The Wabash Valley Motor Company moved to this new building at Eighth and Walnut streets in 1920, signaling a new direction in Evansville’s economy that would focus on automobiles sales and manufacturing for decades. Five years later, a local newspaper boasted that a caravan of 135 Hudson and Essex automobiles, which were sold by Wabash Valley, was “speeding towards Evansville†by train. After the cars were unloaded at the C & EI yards across the street, they formed a line that paraded through downtown streets for all to see; the celebration concluded that evening with a “big barbeque†in the company’s show room. Over the years, other automobile dealerships occupied the building, as well as a Jerry’s Market. It was razed in 2003.
