Merchants Grocer Co & Peoples Bank Searcy Arkansas

Trivia: The Merchants Grocer Co, later Searcy Wholesale, was mainly a warehouse. Behind those front windows was an open office about 15 feet deep and the width of the building. Behind the office on the north left side was a large vault and beyond that was all warehouse with a loading dock on the east side.I worked there part time around 1949-50 putting Arkansas cigarette stamps on each pack. After the stamps were afixed I put the cartons back in the large boxes put them in the vault.

 I dont remember the building having a second story.

Sorry, Barbara, you're on the wrong end of the block. Searcy Wholesale was on the north end of that block. It was across Race Street from the Cumberland Presbyterian Church and kitty cornered from the Rialto theater. Next to the church is a small brick building that once housed a cleaners-- Darden's  I believe.

Someday I'll tell you about attending first and second grade on the site that shared the west half of that block with the church and the cleaners. Boltons acquired that property for their garage and dealership when the Primary School moved to the old high school building at Elm (1st) and Academy.

(This may be a duplicate.)

 Mea culpa, Barbara. Agreed. I should have checked Google street view. That new bank building looks pretty nice too.

At one time, if I remember right, between the Security Bank (on the south end of that block)and Searcy Wholesale (on the north end of that block) was the White County Motor Company, before it moved out on the new section of East Race.  I notice that the bank shown in the above picture is Peoples Bank.  Anyway, I think that building must have been torn down for White County Motor Company building to replace it. 

Bob, I  went to the first grade in 1940 in the old high school building and you didn't.  What was the year that the primary school moved to the old high school building?  I guess that was freed up when the new high school was built.

Harold Gene, White County (Ford) Motors was located next to the old Security Bank building on the south end of the block. There was a barber shop, and perhaps one other building, between Ford and the Peoples Bank building. The distinctive bank building stands out on the horizon in this picture taken from the roof of the high school in the late 40's. http://activerain.com/blogsview/887934/Scene-from-old-downtown-Searcy-Arkansas-Ford-Buick-Place

I believe that the primary school, grades 1 through 3, were relocated in 1941. i remember being in 3d grade there where I was introduced to the fantastic technologies of stereoscopic viewers and wax bed mimeograph machines. So you graduated in 1952?

No,I graduated in 1953 so I started primary school in 1941.  That must have been the first year the primary school was in the old high school.  I didn't know that.  Mr. Wilson was my first grade teacher.  Your reference to "wax bed mimeograph machines" reminded me: 

My mother taught 2nd grade, started the year after I was in 2nd grade.  Anyway, she use to make line drawings for her pupils to color in class.  I would "help" her at night at home to do this.  She would draw a picture backwards on a sheet of paper with a special purple pen.  Then she would make some sort of a jell solution and pour into a shallow pan.  The she would place the drawing down on the jell aand remove.  The image could be seen on the jell aand when one placed a blank page on the jell and rubbed it, the image would be transferred to the paper.  One would make about a dozen copies before the image had "sunk" enough into the jell that it wouldn' transfer good enough anymore.  The jell was sort of transparent and you could look down into it and see all the previous images.  I've wondered what the process was called and how it worked.