Patterson Building

South Higgins Avenue grew rapidly as a commercial hub from 1915 to 1925, and this Western Commercial style building reflects the district’s early evolution. Missoula attorney John E. Patterson developed the property around 1915 while serving as judge of the Fourth Judicial District. Its first tenant was prominent Missoulian H. O. Bell, who operated an early Ford automobile dealership here and, between 1915 and 1929, sold 4,500 new Fords, 2,700 used cars, and many Fordson tractors from his showroom. Bell was also an aeronautical pioneer remembered in the naming of Missoula International Airport/Johnson-Bell Field. Another early tenant was the Quality Market, whose 1930s ghost sign still remains on the façade. The Patterson family owned the building until 2013. A sensitive rehabilitation exposed decorative polychromatic brick panels, a stepped parapet, pressed-metal interior ceilings, and restored the prismatic glass transoms. Introduced in the 1890s, prismatic glass transoms were a popular and practical way to direct daylight into building interiors, and their distinctive purple hue resulted from decades of exposure to sunlight.

Missoula, Montana · United States