Know Your Neighborhood: 444 Lofts  

444 N 4th St was constructed in the early 1900’s (1st photo) for the ACME Tea Company.  Acme was established in 1891, when Irish immigrants Samuel Robinson and Robert Crawford opened a store in South Philadelphia.  In 1917 they merged their store with four small Philadelphia grocery stores and changed it's name to American Stores. It operated chains of drugstores and supermarkets (including Acme Markets) throughout the country, growing to some 1,800 stores by 1925. It served as firm’s primary headquarters for a while. In 1979, American Stores was acquired by the Skaggs Co., which took the company name and relocated it's offices to Salt Lake City.

Over the years, 444 was used for a variety of other businesses including a shoe manufacturing company, finalizing it’s commercial use as a large file storage facility.

Renovated to condos in 2007, it was one of the few buildings to survive the leveling of the area between 2nd & 9th from Callowhill to Spring Garden in the 1950's-60's.

1908

444 in the 1960's

Today