Today what is a parking lot used by customers of SHENANIGANS and the BLUE CHAIR was the site of the community's first store, opened by Pleasant Gilliam, whose lease ran from July 1, 1869 until transferred in November 1875, and then transferred numerous times. The building was labeled a feed warehouse on the 1907 Sanborn map and the lot held a store of general merchandise and a grocery store by the time of the 1922 map.
That grocery was owned by Grant Lappin. Mary Hamilton recalled (as told in Makris, The Other Side of Sewanee, p. 38) the store was later sold to Edward Short, but it burned and on that lot the post office and telegraph office buildings were built. Wade Smith was postmaster and lease holder from 1928, and the lease remained in his name even after the post office moved to its new (and current) location. Then these buildings were used for a dress shop, beauty parlor, and gift shop. Fire destroyed the buildings in March 1977, and Smith's heirs returned the lease to the University later that year.
Patricia Makris. The Other Side of Sewanee as told by Mary Hamilton, May 12, 1983