May 17, 2012Brooklyn Square
Located at the northwest corner of South Main & Harrison Streets
Brooklyn Square, prior to urban renewal in the 1970’s, was the section of Main Street south of the railroad, intersected by Taylor, Harrison, South Main, Market Streets, and Forest Avenue. Since 1848 it has been a center of trade and business activities.
An imposing building for many years was the Broadhead Block, which faced north and formed the base of the triangle. It had replaced a large wood frame building which housed various businesses, among them, furniture, piano and organ manufacturing and a flour and feed mill. Two city trolley lines funneled through the Square.
The Humphrey House, where South Main began, was a popular hotel. A section of it was the terminal for the Warren-Jamestown trolley, and a corner of the building at Harrison Street was the Roosevelt Theater, the last of four movie houses in the Square area, the others being the Strand, Royal, and Majestic.
For more than half a century the City Market at Forest and Market Streets was a forerunner of the modern supermarket. Clothing and shoe stores, jewelry shops, restaurants and saloons, newsrooms, and a pharmacy lined both sides of Main Street. Before automobiles, horses were a familiar sight, drinking from an imposing fountain in the center of the triangle. The city later kept a flower garden here, with an annual Christmas tree attracting city carolers.
Called Brooklyn Square since the mid 1860’s, the City Council changed it to Roosevelt Square in 1919 in honor of President Theodore Roosevelt who had delivered a political speech there. The name was not accepted by many and it was changed back to Brooklyn Square by the City Council in 1925. Urban renewal changed the topography almost completely.
BROOKLYN SQUARE
CALLED BROOKLYN SQUARE SINCE THE 1860'S, THIS AREA HAS BEEN AN INDUSTRIAL AND COMMERCIAL CENTER SINCE 1848.