75 Court Sq

From the National Register nomination

Victorian three-story of painted stretcher-bond brick with a shed roof with stepped side parapets. The front parapet has corbeling above a band of recessed panels with corbeled tops. In the second and third stories are 1/1 windows with reeded wood surrounds. The side elevations are stuccoed and have 1/1 and 2/2 windows. Remnants of what is likely the original highly decorative storefront survive. At the west front corner is a cast iron pilaster with a tall round-arch recess on its face topped by an elaborate carved and chamfered wood bracket. (A much-altered similar bracket survives at the east front corner.) A modern balcony (at the location of a historic one) is supported by carved brackets (historic) and has a railing made from recycled iron fencing (modern). The upper-story entry at the west corner has a late 19th century wood door with reeding and incised gridwork on its two panels. Above the door is an old transom with recently-added stained glass depicting a boy and girl (the stained glass in the transom over the east corner entry depicts grapes and grape leaves). A 1980s Colonial Revival wood storefront with projecting and recessed panels is superposed on an earlier storefront. The 1886 Sanborn map shows this as a two-story dry goods store. The third story was added between 1891 and 1897, a period during which the building contained a drugstore. In 1902 it was used as a sample room, presumably for salesmen staying at the adjoining Clarendon Hotel. In later years a millinery shop, second-hand store, and restaurant operated here. Historic photographs show a polychrome paint scheme on the brickwork and iron and wood storefront before and after the third-story addition. Around 1900 the building also featured a balcony with a decorative iron railing above the storefront. A new storefront with decorative woodwork and stained glass was added in the late 1980s by the present occupant, James McHone Jewelry. (Wayne Harrison; Rockingham County: Its Past and Present, Suter and Lyon, Images of America: Harrisonburg, 14, 18, 114)