City-County Observer

Fulton Avenue near the Lloyd Expressway Views of Evansville change over the years, sometimes so gradually that residents don’t immediately notice. This photograph was taken...

Yesteryear: Old Vanderburgh County Courthouse BY PAT SIDES Seen here in the 1920s, the stately old Courthouse has occupied an entire city block downtown since...

YESTERYEAR BY PAT SIDES Evansville’s proximity to the Ohio River was recalled in this restaurant’s design, which resembled one of the many steamboats that once...

The Farmer’s Daughter restaurant is wedged between National City Bank and the Vendome Hotel in this image of Third Street near Main. The photo was...

Yesteryear: Infantile Paralysis Fund Campaign BY Pat Sides In January of 1944, Vanderburgh County’s 13th annual fund-raising campaign for the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis kicked...

Gordon “Bish” Thompson  Bish Thompson arrived in the city in 1943 to work for the Evansville Press.  A native of Tennessee, Thompson spent his first...

These young, smiling women are students at Reitz High School on Evansville’s west side. They are posing on the large “R” that has been embedded...

Finke’s Furniture was a major retailer in downtown Evansville during most of the nineteenth-century. Founded in 1902 by brothers L. B and C. E. Finke,...

Although the horses and wagons are long gone, this building still stands at 401 NW Second Street, soon to be transformed into a restaurant...

WHEELER SCHOOL BY PAT SIDES Wheeler School, seen here from the intersection of Fourth and Mulberry streets, was the first schoolhouse to be built in...

Evansville College employee Elsie Johnson (left) offers student Sue Gilmour (right) a cup of tea as she sits in a gigantic teacup in the...

This familiar building has housed a variety of industries for well over a century. Armstrong Furniture Company originally occupied the site about 1874, and...

The scaffolding in front of the entrance gate was used to install a sign identifying the new Mesker Amphitheatre in 1952. In the early 1930s,...

Although this photo was shot in 1920, the building is still recognizable. Hose House No. 8 was erected at 913 West Columbia in 1878,...

This photo of the Faultless Caster Company was probably taken shortly after the new three-story brick office building (left) was constructed in 1819, at...

A lone officer stands in the doorway of the police department around the year 1900 when it was located at 312-314 Walnut Street. Two decades...

The Blount Plow Works was organized in 1867 in a small shop in downtown Evansville. The city’s economy and the population exploded in the aftermath...

In the aftermath of the Civil War, Americans began to address the plight of the many orphans it produced. Elizabeth Sinzich, an Evansville resident,...

This view of the Igleheart Brothers plant is dated August 1951, soon after the massive grain storage elevators in the center of the photo...

This view of Pennsylvania Street looks east towards First Avenue and Willard Park in the early 1960s. On the right is the Evansville Supply...