Historic Register Tour - Balkan Hotel

HISTORIC NAME	Bear Frame & Axle Garage
COMMON NAME	Same
DATE BUILT	C. 1930
ARCHITECT/BUILDER	unknown
PROPERTY STYLE
ON THE SPOKANE REGISTER	Yes - 8/04/2003
ON THE NATIONAL REGISTER
IN A DISTRICT	Yes- District
DISTRICT	Yes
NEIGHBORHOOD	East Downtown Historic District

STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE

The Bear Frame & Axle Garage has been a public service automobile garage for 73 years since its construction and is listed as a contributing property in the National Register East Downtown Spokane Historic District. The structure is an excellent example of the industrial garage building type that evolved due to local, state, and national transportation trends that spurred the construction of hundreds of thousands of similar garages across the country. With original Art Deco-style detailing especially seen on the building's facade in pyramidal parapet corner projections and pilaster chevron motifs, the design of the Garage is typical of public service garages built during the 1920s, 1930s and early 1940s in Spokane. Escaping demolition by the wrecking ball, the Bear Frame & Axle Garage is the only surviving garage on Block 2 in the Havermale Park Addition, which was once the site of three garages. Beginning in 1947, the Bear Frame & Axle Service Company leased the garage for 48 years until 1995, at which time the Sylvan Furniture Company occupied the premises for use as a garage and storage facility. The Lang family owned the property and then sold it to the Sylvan and Eleanor Dreifus in 1968.