123-125 East Government Street
John Pfeiffer’s grocery business operated out of the ground floor of this building in the late 18- and early 1900s. When he left home for work each day, John did not have far to go as he and his family lived upstairs. Other Pfeiffer family members lived and worked across the street.
John Pfeiffer built this building about a decade after he built the Snead & Bibb iron building on the southwest corner of Palafox and Zaragossa Street. This building’s cast iron columns and lintels are strikingly similar to the Snead & Bibb façade. Unless there is a marker, identification of the cast iron buildings can be tricky.
Regardless of patents, iron foundries borrowed styles from each other. Many of the cast iron details were not original to the manufacturers but copied from Greek and Roman architecture. The acanthus leaf brackets atop of the columns supporting the horizontal beam decorated with dentil molding derive from classic Greek architectural design. The beautiful woodwork is from a later renovation of the building. The strong and sturdy iron columns allowed J.M. Pfeiffer’s store to have expansive window openings to display his wares.
