The History Center of Cedar Rapids held one of their traveling programs on history in Linn County with a stop at Gwen’s Restaurant Tuesday, Sept. 26.
Roughly 20 people from Linn County and other areas were in attendance for the event, which outlined the history of Lisbon’s historic downtown district. The information presented has been researched and shared by the Lisbon Historic Preservation Commission about the downtown district.
Jenny Fieldman with The History Center presented the information as attendees enjoyed a supper prepared by Gwen Drahos of Gwen’s restaurant.
“The first white settlers to the Lisbon area arrived in 1833,” Fieldman said.
The first land purchases happened in 1843 and, shortly thereafter, the community of Dutch or Church Town was integrated as a community.
One of the historic churches in Lisbon was First Federated Church, which was established in 1881, by Bishop Milton Wright. Milton is more famously known as the parent of Orville and Wilbur Wright, the brothers who designed the first successful airplanes.
“There are stories of the Wright brothers playing with some of the children in Lisbon in their time here,” Fieldman said.
The First Federated Church building was constructed in 1921 and operated as that church through 2021, when it closed its doors. In recent years, it has now been known as the Uncommon Church, and worship services are still held to this day.
Heading down Main Street, the next building whose history was noted was the Opera House. The historic building was constructed in 1893 by the Organization of Odd Fellows, a fraternal organization. In 1910, it was the only theater in the Mount Vernon and Lisbon area, and would routinely hold community plays.
The third floor was where meetings for the fraternal organization were held, and the American Legion and Masonic Lodge also held meetings there for a time.
While the school was busy with one of its early construction efforts, the auditorium space served also as a gymnasium for school activities.
The building was purchased by Lloyd Table Company, one of the largest manufacturers of chiropractic tables in the world.
The space currently occupied by Lloyd Table Company’s manufacturing building on main street used to cater to a number of businesses, including the city hotel.
Fieldman walked through the history of the Lisbon History Center building, with that originally being a business owned by the Rumple family. In the early 1900s, the Ramsay Drug Store was created.
“Which goes to one of the things that happens in history,” Fieldman said. “The street, which was named after that family, uses the spelling Ramsey, but the spelling on the building in the early 1900’s clearly denotes it was Ramsay.”
The Wilson’s General Store opened in the location in 1944. Half of the store was for the grocery store, half for the inventory at the time.
The Wilson family would hold a community dinner once a year that would shut down Washington Street.
Earl Wilson took over running the store in 1980 and ran it until it closed in 2002. The space was purchased by the city in 2005 for the Lisbon History Center building.
There was also a little popcorn store that operated in downtown Lisbon by the Alger family known as the Lion’s Den, which saw a lot of business on nights where events were at the opera house or concerts were held in the street.
The next businesses were a rotating collection of hardware stores, drug stores and pharmacies.
Where the Styling Station now resides used to be a meat market for a number of years. When new owners were renovating the space, they discovered one of the old meat hooks.
One of the long running businesses in uptown Lisbon many people might have remembered was Best Oil Company, in existence from 1916 to 1964.
134 Main Street used to be the residence and office of one of the dentists in the community. His residence was on the first floor, while the dental offices were on the second floor. It functioned as a residence for people for a number of years after, but recently has been home to a number of businesses, including Iron Leaf Stationery and now a realtor.
On the south side of Main Street resided one of the bakeries that served Lisbon, in business right up until Peter Pan bakery started in Cedar Rapids making sliced bread a reality. The location that is The Fantastic Escape today served as the fire and police station for several years.
Walton Construction used to be a plumbing business owned by George McCall. Walton bought the building and renovated it in 2012 for his needs.
The D and D Body Shop was opened by Harry Kinnit, who developed one of the first riding cultivators. He had a patent for the invention in 1867 and was going into mass production on the items, but fire struck the business and while they tried to rebuild, the business closed in 1885. In 1896, the site was the Kurtz Lumber business for a number of years.
Dave Albright and Don Smith bought the business and have operated D and D body shop there for decades.
Other shops that made their homes along the south side of the street included a blacksmith shop, telephone office, grocery store and bakery and millinery. The post office in Lisbon also bounced around to different locations in the community over the years.
The Lisbon library now resides in one of the oldest commercial buildings on Main Street. It used to house a hardware store and general store, and eventually a corner grocery store. The Lisbon Public Library was started as a class project by high school students collecting books in the community, and found its permanent location on Main Street.
Lisbon Heritage Hall was a space for meetings and events and, in the remodel in 1997, signatures of many performers in the space were found and preserved.
The bank building was constructed in 1874, one of the first banks in Mount Vernon and Lisbon communities.
“In fact, many Mount Vernon residents banked in Lisbon until the town built their own bank in 1884,” Fieldman said.
Fieldman’s presentation also made note of one of the other historic buildings in Lisbon, Living Hope Global Methodist Church, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2019. A video by Lisbon, Inc., students documents the history of the church, as well as many of the architectural features found at the building.