The
earliest mention of the Denison grocery owned and operated by Alexander
Campbell and Elmer Groves is Christmas Day 1887, located at 702 W. Main, on the corner of S. Barrett Avenue.
The
1888 Sanborn Fire Map shows the store still on the corner at
702 W. Main in March 1888. The 1889 - 1890 City Directory listing
below was compiled in July 1888; therefore, the grocery must have been
moved further west on West Main St., a few doors to 718 W. Main St. between March and July 1888.
Campbell and Groves Grocery 718 W. Main St. Owners were Alexander Campbell and Elmor Groves Courtesy of : Toni Mabary Campbell Mavis
Anne Bryant
wrote: That house on the
right looks like a residential area,
which the 700 block of Main probably was at that time, as indicated by
the 1888 Sanborn Fire Map, which shows dwellings at 704, 706, 710 and
716 W. Main St.
Jim Sears wrote: The old maps show only one building to the west of 718 in the 700 block. It was a house, 728, on the corner of Armstrong Avenue. If I am correct about the location of the grocery, then the house on the right must be 728 West Main. [NOTE—I wrote that 728 West Main was on the corner of Armstrong Avenue. It was close, but there was actually a vacant lot between 728 and the corner. In later years, a house was built on it and given the number 730.] 728 West Main in 1891-92 was the home of Philip E. Fairbanks. A New Yorker by birth, he was secretary, treasurer, and director of the Cotton Mill; director of the First National Bank; and other things too numerous to list here. John Joseph Fairbanks and Alexander Campbell were first cousins. Toni Mabary Campbell wrote: My grandma (Groves) Hunter told me, back when I married into Elmer Campbell's family, that they were distant relatives of ours and the co-owners of the store. The Campbells, Groves, and Hunters were all Presbyterian. 
In the fall of 1888, Jacob Elmer Grove, Jr. (1865-1951), Campbell's brother-in-law, left the partnership to run a dray wagon.
Alexander Campbell moved his grocery from 718 W. Main to 830 W. Chestnut at the corner of Chestnut avenue & Scullin avenue in late 1890 and added feed and produce to the line of merchandise. Chestnut was just one block from Main St.
Old newspaper ads and city directories show that
he
remained at that location for the next 35 years, or at least until the
1925 City Directory was compiled. The business does not appear in the
1927 City Directory.
Supplies being picked up at Tishomingo, Oklahoma, to be brought back to Campbell & Groves Family Grocery in Denison. Courtesy of : Toni Mabary Campbell Alex. Campbell, Dealer in Staple and Fancy
Groceries
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