As you arrive back from your tour of the two northern sections of the Crystal City the areas to the South of Main and Wooster also provide interesting avenues of life in 1890s Bowling Green. Beginning our tour will be the historic Millken Hotel followed by the Opera House home of the cultural life of the Crystal City. Facing busy South Main Street please be mindful of the comings and goings of Bowling Green citizens entering or leaving the hotel or hurrying to one of the attractions playing at the Opera House.

101-109 South Main Street Millikin Hotel The Evening Tribune, May 16, 1896, called the Hotel Millikin "Bowling Green's Pride." The hotel is still a gathering place, as it was in its glory days some eighty years ago. In 1977, the hotel was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Hotel at 101 - 109 S. Main St. was designed by Toledo architects Bacon and Huber and built by contractor Richard Hattersly. The groundbreaking took place on July 4, 1895 and the building was fully completed in 1897. The building is three stories with a basement and is rectangular in shape. The basement extends under the Wooster Street sidewalk. The foundation is constructed from limestone. The wall construction and treatment is a buff colored "St. Louis pressed brick" and buff "Amherst stone" ("It's Bowling Green's Pride"). There are seven bays, or structural divisions on the front of the building and fourteen on the side. A bracketed cornice supports the balustrade which follows the roof line. A section of the balustrade on the East Wooster side was blown off in some heavy winds on March 28, 1920 and was never replaced. A balcony below this section was damaged and removed as well (Bowling Green Ohio, A Sesquicentennial History, 31). The windows on the second and third stories are rectangular with the exception of two arched windows, one centered over the entrance on South Main St., the other to the rear of the East Wooster side centered over the carriage alley. There are oculus or oeil-de-boeuf openings centered directly over each arch. There are eight oculus windows on the third story, four on the East Wooster side centered over the rectangular windows and four in the rear of the building. These windows are gold and white stained glass with a floral motif. The third story rectangular windows have simple frames except on the East Wooster rear section where they are crowned with a bracketed cornice. The second story windows on the South Main Street side and front section of the East Wooster Street side have a bracketed cornice whereas the second story windows on the rear of the East Wooster Street side are plain-framed. The East Wooster Street side has three arched entrances and two arched windows on the first floor

139 South Main Street Froney Building Insert Text Here

163 South Main Street Kaufman Building This rectangularly shaped building, a Queen Ann design , was originally a general merchandise store owned and operated by Sam Riess. Sitting on a solid limestone foundation, the three story building is covered with brick and has a flat roof. Built in 1892 by J.R. Hankey and Lewis Sanglier, Kaufman's is a nicely restored commerical structure housing a resturant and bar. The flat topped windows have painted stone lintels, and there is a classical cornice with rectangular panels above , at the roof line. The name and date of the building are in the center below the cornice. The center bay is one narrow window, while the side bays are sets of double windows. It has a plain but pleasing appearance.

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