Mathews General Store

Duane's take

The official marker on this one has been my guide, and here's how I'd tell it. Now, Plano, Texas has seen its share of change over the years, but Mechanic Street has a story worth slowin' down for. It starts with fire, because so many Texas stories do.

October of 1895, a fire tore through the street, and what rose up after it were brick buildings. Solid, deliberate, built to last. One of several put up right there on Mechanic Street in the wake of that blaze.

Now, S. J. and Nancy Mathews had already come to Plano, that was back in 1893, and they'd opened a store across the street. They knew the neighborhood.

They knew the trade. And in 1906, they made their move, relocating into one of those post-fire brick buildings and setting up what would become Mathews Department Store. What did they sell?

Dry goods and clothing. The kind of store a town needs. But here's the detail that sticks with me: Nancy and her daughters were making the millinery themselves.

Hats, in other words, right there in the store, handcrafted by the women of the Mathews family. That went on for a long time. All the way until 1947, that store kept its doors open under the Mathews name.

And the building itself? Worth a look even if you're just passin' through. Running bond and corbelled brick on the façade.

Transom windows. Storefront windows. And those columns and base plates, those came from Sherman Iron Works.

Somebody made choices about this building, and those choices have held. After 1947, the place kept right on working, as a department store still for a while, then other businesses down the years. It never quit being commercial.

That's the quiet miracle of it. In a city that's grown and changed and grown some more, this is one of Plano's few 19th-century stores still in continuous commercial operation. S.

J. and Nancy Mathews crossed the street in 1906 and planted something that's still standing. Not bad for a piece of ground that started over in 1895.

What the marker says

This was one of several brick buildings erected on Mechanic Street after an October 1895 fire. S. J. And Nancy Mathews came to Plano in 1893 and opened a store across the street before relocating here in 1906. Mathews Department Store sold dry goods and clothing, including millinery made by Nancy and her daughters, until 1947. The building continued as a department store and then other businesses. The façade features running bond and corbelled brick, transom and storefront windows, and columns and base plates from Sherman Iron Works. It is one of Plano’s few 19th-century stores in continuous commercial operation.