Lost Hopewell Photos – Seminary & Broad

One welcome result of working on this year’s Seminary Avenue Historic Walking Tour has been the discovery four previously-unknown historic photos of East Broad Street and Seminary Avenue in Hopewell from around the 1920s.

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A&P Store – East Broad at Seminary

The first photo, from Kyle Van Arsdale, shows the A&P Store on East Broad at the corner of Seminary.

This small A&P store was on the right side of the building from 1915 into the 1950s –  – later the home of Raymond Cox’s barber shop.

The building behind (also still standing) was built by Miss Boggs as the Hopewell Female Seminary (school), which operated from 1866 to around 1890.

• See recent post on 21 East Broad – Hopewell Groceries / Barbers / Restaurants

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Leming’s Market – East Broad at Seminary

The next two photos, courtesy of Kip Leming, show front and inside views of Leming’s Market.

The front view show the proprietors, Russell and Anna Leming, and the interior view shows their son Homer in front of the display shelves.

Russell Leming operated a meat and produce business in Hopewell from c. 1919 to 1947. It seems to have been based in the same building as the A&P for much of that period, on the left side of the building. The entrance visible in the photo does seem to match the view in the A&P photo above.

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Clark’s Garage – Seminary Behind East Broad

The final photo is from George Spencer, and shows the Clark’s Garage building which was behind the now Hopewell Inn building at the other corner of East Broad and Seminary.

The area behind the Inn was used as livery stables for horses back to the 1890s, and then was converted into an auto garage by the 1920s. George Clark was advertising his Auto Repair business there in 1927.

The original frame livery buildings were destroyed in a fire in the early 1960s, and replaced with the current block building, which was used by Hopewell Auto Parts up to around 2018.

• See earlier post on Hopewell’s Lost Liveries, which includes rear views of the livery buildings and the west side of Seminary Avenue.
• See earlier post on The Hopewell Inn / Central Hotel

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• See References for the historic walking tour, including the Handout, plus briefs on Seminary Ave. and East Broad / South Greenwood, and on individual properties.

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Thanks much to Jack Koeppel and Kim Leming for passing on these photos. These new images provide tremendously helpful views of buildings and businesses that we previously only knew through written records.

If you know of other photos, documents, and information on these properties and Hopewell history, please contact us so we can help share and preserve them.