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Kaufman-Straus

American companies established in 1879Commercial buildings completed in 1902Commercial buildings in Louisville, KentuckyCommercial buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in KentuckyDefunct companies based in Louisville, Kentucky
Defunct retail companies of the United StatesDepartment stores on the National Register of Historic PlacesJefferson County, Kentucky Registered Historic Place stubsLate 19th and Early 20th Century American Movements architectureLouisville, Kentucky stubsNational Register of Historic Places in Louisville, KentuckyRetail companies disestablished in 1969Retail companies established in 1879
Louisville Kaufman Straus Building
Louisville Kaufman Straus Building

Kaufman-Straus was a local department store that operated in Louisville, Kentucky, from 1879 to 1969. In 1879, local retail clerk Henry Kaufman opened the first store on Jefferson between 7th and 8th. Four years later, Benjamin Straus entered into partnership with Kaufman. In 1887, the Kaufman-Straus store moved to South 4th Street in space leased from the Polytechnic Society of Kentucky. The new flagship store opened in 1903, at 533-49 South 4th Street, designed by local architect Mason Maury. In 1924, Kaufman-Straus was acquired by City Stores Company and the following year the flagship store underwent extensive renovations. City Stores rebranded the company as Kaufman's in 1960. It operated two stores in suburban Louisville at The Mall and Dixie Manor. In 1969, Kaufman's was acquired by L. S. Ayres, and the downtown Louisville store was subsequently closed in 1971.The flagship store was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1983. It is a six-story building.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Kaufman-Straus (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Kaufman-Straus
South 4th Street, Louisville

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Latitude Longitude
N 38.251944444444 ° E -85.757222222222 °
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Fourth Street Live!

South 4th Street
40214 Louisville
Kentucky, United States
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Louisville Kaufman Straus Building
Louisville Kaufman Straus Building
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Macauley's Theatre

Macauley's Theatre was the premier theatre in Louisville, Kentucky during the late 19th and early 20th century. It opened on October 18, 1873, on the north side of Walnut Street between Third and Fourth Streets, and was founded by Bernard "Barney" Macauley, a prominent Louisville actor since the 1850s. The theater was designed by architect John B. McElfatrick. It opened with the comedy Extremes. Debts forced him to sell the playhouse to his brother John in 1879. The theatre was a success under John Macauley, featuring the top actors of the day, such as Sarah Bernhardt, Lillie Langtry, Edwin Booth, George M. Cohan and showman Buffalo Bill. Louisvillian Mary Anderson made her debut at the theatre in 1875 while the actress Alice Oates and her company appeared there four times between 1876 and 1879.With changing times, Macauleys began to occasionally show motion pictures in the 1910s. It continued to serve as Louisville's premier live theatre however, until it was razed in 1925. The final performance was of The Naughty Wife on August 29, 1925. Theatre in Louisville lived on at the 1,400-seat Brown Theatre, which opened in 1925 and rechristened as The Macauley Theatre from 1971 to 1998. Before closing its doors in 1998, the world renowned jam band Phish played two different shows across a four-month period in 1993, which is unheard of in today's music wheelhouse.Macauley's lobby was decorated with pictures of the famous actors and actresses who had performed there, many with personal inscriptions and dedications. When the theatre closed, these were donated to the University of Louisville, which still includes them in their archives.

