If you thought the destruction of the old Shakespeare’s Pizza at Ninth and Elm the fall of 2015 was a tragedy, it wasn’t the first one at that intersection. This article by Sarah Everett published in the Columbia Business Time on July 27, 2016 shows the a brick building with a columned portico that once occupied the corner opposite Shakespeare’s.

According to the article, that is now the site of the youth center of the Missouri United Methodist Church.

Starting in 1906, it housed the Columbia Commercial Club, the forerunner of the Columbia Chamber of Commerce, an organization which successfully campaigned for industry such as the Hamilton Brown Shoe Co. and I-70 and Highway 63. The article notes the last tenant before its destruction in 1969 was the fisheries research department of the Missouri Conservation Commission.

Of course, Shakespeare’s is set to return in August 2016 to the opposite corner on the first floor of the new high-rise apartment building, reportedly the same but better. However, even if the youth center of the church provides valuable services, it’s hard to see that the building that replaced the one torn down in 1969 is an architectural improvement.

It does show, however, that change is constant, even if brick and stone apparently isn’t as solid is one might think.