Heard on the Street

TUMBLING DOWN. Washington Avenue Baptist Church and National Avenue Church of Christ are both coming down on Springfield college campuses. Washington Avenue Baptist is in the process of changing ownership into the hands of Drury College. Jim Bucholz, vice president of administration at Drury, said the site just north of Chestnut Expressway will become the college's new science center when construction begins in 2001. Drury's proposed acquisition of the property has a distinctly ecclesiastical flavor. Drury has an agreement for the purchase of Boulevard Baptist Church at 1722 N. National. Once that is complete the college and Washington Avenue Baptist will swap properties. Boulevard Baptist is acquiring property on Eastgate Avenue from the Council of Churches of the Ozarks to build a new church, Bucholz said. "Components of the (Washington Avenue) church that have historic meaning to them will be available," Bucholz said, noting such things as the church's distinctive sign, cornerstone and stained glass may be parts retained by the congregation. Bucholz said the new science center would stand opposite the Hammons School of Architecture and serve as a gateway to the campus. Meanwhile, Southwest Missouri State University is demolishing the former National Avenue Church of Christ on its campus. SMSU has owned the church for about three years and has had offices in the building since then, said Doug Sampson, supervisor of design and construction. Taylor Wrecking is the contractor on the demolition and much of the church's building material is being recycled, Sampson said. The university is planning parking on the National and Madison site, though a timetable for its construction has not been set. Another former house of worship, the First Church of Christ Scientist in the 300 block of Central Street, was bought by the city of Springfield in 1992. A city representative said no plans are on the drawing board for the property. The city now uses the church to store surplus city property slated for sale during its On The Block auctions, which are also held in the church.

NEW COMMERCE. Commerce Bank will have a new branch on North Kansas in 2000. Bob Hammerschmidt, president and CEO of Commerce in Springfield, said the new branch at North Kansas and Talmage will be a 6,000-square-foot full-service bank. Esterly, Schneider & Associates is the architect for the project and no contractor has yet been chosen, Hammerschmidt said. The new bank will become Commerce's main north location, supplanting the bank's 1661 Boonville site. Hammerschmidt said the 9,000 square feet leased from the Assemblies of God General Council at the Boonville bank will be reduced to about 1,000 square feet. The drive-through service will be maintained on Boonville. Many of the Boonville branch's employees will move to the North Kansas bank when it's completed as early as June 2000. Hammerschmidt said demographic studies of the bank's customers showed the North Kansas location in the midst of new development in the area such as Staples, that will be next to the bank is more in the geographic center of those customers.

A ROSE-CON BY ANY OTHER NAME. Rose-Con Pipe of Springfield Inc. is now Scurlock Industries. The change, official Aug. 1, is in name only, said Tom Baron. The former Rose-Con's parent company in Jonesboro, Ark., had a number of entities under it and had recently purchased others, all with disparate names. Baron said an internal contest to unify the company under a single name resulted in the new moniker, an homage to company founder Vance Scurlock. Save new letterhead, all else for the supplier of precast pipe remains the same.

NO. 11. Our own Dr. Cal LeMon (Well, we like to think of the contributing columnist as our own. Actually, he's distinctly his own person and president of The Executive Edge Inc.), has been rated the 11th most effective presenter by the National Society for Human Resources Management.

THE WORD'S OUT. If an area that attracts throngs of thousands can be termed a secret, it is such no more. Springfield's historic Walnut Street, host to the annual Artsfest that draws the aforementioned throngs, was featured in the September issue of Southern Living magazine. The Walnut Street Inn, Collections, Gallery Bistro, Market Place Cafe and the Walnut Street Gallery were all mentioned by name in the page-long piece.

SLICE OF NICE. The Alzheimer's Association Southwest Missouri Chapter will hold its 1999 Memory Walk Sept. 25 at Phelps Grove Park. The goal of the walk is to raise $50,000 for programs such as a resource library, support and education. St. John's Health System and St. John's PremierPlus are grand sponsors of the event. For more information, call 886-2199.