Among the very interesting things about being the curator of the local history museum are interactions with the visitors. My fundamental philosophy is simple: “I know what I know – You know what you know – But I won’t know what you know – Unless you tell me.” In short, many visitors know more about local history and history in general than do I. As a result, I often learn more from them than they do me. (Merci.)

         Last summer a Vermilion girl I’d not seen nor really heard anything about since high school (back in the early 1960s) paid a brief visit to the museum. I believe she currently lives somewhere in New England. I know not the specifics of her life between that time and today. But that doesn’t really matter. What I do know is that her grandfather, father and her uncle once owned and operated the E.G. Walker garage and auto sales business on Liberty Street here in Vermilion. I asked her if she had any photographs of the old garage. The accompanying photograph was her answer.

         Vermilion’s Ritter Public Library now occupies the site where Walker’s garage was located. Previous to the library expansion I always found the location of the garage to be somewhat ironic. That’s because before Walker’s auto repair and sales business (the one pictured) occupied the site a fella named Lewis Decker operated a livery stable there. That, of course, was a thriving 19^th and early 20^th century business concern. Decker’s stable provided housing, care, and food for horses, as well as one that rented out and boarded horses, carriages, wagons, and teams. It was in essence (and to my knowledge) Vermilion’s first and (hopefully) last pay-for-parking garage. In any case, we didn’t eliminate our need for transportation, we just changed our mode of transport.

Although I have several photographs of the garage after it was renovated in the late 1930s this was the first I’ve ever seen of it immediately following its life as Decker’s livery. Although there were several other auto sales and repair garages in Vermilion at the time, this photo of “Guy” Walker’s garage is a noteworthy, and perhaps for some a rather poignant, indication of changes taking place in the world and our village.

The garage pictured was a simple renovation of Decker’s livery. Initially it was a Hudson auto dealership. Among the vehicles sold by Walker was the best-selling Hudson Super-Eight featuring a 254-cu. in. straight-eight engine. It was a luxury vehicle. And then there was the unforgettable Terraplane, one of the hottest performing low-priced cars of the depression years. Some of its stock-car performance records were, believe it or not, unbroken until 1951.

It may be of interest to know that even though it is apparent that the day of the automobile had begun in Vermilion during the first decades of the 20^th century, subsidiary industries from by-gone days did not just disappear. The building just to the left of Walker’s enterprise in this photo was a blacksmith’s shop. And it may surprise ye to know that it operated as a smith’s shop into the 1950s. There were probably very few horseshoes needed in those later days. However, a blacksmith could and did repair farm and lawn equipment. But probably more important than that the smith’s shop was undoubtedly a great place for old-timers to have a smoke and talk of the yesteryear.

During WW2 auto production stopped completely in the U.S. Following the war Mr. Walker and his sons, Gene and Dick, began selling “refreshed” 1942 Dodge and Plymouth autos. By that time the garage building had also been  refreshed / renovated in a modern style. No traces of the old horse-and-buggy building remained. In time a North Olmstead fellow named Dick Baker became the proprietor of the dealership eventually selling the building to the library board. And we all know (as Paul Harvey the old radio commentator used to say) “the rest of the story.” But maybe not…

© RNT March 9, 2026