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The most obvious improvement to our city has been the erection of the E. K. Hoge Building at the corner of Twelfth and Market Streets in Wheeling. This building is an imposing edifice rapidly nearing completion. It is said to be the most obvious improvement because it is in such a central location that there are probably not ten citizens of Wheeling who have not noticed it being raised.

This building has been built by Mr. E. K. Hoge a prominent citizen of Wheeling. It is a three story structure, fire-proof throughout. On the first floor there will be three store-rooms with beautiful show-window fronting on Market Street. On the next two floors will be seventeen light and airy office rooms with an entrance through the adjacent McLain Building on Twelfth Street. The Hoge-Davis Drug Company, of which Mr. E. L.Hoge is President will occupy the corner room and in addition to a modern drug dispensary the company is installing a soda fountain sixty feet long on the Twelfth Street side of the room. This room will be ventilated by the latest type of air-washing machinery, clean, pure air being forced in and the air which has become impure being forced out.

The building cost in excess of $300,000. In its construction only Wheeling labor was employed and asfar as possible the materials used were Wheeling made building materials. Mr. Hoge stated in effect, when interviewed, that he felt the future of Wheeling was assuredly a bright one and that he had built his building this year rather than the next to do all that he could to alleviate the local conditions of unemployment.