Muscogee County GaArchives Photo Place.....Rankin Square ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/gafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Christine Thacker http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00033.html#0008100 April 24, 2007, 2:27 pm Source: Ledger- Enquirer, Special Sesquicentennial Supplement II Photo can be seen at: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/muscogee/photos/rankinsq12657gph.jpg Image file size: 38.6 Kb Rankin Square: Kamensky's Dream By Constance Johnson Ledger Staff Writer It started when Harry Kamensky went West. As a member of a committee appointed by Mayor Jack Mickle to plan a trade- convention center for Columbus, Kamensky was in the group that made a hop-skip visit to four western cities in January 1976. The committee already had recommended to the mayor that the city buy the old Columbus Iron Works property overlooking the Chattahoochee River and convert it into a trade and convention center. As they headed west, their purpose was to see how old buildings can best be adapted for a 20th Century role. What they saw in San Francisco, Seattle, Salt Lake City and Denver reinforced a belief that the iron works complex would give Columbus something unusual: a showcase for trade shows, a functional center far conventions, and a historic building exciting in itself. While all members of the, delegation were exuberant about the iron works potentialities, Kamenskyreturned like a man inspired. An idea that had been germinating in his mind for almost 10 years exploded into what would become Rankin Square. Lookking back, Kamensky said the magic moment acurred in Denver, on a second- day visit to a block of old buildings that had been transformed into Larimer Square. "It struck me that we've got more in Columbus than they had there," he recalls. Years earlier, Kamensky had played with the idea of buying the shabby Rankin, which decades ago had lost its glamor as a hotel. The western trip convinced him that the Rankin still had marvelous possibilities, but only within a larger framework. The entire block would have to be changed. Back in Columbus, Kamensky began buying options, working feverishly with architect Rozier Dedwylder, and in February, 1976, less than a month after seeing Larimer Square, announced plans far redeveloping most of the Rankin Hotel block between Broadway and First Avenue, 10th and 11th Streets. Rankin'Square, as it would be called, was projected to cost $3.5 million and take at least five years to complete. While the Dartmouth-educated Kamensky was doing well in the scrap materials business (he doesn't mind the term "junk), he needed money to take on that kind f deal. To raise capital, he and a few associates formed Rankin Square Inc., offering shares to limited partners at $5,000 each. To date, 89 shares worth $445,000 have been sold. This money, plus construction loans and mortgages have propelled Rankin Square to its present stage, still incomplete but a year ahead af schedule on the five-year timetable. From the beginning, Kamensky planned to move a step at a time, getting plans for one building, negatiating a lease, then remodeling the structure within Dedwylder's overall design. First Avenue, the initial target, was a sorry sight, a seedy block-long stretch of porno shops, pool halls, beer joints and peep shows. The interesting details in the 19th century architecture was distorted by false store fronts, bricked up windows, displaced doors, layers of paint and the ravages of time. Overhanging signs, utility poles and wires made the streetscape even more depressing. When Kamensky announced his ambltious plan, skeptices chortled. But within a few months the jeers turned to cheers when one of the oldest commercial buildings in Columbus, old Muscogee Fire Co. No.3 station at 1041 First Avenue, was given the Cinderella treatment. Thereafter came Emmy's restaurant next to the fire station, law firms and a brokerage house in the old Oglethorpe Hotel on First Avenue, and a chic decorator shoP on 10th Sheet with a rear entrance on the Rankin Hotel courtyard. Tavern on the Square, a eating place on 11th Street, was acquired as a part of Rankin Square. After a fire in a Broadway building that had lost its identify as the Central House Hotel long before it housed a Goodwill store, Kamensky brought the charred remains. He cleared it back to the walls (with the fireplaces still showing)opened it through to the Rankin Square courtyard, and called it Central House Mall. A portion of the building that didn't burn was converted into four apartments on the second and third levels. At street level, in the rear of the mall is the Rankin Deli, which after its opening in 1977 became an overnight favorite luncheon spot in downtown Columbus. On 10th Street, Spano's- the oldest business in the block and the oldest restaurant in Columbus -has been completely renovated and expanded to about three times its former size. The city government, which comes under attack for every dime it puts into downtown Columbus, offered encouragement by a timely decision to separate the sanitary sewer system from the combined storm-sewer line along First Avenue. While the digging was underway, it became financially possible to put the utility lines underground. The city also installed new light standards on First Avenue that are more compatible with the 19th century facades. Still ahead in the Rankin Square plan are renovations of the Rankin Hotel, the Giglio building and second story spaces on First Avenue, the livery stable within the courtyard and landscaping. But what has been accomplished thus far has given downtown Columbus revitalization its biggest shot in the arm since the Springer was restored and the Government Center built. Rankin Square, along with the Springer, the Government Center and the future trade and convention center-all within three blocks of each other - are the talk of Columbus, the subject of political speeches and Chamber of Commerce promotions. The newest addition to the list of attractions is the plan for a Columbus-Radisson Hotel across the street from the trade center. While Kamensky's dream for Rankin Square stands as a singular commitment to the renaissance of downtown Columbus, his role in two other projects is not as fully recognized. As chairman of the Muscogee County Democratic Executive Committee, Kamensky challenged the mayor and city council to stop their foot- dragging on a lO-year-old plan to create a trade-convention facility. And once the mayor's committee began working in earnest, the hotel evolved as a Siamese twin. Experience in other cities showed them that a trade-convention center would not succeed without a complementing hotel. Through it all, Kamensky has rubbed many people the wrong way and been criticized as abrasive, high-handed, a self-promoter.Others see him as a man with enormous vision, vitality and tenacity, in love with his city, and daring enough to take a risk and make it a reality. Special Sesquicentennial Supplement II Ledger- Enquirer, Sunday, April 23, 1978.S-18 Scanned by Christine G. Thacker, 8/22/2007. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ga/muscogee/photos/rankinsq12657gph.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/gafiles/ File size: 7.6 Kb