Pictured is the Morrison store building as it appears today (1983). It is now vacant and unused after seeing a continuous succession of general store operations for over 130 years.
(By Stephen Kelley from the People’s Defender 1983)
Continuing from last week, J.B. Alexander, brother-in-law to John Morrison, took over management of Morrison‘s Eckmansville store and bank in 1889. Previous to his entry into the banking and mercantile fields of endeavor, Alexander was a farmer. Perhaps it was his lack of business acumen that helped bring about the failure of the bank about 1895. When the bank closed the stores that final time, a number of Eckmansville and Cherry Fork residence, lost a great deal of money, and the Morrisons lost a great deal of prestige.
The old store building passed out of the Morrison family’s ownership in 1899. The new owner was Louella Osborn, whose father, the popular “Daddy Blair”, then operated a general store in the building for the next dozen years or so. Louella remarried during those years to Dr. Addison King Kirkpatrick. The newlyweds lived in the east end of the store building where “Dr. King” had his office. Dr. Kirkpatrick was a native of the Eckmansville area and had attended the Ohio Medical College in Cincinnati. He practiced medicine in Eckmansville until his death in 1921 at the age of fifty.
Johnson Hook began operating the store in 1912. For the next three years his enterprise was the largest the community had witnessed since the days of the Morrisons. Albert M. Alexander bought the property in April of 1915 and continued to run the big general store for the next eight years. He sold it in 1923 to Fred and Bessie Boyd who quickly tired of the business, and, after a short time, rented it out to J. W. Fannin. Albert Alexander purchased the property a second time in 1926 and resold it the following year to Chris J. Albright.
Albright ran the “Mom and Pop” country store for almost 2 years before selling it to Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Mabry. Despite the devasting effects of the Great Depression, the Mabrys held on and continued to operate the store through those tough times and through the Second World War. The MabRys owned the property longer than anyone since the Morrison family. Glenmore and Mildred O. Roberts bought the old Morrison store in March, 1946 and managed it for the next two decades. Their daughter, Maxine Roberts Henderson, was the last to run the establishment, closing the store in the late 1960’s.
