Farmers and Merchants Bank Building

National Register Listing

Street Address:

Main St., Eastover, SC (Richland County)

Alternate Name:

Old Eastover Post Office

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NRHP Nomination

Record Number:

S10817740083

Description and Narrative:

(Old Eastover Post Office) The Farmers and Merchants Bank Building is significant as a good example of early twentieth century commercial architecture. Designed by the Columbia architectural firm of Wilson and Sompayrac and constructed by Weston and Brooker in 1910, this building was planned as a multi-purpose building. It is a two-story, brick and cast-stone building with an angled corner entrance as its primary feature. In addition to the bank, accessed at the corner, the building housed the W. M. Hunt Furniture Store on its Main Street façade. Between the two an open street entrance led upstairs to a doctor’s office and rental rooms for single men. Farmers and Merchants Bank was granted its charter of incorporation on April 12, 1910, and was established by Richard Singleton and Julian A. Byrd with $25,000 in capital. The bank remained chartered until June 22, 1954, when incorporation was cancelled. The bank had apparently ceased operations some time before that. It appears that Farmers and Merchants Bank survived both the boll weevil disaster of the late 1910s and early 1920s, and the early years of the Great Depression; however by 1937, the portion of the building occupied by the bank had become a post office and library. Listed in the National Register March 27, 1986.

Period of Significance:

1910

Level of Significance:

State

Area of Significance:

Architecture;Commerce

National Register Determination:

listed

Date of Certification:

March 27 1986

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