The mere fact Ruben has hired one of the region's most high-profile commercial real estate firms to market the largest of her vacant properties is noteworthy in and of itself. Ruben purchased the 200-room Ramada hotel on the 600 block in 1989, which she still operates along with her namesake department store on the 900 block. Green buildings (which she sold for $700,000 in 2002 to the Richmond County Board of Education), the Kress Department Store on the 800 block (vacant since 1980) and the ' Bayou' building on the 900 block (vacant since gutted by a fire in 2001). The retail exodus of the late 1970s and 1980s gave Ruben an opportunity to snap up what was left behind on Broad Street, including the Davison's Department Store and H.L. 'We stayed downtown because we are committed.” “I always liked downtown the best,' Ruben told a Chronicle reporter years ago. (Although it should be noted Ruben's did operate a satellite location in the now-defunct Regency Mall.) That's because the owner of Ruben's Department Store – founded 120 years ago by grandparents Max and Rebecca Ruben – never left downtown after Augusta's suburban shopping malls opened in 1978. Ruben is certainly not downtown Augusta's only mothballed-property mogul, but she is arguably its most enduring. The Albion became the Penney department store in 1958, which it remained until 1987 when the retailer moved into a new big-box addition at Augusta Mall. The Albion's former west wing was redeveloped in 1923 as the eight-story Richmond Hotel, which has been the Richmond Summit – a subsidized 125-unit apartment complex – since 1979. Today, that avenue is blocked to vehicle traffic. The damaged sections of the building were never rebuilt, and a one-block street – Albion Avenue – was laid out when the block was rebuilt. Penney building is more historic than most.īuilt in 1900 as The Albion Hotel, the structure's existing footprint was shaped by a 1921 fire that destroyed the the center and west portions of what was once a U-shaped building.

Nearly all downtown structures are within the Broad Street Historic District, but the J.C.

Hotel mogul level 23 mall not for sale