Columbus Near East Side Historic District-Parsons Avenue (Boundary Increase)

Parsons Avenue, just east of downtown Columbus, once served as the main business street of the Near East Side. This boundary increase adds the west side of the street between E. Broad Street and Bryden Road, a stretch of about two and a half blocks. It holds nine buildings, eight commercial and one residence, dating from 1886 to 1932, plus a vacant lot left after a fire-damaged building was demolished. The oldest is an 1886 Italianate block built for a chemist or druggist. Later buildings include a 1910 grocery, the plainly detailed Mattlin Building of 1922, the 1928 Tudor Revival Reynolds Building, and a 1930s auto service building for a long-established blacksmith and repair firm. The street thrived until World War I, declined afterward, and was cut off from its customers by Interstate 71 in the early 1960s. Listing recognizes the strip as the neighborhood's commercial core and as a record of changing commercial architecture.