Funding has been secured for an unusual project in Phoenix that will see the restoration of a historic structure that for decades served as a Chinese grocery store.
Located at the corner of Tonto Street and 4th Avenue, the one-time Yuan Ah Gim Groceries was a mainstay of the city’s Chinese community until at least the late 1970s, with the building itself finally being boarded up in 2006.
The one-story concrete block structure was built in or around the year 1920. According to documents submitted to the National Register of Historic Places the building housed a “residential duplex that was added to the south side of the store” around 1925, as well as a residential fourplex that was “built at the same time to the west of the grocery.”
The store was an important part of a growing Chinatown section of Phoenix, first established in the late 19th century, that included residences, laundries, and various retail operations, all supporting a Chinese population that was not much larger than 400 people.
The Yuan Ah Gim Groceries building was purchased last year by investor Omar Fabian who, working with the city’s Historic Property Register office, has sought a rezoning of the site as an official historic property.
A staff report submitted earlier this year by the Historic Preservation Office operating within the city’s Planning & Development Department described the building as retaining “sufficient integrity of location, setting, materials, design, workmanship, feeling, and association to convey its significance as a corner grocery store.”
Noting that the doors and window openings of the structure are still intact, the report added: “Examples of this type of construction and property type” are becoming increasingly rare.
A $200,000 grant approved for the project by the Historic Preservation Office, matched by the owner, is expected to see the creation of new housing and community space at the property.
By Garry Boulard
Image Credit: Courtesy of City of Phoenix
