Quick Facts

NPS Description

101-103 East Broadway Street. Fancher Block, 1877. 

Contributing 

Description

Commercial Italianate painted brick two-story retail/mixed use building on the corner of East Broadway Street and North Main Street. The upper façade is of painted brick outlined with raised piers at each end and in the center framing the two sets of three replacement double-hung windows, with transoms. The raised piers transition with rounded corners into a raised frieze. The second-story windows are capped by brick arched hoods with decorative keystones. The storefront has aluminum and glass display windows with recessed entries and some painted brick at the east and west edges. The projecting fabric awning stretches the length of the building and continues around the corner over the first bay on the west elevation. 

The west (side) elevation is of painted brick. Each of the five bays is framed by two-story brick piers transitioning with rounded corners into a raised frieze. The second-story windows, one to each bay, are double-hung aluminum replacements with transoms and brick arched hoods with decorative keystones. Two entrances to the north end have glass and aluminum doors with smaller projecting fabric awnings. 

The north (rear) elevation is of painted brick. Double-hung replacement windows with transoms and stone sills are on the second floor. The two first-floor windows are square with one paneled over. The east (side) elevation is not visible due to adjoining buildings. 

History 

This building is one of the oldest and most historically intact in Mt. Pleasant. Constructed as the Fancher Block in 1877, it sits on the site of the Joseph Miser house, one of only three buildings present in Mt. Pleasant in 1863. In 1866, the Doughty Brothers opened the first hardware store in the county on this block, and it was also the home of the law office of Isaac A. Fancher, and the local newspaper, the Isabella Enterprise. In 1875, a fire started in Doughty’s store, wiping out nearly the entire north side of Broadway, around a dozen stores which comprised nearly the entire business district at the time. Doughty rebuilt his store on the opposite side of Broadway in 1876, but the following year Isaac Fancher erected this double, two-story brick building. On the first floor was the hardware store of L. N. Smith on the east side and Angel and Wood’s dry goods store on the west side. The dry goods store continued under several different owners, ending with Seitner and Co., who moved out in 1901. In 1894, L. N. Smith moved to a new store on South Main; the west half was later occupied by the Waterman’s Company, who in 1903 bought out the existing tenant in the west half (F. D. Graves’ Racket Store) and occupied the entire first floor of the building. In the 1920s it was occupied by a dry goods store. The west half held a drug store from the 1930s to the mid-1940s (Normal Drug and Book Store, MacCarthy’s Drug Store, and Mayflower Drug), while the east half during the same period housed the Savings Store and Kane’s shoe and clothing store. From the mid-1940s to early 1950s, it was a D&C store, then Lloyds Footwear from the late 1950s to 1990. It is currently the Downtown Drug and Party Store. 

Integrity Analysis 

The Fancher Block is relatively intact. Original features still in place include its original fenestration pattern and decorative brickwork on the second floor, and although these windows are replacement units, they mimic the original double-hung, one-over-one units with fixed transoms in the arches. The building has been painted since the early twentieth century, sometimes different colors for each side. The cornice has been missing since at least the 1940s. The storefronts generally retain their historic configuration but have been replaced with aluminum and glass. Historic photographs show a rectangular projecting canopy in the 1970s and 80s, although the current canopy is fabric. The Fancher Block is listed on the Michigan State Register of Historic Sites. 

Sources 

Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps (Mt. Pleasant: 1884, 1890, 1895, 1900, 1910, 1924, 1931, 1950); Mt. Pleasant City Directories, 1925-1998; Past and Present of Isabella County, 1911; City of Mt. Pleasant Building Permits; historic photographs.