1897 401 1st Street

This small one-story brick building has seen a variety of businesses during its 125+ year history. Originally built to be a bank it has a reinforced concrete pad for a vault along its eastern wall. The exterior has been altered quite a lot, though the outlines of original widows can still be seen on the F Street side of the building.

The building first appears on a 1897 map as a bank, though we haven't yet identified the bank in our research. 

It is a small building, that originally had a cut away corner entry fitted with double glass and wood doors, with an arched window above them. One arched window faced First Street, while two arched windows flanked a single-door entry on the F Street side. It sits on a basalt rock foundation. The back half which you see along F street is actually a separate building added in 1904, that is now part of Wild Bill's Longbar.

What was here before? A two-story wood frame building was home to the J.H. Hughes & Company hardware store with a tin shop at the back. Mr. Hughes operated the store from 1880 to 1890, and also was an early Mayor of Cheney. J.F. O'Donnell had the bad luck of purchasing the hardware store at the beginning of 1890, only to see it consumed by fire on February 18th of that year. A number of downtown businesses were destroyed in that fire which was later determined to have started in the tin works at the back of the building.

Back to our brick building. It was turned into the Cheney Post Office about 1905, but was soon too small to handle the mail. The Post Office moved to 122 College Ave in December 1908.

The Spokane Restaurant then opened in the space, but by 1916 Frank S. Bunnell was operating his Cheney Shoe Hospital here.

In 1927, Wes Packer opened the Kandy Kitchen confection shop. A couple of years later, the menu expanded to become Packer's Quick Lunch. The Cheney Shoe Hospital continued to share part of the building for its work. It was around this time that the First Street side of the building was remodeled. The cut-away corner was replaced with large glass display windows, a new double entry was centered at the front for the two businesses. 

In February of 1938 the Cheney Free Press noted:

"Rollie's Café (Rollie Johnston) will move to the corner of 1st & F to the building which formerly housed Packer's Quick Lunch and F.S. Bunnell's Cheney Shoe Hospital. Rollie's current location is on First across from the Post Office."

The café was a popular spot through the 1940s and into the 1950s. It closed in 1956, and the building went in a different direction of business. William F. McKinley operated his insurance and real estate business, sharing the space with Cheney's Liquor store through 1960. McKinley was followed by Garnett Boots operating Boots Insurance to 1965. Then in 1966, Bill Geschke opened Cheney Real Estate. Some additional remodeling of the front took place in this era, adding a wood shingle awning. Bill's son, Gary took over the business in 1978. Cheney Real Estate moved to new offices in the F&M Plaza mall at 1st & Cheney-Spokane Rd in 1987. 

Starting a new era for the building the Fishers of Men Bible Bookstore settled in after the real estate office moved. They were a fixture on the corner through 2008. Cornerstone Christian Books followed for a couple years, closing in 2010. The building has been vacant for over a decade, but in 2022 it was remodeled and opened as the Inferno Wings restaurant.

1. Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps 1884, 1888, 1890, 1891, 1897, 1905, 1908, 1916, 1939.\
2. Cheney Historical Preservation Commission Reports
3. Southwest Spokane County Historical Society image collection
4. Cheney Free Press, various dates
5. Cheney phone books 1955 - 2010
6. Cheney Enterprise 6 February 1890
7. Edwards, Jonathan. An Illustrated History of Spokane County, State of Washington. W.H. Lever, 1900.