometimes the tone was lighthearted, often it was serious. Always it was a real life snapshot of Bartlesville through the years.

Layers of dust and discarded furniture filled the building in recent years until the promise of the future met whispers of the past in a project to revitalize these Dewey Avenue storefronts and apartments, which have stood for more than a century in historic downtown Bartlesville. It’s going to be wonderful seeing the next plots unfold in this ongoing story.

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