Nine thousand souls. The first settler named it after his wife. An underwhelming example. I don’t mean to belittle it or suggest that it’s not full of fine folk who love it. I just find it ordinary.

With some exceptions!

There’s a happy sight. Apparently you don’t have to take down the signage when you leave the brand.

It must be a hot day, the way people are shielding themselves behind the tarp.

A beautiful old corner building with that 30s - 40s flair.

What it looked like before. Yeeeee ha

Just your basic commercial office block. 1916.

I’m guessing I had trouble framing this street correctly.

How I’d love to know what the rationale might have been. Was there a holdout tenant with a long lease who threatened to take them to court?

The window:

The website has the same logo.

Gone for a long time, it seems. Never a good look for a town.

But sometimes it gets better!

Undistinguished and boring and ordinary - but a good blank canvas for someone who wants to put up an old windmill blade and call it art. Which it is!

There might be better ways to spiff up and old facade, but they’re probably not cheaper.

World’s famous?

It’s a tropical themed cafe. As of this writing, the Tuesday special is Chicken & Noodles.

A rather imposing bank.

But was it always a bank? Something made me rewind.

It was not. I wonder what the original 1918 structure looked like. Nice of them to scrape off its face and glue it on.

It’s 1942.

Original glass blocks! Possibly preserved because someone slapped on a facade for a while.

To be honest, I’m ambivalent.

I didn’t think that was the original facade. Doesn’t match the letters.

What was done cannot be forgiven.

Every main street can benefit from a little bit of American Georgian.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the ground floor had some recent rehabbing. The columns may not be original.

Couldn’t get a straight-on view. The infill building probably said “damn right we’re going to suggest our offices are bigger.”

But wait. 1918:

Also 1918. Big building year for the town. Simultaneously build? Competing projects?

A strip mall with no parking?

Its previous incarnation. Today’s version is better.

It’s always sad, somehow, when the rails just terminate. But it makes you want to take flight and see:

You can follow it into the plains, if you like.