CITY BEAT: FOND MEMORIES OF MEETINGS IN THE CITY’S TALLEST ‘SKYSCRAPER’

     Over the decades that I’ve been editor of this newspaper I’ve had the opportunity to be inside about all of the buildings of community significance many times.
     One building, still known today by most residents as the Staley Office Building, is one of the most impressive and you can read more about it in the second part of today’s “Scrapbook” feature on pages 4 and 5 in this week’s print and online edition.
     About all of my visits to the building, that stands tall on the city’s eastside, came during the years I served as Decatur’s mayor when several meetings were held there.
     I remember some gatherings involving members of Congress, including Dick Durbin, when we gathered in the conference room pictured at left and, another time, when we gathered and discussed the issues of the day in the massive rotunda that was impressive to anyone who was in the building for any reason.
     Several of my friends worked in the building for many years so a lot of what amazed visitors probably seemed less exciting to them — because they saw most aspects of it every workday for years.

     The building was 75 years old when I was making my visits there as mayor, but it was still very impressive to see firsthand..
     It has been several years since I was inside the building, and a lot has changed in Decatur and the business world since then.
     However, one of the solid memories that is etched into the minds of most residents who have lived in Decatur for any amount of time, is that 14-story building standing tall and proud as the “Palace On The Prairie”.

     • THE next tallest building after the “Palace on the Prairie” is the Citizens Building at Water and William streets downtown.
     I never had an office in that building, but when I started my business downtown in the mid-1960s, the Citizens Office Building was the top location for executive offices in the core area.
     Attorneys, doctors, dentists and other professions filled all of those offices and I did a lot of publication work for firms in that building in my early years.
     I remember one legal firm that occupied offices on the east side of the top floor of the building and the commanding view of downtown from the windows in that office.
     Many years later, when I was looking for office space for the Tribune after we were downsizing because of the elimination of so much huge typesetting equipment (thanks to the digital age), the office on the top floor with the commanding view was for lease.
     I did check it out and considered making the office I was in decades earlier my office and the view was just as spectacular from those windows so high above downtown as it was when I first saw it.
     However, it was too high. When I looked at Central Park and other parts of downtown, the people below seemed too far away.
     I didn’t want to be that removed from what was going on downtown!
     I shot a photo (below) looking east from one of those windows while I was looking at the office and it is printed here.

     Twelves stories up was a little like looking out of an airplane window to Decatur below.
     So, I decided to find another place for the Tribune offices and that’s when we moved to the fourth floor of the Millikin Court Building where we’ve been for the past 15 years.
     The fourth floor view is about the right height and I can seen Lincoln Square, the westend and so much of our downtown area from my office windows.
     It is an elevated view, but still close enough to the street to recognize people below.
     It is a touch of irony that I returned to the building where I started the business in 1964 on the fifth floor.
It was the Standard Office Building back then and it had the cheapest rent which was the reason I opened my office there.
     Today, thanks to the Romano Co., the Millikin Court Building is like new on the inside and I feel very safe with the security measures (cameras, locked doors, etc.) that are in place.
     Back in 1964 when I moved in, there was no air conditioning and heat was provided via radiators in each office.
     The remodeling of the building has produced an amazing environment and I’ve never had any regrets moving our newspaper offices to the Millikin Court Building — which is within walking distance to about every place I need to go in the core area.

     • SORRY to receive the news that Perkins Restaurant on the corner of West Pershing and North Monroe has closed down as of last week. There is some consideration that the restaurant may reopen in the future, but that’s questionable — especially if the reason for the closure was a lack of customer traffic.
     I have to admit that I went to Perkins fairly often for many years, but haven’t been there in the last several years.
The food service business has always been a tough road for owners to travel, with a high rate of failure, but it seems we’ve had more than the usual number of restaurants close down in the Decatur area during the past year or two.

     • I HOPE by the time you read this all the storms will be over! It seems like we have a bad storm about every other day — at least for the past few weeks!

     • I JOIN Brian Byers on WSOY’s Byers & Co., every Thursday morning at 7:00 for the City Hall Insider.
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