Lobach Building

In 1897 Edwin Lobach built a two-story double-bricked building at 125 East Main Street. The building had stone trim, cast iron columns, a parapet with decorative brickwork and a stone name and date plaque as well as highly decorative panels with fleur-de-lis and anthemion ornament. Originally the building housed a clothing store and a combination  confectionary and cigar store on the first floor and an Elks Lodge on the second. In 1899 Lobach erected a one-story, three storefront building to the east that notably housed The Florence Tribune newspaper; now the site of “Lill’s Garden.” Edwin Lobach had been a miner, opened a mercantile, hauled freight and worked on the railroad.  After developing one of the finest ranches in the county he organized a company that drilled an oil well in 1880, which began the Florence oil boom.