BAIRD HARDWARE

On the West Side

See large photo HERE

Daniel Edgar Baird  (on the left) came to Charleston from Ohio in 1885.  He went to work for the locally famous N.S. Burlew, who owned a large hardware store. ( not to mention the Burlew Theater on Capitol St ).  After 22 years with Mr Burlew,  Edgar started his own hardware store in 1905 on what is now Washington Street W., formally Charleston Street.  The first store was located where the Rite Aid parking lot is at Washington & Watts St.  This hardware store was formally Higginbothams. These three photos were taken in 1907

See Large photo HERE

Daniel Edgar Baird is in shirt sleeves in the center.  His sons are in the photo also. That's Floyd in the dark shirt with light suspenders. Daniel Bartlett stands behind the unknown little boy.  In 1924, Daniel Bartlett Baird drowned in the Elk River at Mink Shoals while trying to save a small boy from his Sunday School class.  The boy made it by the way.

DELIVERY

Delivery's were made the hard way,  man and animal muscle.

This ad from 1916

By 1910, this building  was erected at 331Washington Street and Ohio Ave., across the street from the old store

Inside Showroom- Circa 1925 332 & 333 Charleston St. ( Washington St. ) Charleston WV.                            Lee Johnson - Daniel E Baird – J.M. Hickman – Floyd Baird Bartlett Baird – Harry Thaxton - ??? Woodall – Garnet Brown. Miss Donnally - Charles Higgins

Baird Hardware lasted into the 60s.  By then, almost all of Charleston's locally owned hardware stores were gone

 

I placed this photo here because the Baird's owned this rental house, which was located right around the corner on Ohio Ave. Here, a retaining wall is being built that would be removed a year later by orders of the city. Something about encroaching onto the sidewalk too much. You can see that most of the streets on the West Side (and East Side too for that matter) were still unpaved.  This photo taken in 1915.

 All photos courtesy of  Daniel E Davidson

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