AUTOMOBILE DEALERSHIP, DERMOTT ARKANSAS

Built in 1919, this abandoned automobile dealership is in Dermott, Arkansas, in the southeast corner of the state. I was passing through and had no time to investigate it, so if anyone knows its history, please send me a note.

It has some typical Cratftsman details, such as the three-lite transoms and terra cotta tile roof, but other details are more esoteric. The turned stone (or more likely cast concrete) tapered round columns in front support a massive entablature sporting scrolled brackets. The brackets are somewhat Craftsman, but the entablature and columns seem straight out of the pages of Greek Revival. The whole thing has a well-constructed gutter along its edge.

I especially like the brick; it's a running bond, which uses the long side of the brick (stretchers) without any runs of the short side of the brick (headers). The tooling of the mortar is flat and recessed, leaving the edges of the brick crisp and sharp. The brick is probably from Malvern (Brick Capital of Arkansas) and has purplish-maroon headers as opposed to the dark red stretcher side. This creates an alternating color scheme of dark and light at the corners, which is rather striking.

I wasn't sure what the building was until I saw the AAA sign on the pole out front, and only until I peered into the repair garage in the back that I realized it was actually a dealership. No simple repair shop would have such an elaborate storefront, and the hand-painted lettering above the door into the front confirms it. Might be hard to see here, but it reads "OFFICE AND SHOWROOM." "GENTS" adorns the right-hand door; there might not have been a public restroom for the ladies, or, more likely, if there was, it's in the showroom. Only gents would have been in the garage, of course.

The doors from the showroom into the garage are somewhat unusual, being six-panel ladderbacks, and for the life of me I don't know how they got the cars into that showroom. Possibly there was an entrance on the side of the building with the steel shed, or the opening on the near side may have originally been a door. Close inspection of the brick shows the brick below this window does not match the surrounding brick.

A massive truss supports the roof joists above, and the rear of the roof structure is collapsing.

The building, if it does not get a roof soon, will likely collapse in the next ten years. Pity. It really is beautiful.