herr2ck: DeKalb Trip, pt. 1 - Lincoln Highway East of 2nd Street

June 2025.

This post of DeKalb’s vernacular commercial architecture begins with the east side of Lincoln Highway, the main artery of the town. I’ll start at the block between 6th Street and 7th Street, and resume at 4th Street to 2nd Street.

659-665 East Lincoln Highway

I liked this c. 1880-1900 Queen Anne building’s bay windows and corner turret. They’re very ornate, much different from the relatively bare remainder of the facade.

Sohne Building + Williamson Building

These late Victorian neighbors have identical expression and decoration, but they differ in materiality. The Sohne Building has typical red brick, while its neighbor has white glazed brick. The base has been altered to match the Mexican restaurant next door.

Fargo Theater

1937 photo of the building. (Cinema Treasures)

DeKalb’s Fargo Theater opened in 1929 but closed early on, in 1952. The building was vacant until the 1970s, when it briefly became a roller rink, and the lobby was later used as a designer clothing outlet during the 1980s.

It is currently used by a skateboarding store, which uses the former theater space as a skate park. This is a really cool adaptive reuse, and I’m glad that it is so successful.

The theater is mostly Art Deco in design, but it has Gothic-inspired decoration on the piers. It’s a pretty odd synthesis of ornamental features. The shop still maintains the original mosaic tile floor:

Elsewhere, the storefronts have their original doors and numbered tile floors:

The Illuminati carving is not original and was installed by the current tenant, as it is part of their logo.

607 East Lincoln Highway

Herr2ck, you’ve actually gone insane…why are you taking pictures of auto parts stores? Behind the shoddy paint seems to lie a late Stripped Classical design, c. 1930-1950, as seen in the decorative urns, rosettes, and fluted pilasters.

Commercial Trust & Savings Bank/McCabe’s Tavern

This fanciful Beaux-Arts design was built as the Commercial Trust & Savings Bank of DeKalb, which didn’t pull up many hits on Google. I was able to find some information in the DeKalb architecture survey and McCabes’ website, though.

Completed in 1902, the Commercial Trust & Savings Bank is an example of the Beaux-Arts style. It is lavishly decorated with Ionic pilasters, a vaulted portal with coffers, quoins, and oxeye dormers. The cornice above the second floor is denticulated and features a relief in the middle.

Beyond its usage as a bank, the building was also used by the Freemasons, and the storefronts housed a hardware store and a furniture store. Commercial Trust & Savings merged with First National Bank in 1903, and it seems that the bank inside closed by 1912. Its most recent tenant was McCabe’s Tavern, which seems to have operated for decades but closed between 2018 and 2019.

As large and fancy as this building is, it has been altered. The original storefronts and second-floor windows have been obscured or removed in favor of metal panels. Other features like sooty ornament show signs of deferred maintenance. The website still operates today and suggests that the building will become an event venue, but it appeared vacant to me.

The DeKalb architecture survey suggests that this property is NRHP eligible, which would track. It has been modified, yet it still remains as one of the city’s largest historic landmarks.

The bank also had some neighbors, which were demolished between 2007 and 2012:

I really wish I could use the historic picture on the building’s website, but it is covered by banners and different media. It boils down to structures of a similar character standing nearby, which were either demolished or altered for the construction of this Colonial Revival thing. These sites are an empty lot now. Here is said lot, plus the backs of the existing buildings:

Andy’s Lounge

Like its neighbor, this is another old bar well-known in DeKalb history that has since closed. The building was a pharmacy in the early 1900s, and the 1933 bar moved here after the pharmacist departed. It was purchased from the founder’s family in 2000 by Robert Goering, who seems to still own the building. Andy’s seems to have given up the ghost at the same time as McCabe’s, and Goering also co-owned that business.

314-322 East Lincoln Highway

A fancy Commercial-meets-Gothic Revival design, probably dating to 1900-1920; this building incorporates lots of Gothic ornament in its terra-cotta facade.

311 East Lincoln Highway

An 1876 (visible on the datestone, which is obscured by leaves here) Italianate building, the only identifying feature besides its address is a cryptic “RS” on the datestone, undoubtedly the initials of whoever built it. Its most intricate detail is the cornice, the remainder is mostly articulated with simple brick and stone.

302 East Lincoln Highway

Built before 1885 (probably 1870s-1880s), this Italianate has a large, intact cornice along the roofline. It was historically a grocery store but is now used as a balloon store. The western side seems unusually bare.

DeKalb Theater

View of the theater in 1949. (Cinema Treasures)

The Art Moderne DeKalb Theater was designed by Axel Claesson and opened in 1949. The theater closed in 1991, and it is currently used as a cosmetology school.

It seems like the exterior was once a smooth, colorful tile, which has since been stuccoed over. What an odd decision. The marquee has been restored, however:

Drs. Smith Building

This Art Moderne building is much more intact than its northern neighbor. It was built from 1946-1948. The architecture report contradicts itself regarding the site’s previous occupant, Haish’s Opera House. The first (Jacob Haish Opera House) was built in 1876 and burnt down in the 1880s, being replaced by a presumably similar building. The second burned again in either 1906 or 1938. Regardless, whatever iteration stood on the site was demolished by 1938.

The tenants for which the building was named, Drs. Richard and Clifford Smith, had originally operated out of the opera house and commissioned a new structure. Note the caduceus motifs beneath the two corner windows. This building is very intact for its age, minus the modification of the side windows to be glass block (which does not clash stylistically). I like the dark stone base that contrasts with the gray stone/concrete above, as well as the fluted pilasters.

249 East Lincoln Highway

A simple Queen Anne with a large bay window and cornice, this building is currently used as a stage for the sports bar next door. The storefront is a recent alteration, but the one it replaced was not original.

235-241 East Lincoln Highway

Out of these three, I was most interested in the middle building, which has turn-of-the-century Beaux-Arts decoration that has recently been painted. I think it was Italianate in style beforehand. The rightmost building appears to be a modern facade rebuilt over an existing structure.

Flusch Building

This 1920s Renaissance Revival design has prominent terra-cotta blind arches embedded in its brickwork. Though simple in execution, I think it is one of the best on the block. It gives a Roman ruins effect.

206 East Lincoln Highway

A fancy Queen Anne c. 1885, the first floor has been heavily altered. I’m betting the chamfered entrance isn’t original, either. The side has a mural that is missing a panel: