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SMART Centre Market Moving to Former Goodwin Drug Co. Building in Downtown Wheeling

photo by: Shelley Hanson

The former Goodwin Drug Co. building is the planned new site of the Smart Center. Libby and Robert Strong, owners of the SMART Centre Market business, recently purchased the 1410 Main St. building, which is located next to the building that houses River City Restaurant and the Wheeling Artisan Center.

WHEELING — The Friends of Wheeling took a “before tour” this past week of the former Goodwin Drug Co. building, which is the future new home of the SMART Centre Market.

Robert and Libby Strong, who operate the SMART Centre Market shop in Center Wheeling, completed the purchase of the Goodwin building just a few days ago.

They plan to renovate their new building, located at 1410 Main St., and move their interactive science store into it. Their business’s current location is in a rented building that does not belong to them. That building is up for sale.

During the tour — a video of which is posted on the Friends of Wheeling Facebook page — Libby Strong said the previous owners, the Albers family, had been in the building for many years and operated their wholesale drug company there. Goodwin Drug Co. was in business until 2017.

“We’re so happy to be the stewards of this building. … We wanted to own and this is what we were looking for,” she said to the group. “We’re going to be doing historical renovations.”

She added the four-story building would house their retail space on the first floor and also allow them to expand their science center offerings, something they had been wanting to do for many years. The science center will be on the second floor.

She noted they also plan to continue selling Kirke’s Ice Cream there.

“We’re trying to get everything paced properly so we can get that accomplished,” Libby Strong said.

A tour-goer inquired as to whether their shop’s T-Rex head, which can be seen sticking out from the current center’s second-floor window, would be moving, too. The couple answered yes.

“There are several people who have already expressed the want to be the movers. They want to put it in the back of their truck and take a circuitous route before it arrives, which I find very, very funny,” Robert Strong said to the crowd.

On Thursday, Libby Strong said she believes they will be able to move into the new building after Christmas, but it could happen sooner. She said they received a facade renovation grant from the city of Wheeling that will help restore the existing windows, do paint work and patch some of the brickwork.

“We’re really excited. … We’re going to be able to expand,” she said, adding they have exhibits ready to go.

In their current space when workshops are held the retail space must be used. With the new building there will be separate spaces for retail and science programs.

While the process of getting the building ready is just beginning, Libby Strong said they are planning to install commercial bathrooms for their visitors, update the staircase and add a passenger elevator.

“We love the Centre Market area very much, but this opportunity presented itself,” she said.

The new location is surrounded by other businesses including the Public Market, Table 304, Wheeling Artisan Center, Wheeling Coffee and WesBanco Arena. Being close to Heritage Port also is a plus.

“It will be a nice fit for us,” she said.

Jeanne Finstein, president of the Friends of Wheeling, gave a history of the building prior to the tour starting. She said in the late 1800s there was a three-story building in the same location that was home to a wholesale candy and grocery company owned by George Steenrod Feeny.

“Our assumption was the fourth floor was added on at some point,” she said of the building.

Later in about 1898, the building was used by a hat company, Harper Bros. Wholesale Hats, which was operated by Samuel Harper and mother Marian Harper. They sold Eagle brand hats.

By 1902, the building had become four stories, according to Sanborn maps, Finstein said. Later the building became home to Miller Storage and Furniture Co. about 1917.

The Goodwin Drug Co. took occupancy of the structure about 1921. The company president at that time was listed as Jay Thomas Goodwin.

“The company name is still visible on the window,” Feinstein said to the crowd. “You may not have recognized that this was the Goodwin Drug Co. because it was a wholesale drug company. Normal people didn’t go in and out. It just provided drug-related materials to commercial drug stores.”

Libby Strong on Thursday said she talked to a member of the Albers family, Jo Ellen Albers, about the history of the building and what it was like while the family operated Goodwin Drug Co. Her great grandfather was one of the original stakeholders and her grandfather, Chester, also worked there. Her father, the late William Albers Sr., became president and she and her siblings worked there, too.

“At the height of the business they had 15 to 20 employees. No one was allowed inside except the employees. That’s why it was kind of a big deal to be looking around it,” Strong said, referring to the Friends of Wheeling tour.

Strong said she learned that because of DEA regulations only certain people were allowed past a certain point in the building. There were special cages, vaults and safes where certain types of drugs were locked up. At one time, Goodwin Drug Co. supplied drugs and other items to drug stores across the Ohio Valley and into Pennsylvania.

Strong said the Albers family decided to close the business for various reasons including the passing of their father, William Albers Sr., in 2016. The nature of the wholesale drug business had also changed.

“A lot of the pharmacies they used to sell to were small mom and pop shops that got squeezed by bigger drug places and there were bigger wholesale drug companies,” she said.

Strong said when the new science center opens there they plan to also install a kiosk dedicated to the history of the building including its time as the Goodwin Drug Co.

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