{"nrhp_refnum":"08000203","name":"Ah Louis Store","other_names":[],"category":"building","location":{"address":"800 Palm St.","address_restricted":false,"city":"San Luis Opispo","county":"San Luis Obispo County","state":"CA","lat":35.28268538400005,"lon":-120.66470578199994,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2008-03-26","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Asian","Commerce"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A two-story brick commercial and residential building at 800 Palm Street, San Luis Obispo, California, built in 1885 by contractor Alfred Walker for Chinese-American merchant Ah Louis on the site of his 1874 wooden store.","why_significant":"It is a surviving building from San Luis Obispo's historic Chinatown and is closely tied to Ah Louis (Wong On), a labor contractor, merchant and brickmaker. The store served as general store, bank, post office and employment office for the Chinese community, and it was the center of Chinatown. It is one of only four buildings left from the original Chinatown.","narrative":"Built in 1885 at the corner of Palm and Chorro Streets in San Luis Obispo, this two-story brick Italianate building replaced an 1874 wooden store owned by Ah Louis, born Wong On. Walker built it with bricks from Ah Louis's own brickworks. The ground floor held a general store with original redwood shelving and cabinetry, and the family lived upstairs. Heavy iron shutters, one marked by gunfire, still protect the openings. The store served as the center of the local Chinese community, acting as a bank, post office, gathering place and employment office. Ah Louis supplied laborers for wharves, roads and the Pacific Coast and Southern Pacific railroads, and he later pioneered a seed business. By the 1930s most Chinese residents had left, and this is one of only four buildings surviving from the original Chinatown. The building was designated California Historical Landmark No. 802 in 1975 and was seismically retrofitted in 2005 with little change to its historic appearance.","period_of_significance":"1885-1936","architect_builder":"Walker, Alfred","architectural_style":"Late Victorian/Italianate","criteria":["A"],"status_note":"Described as in excellent condition and almost entirely original, with earthquake retrofitting, rewiring and replumbing completed around 2005; it also serves as a specialty store and single dwelling.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:54:29.532804-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_CA/08000203.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/08000203/de69f26409-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/08000203/de69f26409-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 2.0","author":"The original uploader was XSG at English Wikipedia.","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ah_Louis_Store.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">The original uploader was XSG at English Wikipedia.</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 2.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ah_Louis_Store.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/123861439","wikipedia":null,"wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q57423003"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/california/san-luis-obispo-county/ah-louis-store-08000203/"}