From 2008 through 2014, our business, which included a sound stage, photo studio and several offices, was located in the Dunn Building, on South Railroad Avenue in downtown Chipley, Florida, right next door and attached to (with ‘zero lot line’) to the Mongoven Building, arguably one of the most embarrassingly interesting edifices in this sleepy town.
A bank at which my mother-in-law worked many years ago, the building was later remodeled into a restaurant, but through lack of interest, funds or a sense of history, was allowed to slowly fade into the unsightly hulk of moss-covered gutters, mildewed marble trim work, rotting rafters and broken glass that we see today.
For our first year in the Dunn Building, we occupied a suite which shared a wall with the Mongoven Building, that wall encompassing an office, restroom and kitchen/break room. First-time visitors to the restroom would be either enchanted or disturbed by the rain of grass bits and the cooing of pigeons in the ceiling in good, warm weather, or by the steady stream of rainwater following the surface of the old ‘Chipley brick’ walls when it was inclement.
At that time, in approximately 2008-09, newly elected blood in the city hierarchy purported to have a solution to the problem, with a potential grant discussed and a huge remodeling project in the planning stages. Seeing that such a project would severely impact our production work, we chose to relocate in another part of the Dunn Building, further removed from the promised construction project, that connecting wall and potential construction noise.
Well, nothing positive happened and after 6 years occupancy, doing business next to the Mongoven Building and observing huge clods of moss falling from the roof, gutters falling on parked cars and plate glass windows crashing to the sidewalks without warning, the city installed a chain link security fence which kept all but the most determined adventure seekers and pecan lovers (if you know, you know) from the premises.
A legal trust, liabilities, costs and other issues floated about for quite some time, followed by a failed purchase attempt and more flotsam and jetsam, until we find ourselves in present day discussions, with the city of Chipley moving toward purchase of the building, with demolition in mind, and the creation of a downtown Chipley Entertainment District.
Although I can tell you that at least during the half-dozen years during which we looked out the windows of the Dunn Building onto the foot, train and vehicle North and South Railroad Avenue traffic and the surrounding areas, there is already a lot of quite entertaining activity in the area, but we applaud the city fathers for finally being aggressive and proactive in the pursuit of sightliness and safety at the very least, and who knows what potential value at best.
