J.M. McNaughton & Co. Hardware and Goodman & Yerxa Groceries and Dry Goods in 1879. [Regional Studies #2029.8.21]
Peter Goodman and W.A. Yerxa founded the Goodman & Yerxa Groceries and Dry Goods general store in 1875. Shown in the above 1879 photograph is the Union Block, built in 1878. The Goodman & Yerxa general store was one of the original businesses on the block. The Union Block stood two-stories tall and was built of brick. It had ornate brickwork design adorning the top of the building. Goodman left Fargo in 1882
[1], leaving Yerxa as the owner. Yerxa expanded his business into the W.A. Yerxa and Company, and he soon owned “three other buildings, each 25 x 100”
[2]. Yerxa’s four buildings housed his four companies which supplied Fargo with a retail display and sales department, groceries and crockery, clothing and boots, and dry goods and carpets. Yerxa’s business was key to the commercial, retail and industrial growth of Fargo and the Union Block was the starting point.
The Fargo Fire of 1893 originated in the Union Block (notice the restaurant sign). [Regional Studies # 51.30.1]
-Logan Kern, Digital History 2012
[1] http://library.ndsu.edu/fargo-history/early/yerxa.htm
[2]http://books.google.com/books?id=OCYaAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA43&lpg=PA43&dq=goodman+%26+yerxa+fargo&source=bl&ots=T-guallOj5&sig=Swfz8EslmXQl4kQ6iSFRPoLoDw4&hl=en&sa=X&ei=q_qRUOjJG8q3yQHUp4GIDA&ved=0CDEQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=goodman%20%26%20yerxa%20fargo&f=false
