Historic Clearmont Building Gets Facelift

The oldest and most recognizable building in Clearmont, standing at the corner of New York and Front Street,  recently received a new paint job.  Currently owned by Tom and Julie Weber,  the old building was, for years, known as the Pay and Save Grocery store, and is now a private residence.

       The old rock building was built by J.N. (Jeptha) Sweat, who purchased the corner lot on December 1903. In May of 1904, he took out a mortgage to finance the building of his dreams. Sweat was making plans to start his own business and build a 10 room hotel and saloon.  It was to be the finest building of it’s kind in the Clear Creek Valley. The building was completed in 1907, but unfortunately, Sweat ran into financial difficulties and the bank foreclosed the same year.  The bank sold the building to B.J. Perkins August 1908 in amount of $4050.00.

       In 1923, a fire engulfed the building, leaving only a shell of the rock walls standing.  The store was rebuilt, and was purchased in December 1938 by Carl Sackett as an investment.  Renamed the Clearmont Hotel and Drug store, Sackett sold it to Russell Snider, who was running a grocery store next door.  Snider sold groceries on the lower floor, renaming it the Pay and Save Market, while the  upstairs rooms were leased out.  The building went through several owners over the next few years, but the name, Pay and Save, was retained.  Addie Cook purchased it 1977, and ran it until she sold to her daughter, Julie and her husband, Tom Weber in August of 1994. They ran it as a grocery store, and later added a deli, served sandwiches, drinks and a carried a small selection of liquor.

       Julie Weber added, “We ran the grocery store for about 10 years, then we closed down.  I ran a quilt store and fabric store in the building from 1999 until four years ago, now it’s just our home.  We live upstairs and the downstairs is my sewing room.”

       “We’ve been wanting to repaint the outside for a long time, and this spring we finally felt we had the time to do the facelift.  Tom did the work himself, he scraped off the old paint, repaired the old concrete, and repainted the building.”  They also replaced the lower windows, and painted the trim white. 

       Julie added, “Its the first building you see when you come into town, so we wanted a color that was classy, and the color we choose was from an historic colors paint line, and we like it.”  She said they have received a lot of positive feedback from the community.  “A lot of people like it.”