Sept 8, 2022

Earlier this week, a subscriber to our e-edition reported he had purchased at an auction a small box that had Long & Son Hardware, Superior, Nebraska, stenciled on it.

I envisioned the box to be smaller but much like the one I have in my garage which holds the leaves to the dining room set my mother purchased in 1941. Only that box has the name of C. R. Phillipi Furniture, Superior, Neb. Mr. Phillipi was married to Grandfather Blauvelt’s sister, In 1918, he and my grandfather opened a furniture and undertaking business in the building at Fourth and Central which in more recent years has housed the Glass Connection.

The Phillipi furniture store was to occupy at least two other locations in the downtown Superior, the last being the opera house building at Fourth and Central. By 1941, Charlie had retired and sold the business. Don’t know how my parents came to have the box that was sent Uncle Charlie. Perhaps they bought the box and leaves at an auction or they repurposed the box. Mother’s dining room set was purchased from the Mullet Store. Charlie worked for John Mullet before going into his own business 104 years ago.

This week the subscriber was asking if I knew anything about the Long hardware store. The store was gone long before I was born but I heard my father talk about it. The store building to the east of The Express office once housed the Mullet and Long Hall. Could there be a connection?

Dad purchased from the Sam Long Hardware Store the first balloon tire bicycle sold in Superior. I don’t know the year but according to my father’s story prior to that all bicycles sold in Superior came with solid tires. The balloon tire concept was so new that Sam Long took the young Roy Blauvelt to Lincoln to see the new bicycles. I would like to have that bicycle today but like most boys, Dad’s interest in bicycles turned to automobiles. His first car was a Model T he purchased from James Nicholls, the man who in later years endowed the college loan fund that carries his name.

I’d rather Dad had kept the Model T but like the bicycle, only the memory exists today.

Monday I turned to the three volume reference history of Superior written by Stan Sheets expecting to learn more about the Longs and their connection to Superior.

In 1906, the W. P. Long firm leased a frame building at 256 N. Central Avenue and opened a hardware, plumbing and furnace business. In 1915 a plumbing license was issued to W. P. Long & Son. That license was to be maintained until 1937. Over the years several additions were made to the store building and a new board walk constructed on the Third Street side. The building was razed in the 1950s.

In 1918, Sam F. Long Hardware was reported to be the successor to the W. P. Long & Son firm. Prior to entering the hardware business with his father, Sam was manager of the lumber yard now known as Kenny’s Lumber and Farm Supply. An advertisement in the Superior Journal said the Long firm sold Racine tires. In the 1930s a potato chip maker rented the rear portion of the Central Avenue building. A fire ended the potato chip business but did not destroy the building or close the hardware store.

Sam died in June of 1937 and the Long business closed that September,

In May of 1917, Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Long built a home at 753 N. Dakota.

Sam Long was born in 1875 in Madisonburg, Pennsylvania. He came to Jewell County with his parents in 1879, moving to Superior in 1880. He was the father of four children, one of which became Mrs. Minor Baird. Another daughter married Richard Furlow, the man who designed the Champlin Refining Company’s Superior petroleum tank farm. His sister, Avis, married Frank Stubbs. Stubbs was an attorney with an office in Superior. He also served for a time as Nuckolls County attorney. His son, also known as Frank, was the operator of an insurance agency,

In January of 1924, Sam Long advertised clamp-on steel wheeled roller skates for $2.25 a pair. I don’t know if my skates came from Long’s store but I remember having a pair. They clamped to my shoes at the front and had a strap that went over the instep. They weren’t much good in the country where there were few concrete sidewalks but I liked to bring them to town and skate on the concrete sidewalks that circled most residential blocks. I tried to avoid those blocks that contained brick sidewalks or poorly constructed concrete walks with big cracks.

I also rented similar skates when visiting the Skatemor Roller Rink. If I could acquire a quarter, I could pay the roller rink’s 10 cent admission fee and 10 cents to rent a pair of clamp-on skates. After I finished skating, I could go up town and purchase a nickel ice cream cone. Clamp-on skates only worked with heavy leather shoes that had thick soles on which to tighten the clamps.

John Mullet, the founder of the Mullet Hardware Store, also came to Superior from Jewell County. He married Emma Long and the Long name was associated with the Mullet name in some Superior business ventures. If the conclusions I have made from reading the Sheets’ history are correct, the Longs in the Mullet line are not related to the Longs which operated a competing hardware store. Both Mrs. Mullet’s father and Sam Long’s father were named William but their middle initials were different. Sam’s father was William P. and Emma’s father was William I. They may have been related but probably not brothers with such similar names.

Bill Winebar who in later years operated a plumbing business in Superior was employed in the plumbing department by the Long Hardware store. The Winebar firm was for many years located on East Second Street before building the structure which now houses Mid-Nebraska Individual Services. Bill’s son, Richard, moved the business into a new building on East Third Street. That building is now occupied by Superior Outdoor Power. Bill Winebar’s brother, Bob was also a plumber associated with the Winebar firm.

If asked the age of the small box purchased by the Omaha resident at an auction, I would guess it to be more than 100 years old since the Long & Son name was not associated with the store after 1918.

While I don’t have one, I have seen yard sticks with the Phillipi & Blauvelt Furniture Store name. Those yard sticks date to 1918 and are now 104 years old.

Our cardboard shipping boxes and plastic measuring sticks won’t last that long.