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Ames Main Street
1913 postcard image from the Ames City Hall time capsule
Learn more about the contents of the time capsule.

This view of Ames Main Street faces west and shows the north side between Douglas and Kellogg.   Evidence of businesses visible (starting from the right) include one barber pole advertising the downstairs OK Barber Shop, Union National Bank sign over Wallace Greeley's bank doorway, the word Tildens on an awning, Judisch Bros. painted over George's storefront, baskets of produce from the W.H. Poole Grocery, two more barber poles, a sign for Gus Martin Clothiers, the SHOE sign for Tallman Shoe Store, and a real estate LAND sign on K.W. Brown's building.  The Odd Fellows Temple, the largest building on Main Street, is next.  Cagwin Drug Store, occupying a storefront on the east side of the Odd Fellows doorway, displays a mortar and pestle sign.  The Carr Hardware sign painted in large white letters is just visible on the east half of the Opera House Building.  J.J. Grove Grocery occupies the west half.  At least two lunch counters (and, no doubt, a number of other small shops) are located on this block but are not readily apparent in this photo.

An enlargement of the area beyond Kellogg Avenue helps establish the year of this photo.  The site on the southeast corner of Main Street and Kellogg is being readied for the construction of a new bank building.   Completed in 1913, the structure served first as Ames Trust & Savings Bank, later known as First National Bank, and still known to Ames residents as the Ames Stationers building.

Ames Evening Times, January 31, 1913 CONTRACT LET FOR NEW BANK YESTERDAY - C.W. Ennes of Toledo, Iowa was found to be the lowest bidder when the sealed bids were opened yesterday for the construction of the new Ames Savings Bank building.  Eleven bidders were in the field.  Among them were three local men who were within a few hundred dollars of the winning figure.  The bidding was close, it being understood that eight of the bidders were within a margin of $1,000. Mr. Ennes is a successful contractor and has done work in Ames, having built the engineering annex at the college and the Lincoln school building.  He now has several large projects under way at different points in the state.  The contract calls for work to start March 1st and the building to be completed September 1st. All of the bidders were in the city yesterday as was also Dr. Amos of Des Moines.

The following advertisements appeared in the Ames Evening Times in January of 1913.