|
The Merchants National Bank Building is a two-story, red brick building in Lehigh, Oklahoma, located at the southwest corner of Main Street and Railway Street.〔 〕 It was one of two banks that served Lehigh during the town's mining boom.〔 It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.〔State Historic Preservation Office: Oklahoma Historical Society.(''Oklahoma's National Register Handbook'' ). April 1, 2015. Accessed July 2, 2015.〕〔("State Sites Placed on Register," ) ''The Oklahoman'', February 17, 2007.〕 It is historically significant because it represents the economic growth and decline of Lehigh and exemplifies Late Victorian Renaissance architecture.〔 ==History== During the late-19th and early-20th centuries, Lehigh was a prosperous community due to the high demand for coal from mines in Coal County.〔 The Merchants National Bank was founded in 1906.〔 It was the second bank in Lehigh; the Lehigh National Bank, founded in 1898, was the first.〔 Merchants National Bank operated out of a temporary headquarters for the first several months of its operation.〔 On January 29, 1907, it was announced that the contract for the bank's building had been awarded to Faudree Brothers of Atoka, Oklahoma.〔 The new bank was built on the southwest corner of Katy Avenue and Main Street, and it was, architecturally, one of the most striking buildings in town.〔 The coal boom ended in the 1910s, as railroads switched to cheaper fuel oil to power their trains.〔 In the early 1920s, the railroads closed their mines in Lehigh.〔 Declining crop prices and damage to the cotton crop from boll weevils further weakened the economy.〔 The Merchants National Bank closed in 1923. The building subsequently housed a grocery store.〔 Many of the other buildings on main street were abandoned.〔 As part of New Deal projects during the Great Depression, most of the abandoned buildings on Main Street were torn down.〔 During World War II, there was again a demand for coal in the area, and many of the town's buildings were torn down or moved so the ground underneath them could be readily mined.〔 By the 1980s, the grocery store in the Merchants National Bank Building had closed, and the building had deteriorated and been damaged by vandals.〔 In the 1980s, the Lehigh Historical Society completed restoration work on the building.〔〔Caruthers, Lorene. ("Lehigh," ) ''Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture'', Oklahoma Historical Society, Accessed July 4, 2015.〕 They replaced most of the windows and repaired the roof, ceilings, and floors.〔 The building is the only remaining commercial building in what was once downtown Lehigh.〔 It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2006.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Merchants National Bank Building」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|