Starks Building
Starks Building

The Starks Building is a landmark 14-story building on Fourth Street and Muhammad Ali Boulevard in Downtown Louisville, Kentucky, USA. It was built in 1913 on a site that had been the First Christian Church of Louisville. It was commissioned by local businessman John Starks Rodes and designed by the Daniel Burnham firm of Chicago. It is 202 feet (62 m) tall (62 m).The Starks Building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1985.It was built in the Chicago School of architecture with Beaux Arts details. Cream-colored bricks are one of its signature features. It is decorated with classical motifs, including acanthus leaves, lion's heads and urns. It was originally a "U" shaped structure, but a 1926 addition designed by the firm Graham, Anderson, Probst & White added a new wing to create a rectangular shape with a central sunlight well. At the bottom of the central atrium was a courtyard, and until 1984 it was covered with a Plexiglas skylight. In 1953, the building was renovated to add a parking garage - the first in the city - to the building. The 700+ space garage was built on an adjoining lot and fronts Third Street. The Starks Building is mixed use, with retail, dining and office space. When it was sold in 1997 the building included about 350,000 square feet (33,000 m2) of leasable space. In the 1990s and 2000s the owners had trouble finding tenants, with over half of the space vacant in 2006.Notable long-time tenants include the Colonnade Cafeteria, Seng Jewelers and Rodes Men's and Women's Clothing. Current tenants include the Business First of Louisville news publication, FoodCare, a startup that relocated its headquarters to Louisville from San Francisco in April 2012, and Mediaura, a highly successful digital agency. Colonnade Cafeteria moved into the Starks Building basement in 1926 and remained until 2006. Rodes Clothing, founded by the building's financier John Starks Rodes himself, was located in the building from 1914 until the company relocated to the suburbs in 2004.It was owned by the Starks family until the mid-1980s when it was sold to an investment group, which resold the building in 1997 to Empire State Collateral. Empire State defaulted on the mortgage and ownership was taken over by Allstate in 2004. It was listed as the 11th largest office complex in Louisville in 2004 by the newspaper Business First.The building was sold again in 2006 to the Hertz Investment Group. Since the purchase in 2006, occupancy has risen to 71 percent, as of May 2010, Hertz Investment Group said. The Starks building signed a number of new tenants during 2009, including an 11,500-square-foot (1,070 m2) Eddie Merlot's restaurant, part of a Fort Wayne, Ind.-based upscale steakhouse chain. With Eddie Merlot's, all the Starks street-level space has been leased.It is connected by a skyway to Fourth Street Live!, an entertainment mall adjacent on the North side. On July 2, 2007, the Cordish Company, developers of Fourth Street Live!, announced that it would expand the mall southward by leasing the first floor (street-level) of the Starks Building. The Baltimore-based developer has since abandoned plans to develop 20,000 square feet (1,900 m2) of vacant street-level space in the Starks Building.

500 West Jefferson
500 West Jefferson

500 West Jefferson, previously known as PNC Plaza for several decades until renamed in 2020, and now also called 500W or 500 West by its owners, is a skyscraper in Downtown, Louisville, Kentucky and located at 500 West Jefferson Street. Previously owned by Pittsburgh-based PNC Bank and currently owned by SomeraRoad Inc, the 31-story, 420-foot (128 m) high structure was designed by architect Welton Becket and was completed in 1971. A notable feature of the building is the pattern of pre-cast concrete panels on the exterior of its windows. The building, originally named Citizens Fidelity Plaza, was named after Citizens Fidelity Bank and renamed PNC Plaza when Citizens Fidelity was acquired by PNC Bank.It was the tallest building in the state of Kentucky when it was completed in 1971, but lost that distinction a year later when National City Tower was completed in 1972. PNC now has offices in both buildings due to its own acquisition of National City Corp. in an unrelated move, however, it does not own National City Tower. The Jefferson Club, a private city club, was located on the top floor of the building, until closing in February 2010.The building was purchased by Optima International, a firm based in Miami and run by Chaim Schochet, for a $77 million cash and mortgage assumption deal that closed on September 21, 2011.In 2019, Milwaukee-based financial services firm Baird purchased Louisville financial services firm Hilliard Lyons and became the anchor tenant, renovating and moving workers to the top five floors.In August 2020, Federal prosecutors filed a lawsuit claiming that the Ukrainian owners were laundering billions of dollars over more than ten years.In November 2020, the New York–based private equity firm SomeraRoad bought the tower for $22.5 million, renamed it to "500W", and began renovation plans. Vice President of SomeraRoad Andrew Marchetti said "What we're doing is going to change the trajectory of 500 West. And it'll be noticeable," saying the company hopes to attract new tenants with these amenities and updates. Spending $16 million, changes include a new entrance and lobby, a tenant lounge, a conference center, and fitness center. Ev's Deli is currently the only café or restaurant in the building. In September 2022, Tennessee-based Barista Parlor announced that it planned to open a new location in the atrium of the building, but did not say when that would happen.