Jefferson General Store

[Jeff Young]

The Jefferson General Store was more-or-less across the tracks from the depot, facing away from the tracks.  The question is, was there a loading dock on the back?

Here's a couple of pictures of the front (from the Park County Archives):







The water board special picture shows the end view, which nicely shows that the eastern lean-to is shorter than the main building, but doesn't give much away in terms of the back:



Lastly, I know of this picture, which gives clues about how various buildings are arranged, but is pretty useless in terms of details for any of them:



Later pictures don't show the store at all as it burned down sometime in the early 30's.  (I've seen one report of 1928, but isn't the water board special 1929?)

Anyone know anything more about this building?

Thanks,
Jeff.

[South Park]

  Interesting that the phone line only has one arm in the panoramic shot
from 1929.  I have other pix where the line has two arms in Platte Cañon
and in Como and Alma at this time.  Given that Jefferson is on the main
road AND railroad, I would not think Jefferson had a branch line off the
main.

  This line was still in service in 1977 when I first visited the South Park
and was populated with an amazing collection of insulators, going all the
way back to the 1880's.

[Jeff Young]

Note also that the telephone pole in front of the store moves.  In the late 1800s and early 1900s shots (first two) it is between the main platform and the lower platform, while in the 1926 shot (third one) it is at the end of the lower platform.

Cheers,
Jeff.

[Jeff Young]

Draft one of the front elevation:

[Keith Hayes]

Wow. You actually create a drawing before you start a model Jeff?

[Robert McFarland]

Could you do the A.S.Turner Garo store too?

[Jim Courtney]

Not all of us can be architects, Keith, able to build structures in our heads.

[Jeff Young]

Hi Robert,

Given that the Garo store is still standing, I’d rather do it from measurements than from photos.

That being said, I’m headed to Breckenridge in a couple of weeks, so I’ll see if I can get down and measure it up.

Cheers,
Jeff.

[Keith Hayes]

Jim, I applaud Jeff's diligence and planning. It shows in the end result. I am just lazy, plus all my drafting software was taken away long ago.

[Jeff Young]

I was about to conclude that there was likely no loading dock in the back, predicated mainly on the assumption that a general store would be using LCL freight which would come in on front end revenue cars...

... when I found this:


Fairplay Flume, March 27 1908

So while we don't know how often the store received carload freight, clearly it did happen.

[Jeff Young]

FWIW, we know that Lilley owned the general store at that point because he bought it in 1905:


Fairplay Flume, Feb 24 1905

and later had it for sale in 1918:


Fairplay Flume, June 28 1918

[Robert McFarland]

Notice the 1905 Flume article mentions a warehouse.JW Green store's warehouse  at Buffalo shows up in several Buffalo photos.Makes you wonder where the Jefferson store's warehouse was.

[Mike Trent]

Jeff,

Yes, for sure there was a loading dock at the rear. It appears in the side view photo how large this structure was, and it appears to back right up near the track.

This was a large business (for Jefferson), and the article about the sale indicates three components, the Store, the Warehouse, and the Residence.

The Warehouse would likely be the addition to the Western side, with the residence being the part with the sloped roof to the East. This business would have dealt in wire, fencing materials, and barrels of various commodities including feed, along with all of the countless stores and other items common to a General Store of the time. There most likely was a sliding windowless door at the rear of the warehouse, and almost certainly would have also been a smaller windowless sliding door at the rear of the store itself. The warehouse would have received heavy bulk items. Other smaller goods would have been received into a store room at the rear of the store, where merchandise would have been checked in, then stocked and stored.

This was a pretty big operation. From the front, it looks like a pretty diminutive building, but from the side it was very substantial. The door on the left side at the front of the warehouse would have been used to load freight on to wagons or small trucks backed up at the front dock. Most likely there would have been a provision at the rear to load larger and heavier freight off the rear dock.        

[Jeff Young]

Pushing the tracks into Jefferson:

[Robert McFarland]

Whats the deal with the wicker basket-like lath work where the scenery is going to be?

[Jeff Young]

Hi Robert,

Strips of cardboard, glued together with carpenter’s glue, over which I paste Sculptamold.

I find it gives me a more natural “almost flat” ground than trying to build up from truly flat.  And it’s also easy to get the heavier contours in my more mountainous areas.

(The track is laid on homosote on top of masonite spline roadbed.)

Cheers,
Jeff.

[Jeff Young]

Draft two, based on some dimensional corrections on the "light table" (actually just a window on a sunny day).

And yes, the second storey window really is off-centre, and the spacing of the windows around the door uneven.



Cheers,
Jeff.

[Jeff Young]

Final draft of the actual building:



And these two drawings are how I'm going to build it.  I've made a few changes to trim size, etc. to ease construction, and created an entirely conjectural rear elevation (as I've never found any pictures of it):





Cheers,
Jeff.

[Jeff Young]

You'll note Grandt Line and Tichy part numbers by the windows and doors in the second two drawings.  While they're close, they did require a lot of modifications.  

In the following picture, the red areas were removed and yellow ones modified.  Original windows on the left of each pairing; modified windows on the right.

[Jeff Young]

My local supplier is out of the Chocolate Brown I want to use for the trim, so I spent some time figuring out how to do the false front.  

The standard kit method of a couple of sequentially larger boards laid on top of the wall looks wrong to me because there's no drip rail.  This is what I came up with, which should only be marginally harder to build:



Cheers,
Jeff.