The Parking Lots of Winchester: A tour of places no longer there
Published 10:00 am Saturday, July 15, 2023
Central Kentucky Natural Gas Co. (Photo submitted)
The Broadway Grocery (Photo submitted)
Clark County Jail (Photo submitted)
Fairfax Church of Christ (Photo submitted)
M.G. Taylor House (Photo submitted)
First Presbyterian Church (Photo submitted)
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By Harry Enoch
Contributing Writer
Central Kentucky Natural Gas Co.
The building (with the arrow pointing to it) at the northwest corner of Wall and Cleveland was erected before 1886. City directories indicate that the Central Kentucky Natural Gas Company occupied this building from 1907 through 1958. The company, incorporated in 1905, serviced customers in Central Kentucky from their natural gas fields in Menifee and surrounding counties. The fields were exhausted by 1919, and the company began bringing gas in from distant sources and storing it in their vacated reservoirs. By 1963 the company offices had moved to 123 West Lexington Avenue, at which time they were known as Columbia Gas of Kentucky. The site now provides parking for Traditional Bank.
The Broadway Grocery
This handsome three-story brick building at the northeast corner of Broadway and Wall Alley was put up between 1886 and 1890. The ground floor held two commercial spaces, 17 and 19 West Broadway, and the upstairs was used for residences. City directories indicate that a grocery occupied one side of the ground floor until after World War II. Samuel E. Pruitt operated the Broadway Grocery from 1895 to 1911 and perhaps longer. He was followed by John G. Parrish, A. C. Green and Ura A. Haggard, the last in 1947. The building housed a liquor store for three decades and then a beauty salon. The building was vacant in 2009. The following year, the county purchased the property and razed the building for a parking lot.
Clark County Jail
The old jail was torn down in 1993 after the new Clark County Detention Center was built. The Clark County Jail was a house-like structure erected in 1912 at a cost of $22,000. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In order to meet stringent new standards for jails, a new facility—the $4.6 million Clark County Detention Center—was opened in 1992. The Fiscal Court looked for ways to preserve the old building, but renovation was said to be impractical, and it was torn down in 1993 to provide a parking lot for City Hall.
Fairfax Church of Christ
In 1887, J. W. Harding and fifteen members of the Court Street Christian Church left the congregation in protest over the introduction of musical instruments. The group formed a new congregation, and in 1891 they erected a building—Fairfax Church of Christ—at the corner of Maple and Fairfax Street (now Lexington Avenue). The growing congregation purchased a lot on Boonesboro Road for a new building, which they moved to in 1984. The old church was sold to Clark County Bank and razed. The lot now serves as parking for the CVS Drug Store.
M. G. Taylor House
This old house sat on two town lots purchased by Dr. John Irwin in 1810 and 1812, respectfully. Doctor Irwin, an army surgeon, died in the massacre at River Raisin during the War of 1812. When Irwin’s heirs sold the property in 1828, it was described as “having thereon a large brick building & other buildings and at present occupied by Thomas F. Harrow.” Thus, the house must have been built by the Irwin family sometime between 1812 and 1828. Succeeding owners were Harrow, Walter Preston, Alexander M. Preston (married Doctor Irwin’s daughter Elizabeth), Henry Grant, Thomas H. Moore, and Mrs. Ann Poston, and Mary Laura Taylor. Mrs. Taylor’s husband, Martin Gibson Taylor, was a grandson of Clark County’s pioneer leader, Hubbard Taylor. After her husband died in 1887, Mary Laura placed the following notice in the newspaper:
“I will sell privately my brick residence on East Fairfax Street containing ten rooms and kitchen, brick stable, ice house, and all necessary outbuildings. Cistern and well in yard, large garden, etc. This is without doubt one of the most attractive and desirable residences in Winchester.”
The large home was added onto and used as a school—Winchester Female College—and boarding house for many years. First Baptist Church purchased the house and demolished it to make a parking lot in 1979.
First Presbyterian Church
The First Presbyterian Church in Winchester, organized in 1813, has met in five different locations beginning with the old Winchester Academy on Hickman Street. They then built a small church at 245 South Main before moving two blocks north into a new building that later served as the Clark County Public Library. In 1893 they built the lovely church (pictured here) at 121 South Main that burned in May 1972. After they moved to a new building on Windridge Drive in 1975, the old church was razed. The site now serves as a parking lot for Tom Goebel & Company.
This is part two of a three-part series.
