OAK CLIFF OAKLEY

Most Oak Cliffers remember Dallas County Schools, whose headquarters were at the northeast corner of West Davis at Zang for decades.

But who remembers when it was Fred Oakley Motors?

The auto dealership opened with a brand-new building, constructed for $130,000 in 1948, and originally was the city’s second Studebaker dealership, later adding Packard and Chrysler. In 1952, they expanded to include a lot on North Beckley behind the original dealership.

Now-defunct Dallas County Schools later owned all of that land. They sold it to Crescent Communities in 2014, and their mixed-use development, Novel Bishop Arts, currently is under construction there. Crescent later sold the Beckley parcel to Central Market, which has not yet announced any plans for it. Oakley, who lived on Kessler Parkway and worked in some of Dallas’ earliest car dealerships in the 1930s, died in 1976. The dealership moved to Irving in the late ’70s and was acquired by AutoNation USA in 1999. — RACHEL STONE

By RACHEL STONE I Photos by KATHY TRAN

offee and chocolate are not so far apart.

Oak Cliff Coffee

Roasters owner Shannon Neffendorf started forming relationships with coffee growers years ago and developed a direct trade for coffee beans. Now he’s working on a similar system for chocolate.

For now, Five Mile Chocolate, which is based out of Neffendorf’s Davis Street Espresso, buys beans from California-based Uncommon Cacao, which works with farms to create a fair and sustainable cacao supply chain.

Culturally speaking, chocolate is about 10-15 years behind coffee, says Jessica Beeman of Five Mile Chocolate. “Bean-to-bar,” which starts with roasting cacao beans and several days later ends with a perfect bar of chocolate, is a bigger deal in America than other places, she says.

While there are a couple of chocolatiers in Oak Cliff, including beanto-bar maker CocoAndré, “no one in Dallas has devoted a whole business to bean-to-bar,” Beeman says.

The bars take about five days to produce, starting with a roaster in the shop’s front window. Each bar contains 75 percent cacao, 25 percent organic sugar and nothing else. Flavors come forward depending on the beans and the roasting.

“We’re always tweaking that roast profile,” Beeman says.

Our neighborhood is home to three chocolatiers — CocoAndré and Dude Sweet Chocolate in Bishop Arts and Kate Weiser in Trinity Groves — and now a chocolate maker. They’ll all be participating in the three-day Dallas Chocolate Festival this month.

The festival, at the Fashion Institute Gallery in Downtown Sept. 7-9, is one of only two major chocolate festivals nationwide. It’s open to the public and includes demonstrations, workshops and samples.

Five Mile Chocolate

Ambience: Coffee shop

Price: $8 per bar

Hours: 6 a.m.-3 p.m. Monday-Friday, 7 a.m.-6 p.m. Saturday, closed Sunday

Address: Davis Street Espresso, 819 W. Davis St. fivemilechocolate.com