Lihue Store, with its unique mascot — a small, carved wooden man holding a spyglass that stood outside on the southwestern edge of the store — was located on a now vanished corner of Rice Street north of and opposite the Isenberg Memorial.
Built of concrete and opened in 1913, it carried general merchandise, hardware, dry goods, groceries and cold storage items and was at the center of the community and a familiar Kaua‘i landmark until it was razed in the mid-1960s to make way for the Lihu‘e Shopping Center.
But the original Lihue Store, a 1-1/2 story wooden structure, was built in 1850 at Koamalu above the sugar mill.
One early storekeeper’s Dickensian handle was Johnny Stubblebean, and sugar planter George Wilcox got his start in business there.
Then in 1876, when Oswald Scholz was manager, the store was moved down into the mill valley and uphill on rollers pulled by ox teams to the corner on Rice Street (then called Government Road).
A framed building replaced this store in 1896, and before construction commenced on the concrete store in 1911, the framed building was moved westward onto the site where the old Tip Top Building would be built in 1915 — approximately where the “round building” of the Lihue Civic Center now stands.
On opening day, Nov. 8, 1913, thousands of customers thronged the new store. Displayed were the latest fashions purchased back East by Mr. De Lacy, Manager Hermann Rohrig’s buyer. But the most popular feature was the soda fountain, crowded with customers throughout the day.
For entertainment, a Hawaiian quintet played upstairs. Flowers and palms decorated the interior, and outside, never before had more cars been seen at one place on Kaua‘i during the course of a single day.
