LOCALS came into existence in 2005 when local craftsmen renovated a building purchased by John and Melissa Goodson, anchored in the village of Sewanee. Constructed by the 1920s, it was not the first building on this lease, as the newspaper clipping from 1908 attests. The 1920s structure housed at various times a dry cleaning business, a bank, a general store, the local electric company and finally a weekend antique store.
Once renovated, LOCALS opened to showcase area artists' works in canvas and paper, mixed media, hand-blown glass, fine ceramics, hand-loomed textiles, wood, copper patina and sculpture in bronze and stone. It is now in its third decade of operation.
Website information
Sewanee Fire Does Much Damage
SEWANEE, Tenn., Dec. 2--(Special.) At an early hour this morning fire started in the small restaurant next to Bates & Sneed's grocery. It spread rapidly, and Bates & Sneed's grocery, Roseborough & James and Brooks' clothing store were burned to the ground and little was saved.
The Nashville American (1894-1910); Dec 3, 1908; Proquest Historical Newspapers: The Nashville Tennessean pg.
________
The building had been built by Mr. Rosenborough who sold men's clothing. This business did not last too long (see fire description from 1908) and Patricia Makris quotes Mary Hamilton who recalled a new building on the lease was used as a cafe by Mr. John Glover, while the lease was in the name of Birmingham Securities Company, from 1909 to 1930.
The lease was acquired by W. Cecil Myers in 1930 and held first by him and then by his daughter Ina M. Myers until 1984, except for a brief time when Earl and Shirley H. Nunley held it in 1969-71.
By 1946 the TENNESSEE ELECTRIC COMPANY office was housed here, and later the DUCK RIVER ELECTRIC COMPANY had their offices in the same building.
Ina M. Myers operated MYERS CLEANERS, a dry cleaning shop here in the second half of the 1960s (see Lumiere/Sewanee Steam Laundry) and that business was bought by Mr. and Mrs. McPherson who changed its name to COUNTRY SQUIRE CLEANERS in the 1970s.
Later, David McBee and Ina M. Myers sold antiques here before Myers Point LLC bought the building from Ina M. Myers in 1984. In 2005 John Goodson opened LOCALS.
Photos courtesy of Mary O'Neill, David McBee and estate of Ina May Myers