Ironton's Landmark
Submitted by Martha J. Kounse

Workmen razing the building on the corner at Second and Washington Streets, which is to become a parking lot location. Many elder citizens can remember the R. H. Ellis dry goods and shoe shine store in this building at the time of the Columbian Exposition in Chicago 1892. Mr. Ellis was father of Mrs. A. D. Markin, 510 Lawrence Street. The Excellisor Shoe factory of Portsmouth next occupied the building with a retail store managed by Thomas W. Price, who later was manager of the Ironton Corrugation and Roofing Co. The corner room was an exclusive business men's gathering place the 20 years previous to national prohibition. John C. Healy was proprietor of the Capitol Bar. The porter at the saloon, William Crosby was an ex-slave and told many stories of his experiences during the Civil War. Harry D. Minces, one time owner of the city's two biggest advertised stores the Fashion and the Underselling Store, started his first store next to the Capitol Bar in 1904. He became rich before starting a store in Cincinnati just before the 1929 depression. The Ironton Monument Co. under management of the late Mrs. Alys Sechler, occupied the building from 1920 to the end of the war. Several shops had been tenants since then.