Dated at 1905, this is the oldest Kelly Supply historical photos we've found so far. From a distance, it seems fairly unremarkable. Click on the above picture to see a much larger version, but even then it may not seem like much other than being a nice old photo. But as always, a little digging and closer examination pays off.

First off, and most important in relation to the Kelly Supply Company, you can clearly make out that the horse drawn carriage shown above says "Porter-Kelly Plumbing". Kelly didn't get their first company truck until 1909, so this was obviously the only way to transport materials and workers to a job site. Speaking of workers and job site, you may not have even noticed what's going on in the photo:

We're not sure if this building was going up for a client or if it was a new shop for Porter-Kelly. But we may be very close to finding out. One obvious question we had was where in Grand Island was this photo taken? If we knew that, would we have a better idea of what building is being constructed in the photo?

Well, partially at least, we solved the mystery! But in doing so we came across some other interesting info that we'd like to share first. Read on!

Off in the background, beyond the 2 workers, we can see a building that says “GLOVER'S”.

Our research has turned up a man named H.H. Glover who founded and ran H. H. Glover & Co., large dealers in dry goods, including clothing, boots and shoes, carpets, and all sorts of things. Born in Dorchester, Mass. in 1853, he moved to Grand Island and opened the above business.

In 1902 or so, Glover and 3 other prominent Grand Island businessmen (G. H. Thummel, R. R. Horth & James Cleary) donated a site at Walnut and Second streets to be used for the construction of a new library. Securing $20,000 from a foundation created by Andrew Carnegie, Tyler & Sons of Lincoln, Ne were hired as architects and Falldorf & Kirschke of Grand Island were awarded the building contract.

While looking for info on Glover, we came across the color postcard below, now located in the Omaha Public Library. It’s dated between 1907-1920, and depicts “Glover’s Boat House, Schimmer’s Lake, Grand Island, Neb.” The same Glover? Don’t know for sure. Do you? If so, drop us a note in the comment box below.

And now, on to another portion of the photo that yields some interesting information, and a crucial clue.

Ferdinand Seebohm, full name Frederick William Ferdinand Seebohm, was from Maryland and married in Grand Island in 1902. An article in the Grand Island Independent from Sunday, Sept 6th, 1998 says: “Ferdinand W. Seebohm ran Seebohm Music Co. in downtown Grand Island and played in the municipal band into the 1950s.”

However, upon closer inspection, the building doesn’t seem to make mention of “Seebohm Music Co.”, but you can clearly make out the letters “E-R-I-E-S”. Kind of looks like “groceries”, doesn’t it? We thought so. Could Ferdinand have had a grocery store before opening his music store? Well, we looked into it and that's exactly the case. We found mention of Ferdinand Seebohm Groceries, owned by Ferdinand Seebohh and located on the NE corner of 2nd & Wheeler. So that gives us a location for this photo!

And a nice surprise: The same place where we found the above info regarding the location of Ferdinand Seebohm Groceries also gives the location of the building owned by H. H. Glover, the NW corner of 3rd & Wheeler! So there you have it! We've pretty much pinpointed the location of the building being constructed in the photo. We're going to look into whether or not the building was for the Porter-Kelly company, but in the meantime, we're asking for your help.

Using the info we've provided above, we're hoping that our readers can either identify which building is being constructed in the above photo. Is the building still there? If not, what's there now? Any chance a reader could take a current photo of the same vantage point? Any help would be greatly appreciated and feel free to leave any and all comments below.