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‘THE PRETTIEST BUILDING ON MAIN STREET’
A renovated anchor serves the city in Lake Village.
BY STEPHEN KOCH
Tushek Building
WINROCK INTERNATIONAL Totaling 4,000 square feet, the Tushek Building “could have been anything,” said former owner Beverly Mihalyka. And it has been. But, over a century of use, the Tushek may now be serving its most important function yet — as the anchor of municipal services for its citizens, and as a model of historic renovation in a city looking to encourage reinvestment in its downtown.
The two-story building has housed a jewelry store, and later became Epstein’s, a department store that eventually moved down the street in the 1950s. It was also home to Lake Village’s first telephone office, an optometry office for the Tusheks’ son and USDA offices. A rooming house was upstairs, and during the 1927 flood the family lived on the second floor — rare high ground in the flat river Delta plains of extreme Southeast Arkansas.
As years went on, the distinctive structure fell into disrepair, although the thickwalled building remained structurally sound. Mihalyka, who now lives in Vicksburg, Mississippi, loved it so much that she and her then-husband’s company, Chicot Irrigation, bought the Tushek from the family. “I couldn’t let anything happen to that building,” she explained. Estimates for renovation ran at about $1 million. After plans for a restaurant languished, JoAnne Bush, Lake Village mayor at the time, asked if they’d consider donating the building to the city.
And today, the Tushek, located on Main Street in the Chicot County seat, serves as Lake Village City Hall. “I’m in the building right now,” said Lake Village Mayor Joe Dan Yee during a phone interview. LEED certified, the Tushek Building became Lake Village City Hall 10 years ago. In addition to the mayor’s office — with its stellar views of Lake Chicot, the titular “Lake” in the town’s name — the building houses municipal court offices, city council chambers, the fire chief’s office and police. The city water department is also located in the building, which means most of the local citizenry visits at least once a month, if only to pay the water bill — but benches outside encourage sitting a spell if you’ve got the time.
JoAnne Bush served as mayor during the changeover. “We had outgrown the old City Hall, and it was not in the best shape,” she said. Born and raised in Lake Village, Bush had childhood memories of the jewelry store and Mr. Tushek, but she was driven by more than nostalgia for an admittedly “gorgeous” building: “We wanted to stay downtown and stir up some growth,” she said, noting that “most new construction is out by the highway.”
With the previous city hall in “pitiful” condition, council member Linda Haddock served on the renovation committee; she said the goal was to save and restore as much of the building as possible. Original doors were hung on the walls “like art.” The early 20th century wood floor remains on the top story. The antique glass display cabinets from the Tusheks’ jewelry store era now show off other jewels — area “relics,” including a hunk of the old river bridge that once straddled the mighty Mississippi east of town. “It’s a beautiful way to show off those things, and preserve what we have,” Haddock said. In still another instance of adaptive reuse, the old mayor’s office is now the local food pantry.
“It’s the prettiest building on Main Street by far,” Haddock said. “And it’s all only because JoAnne Bush was on this project like white on rice. She was the glue.”
Bush said with the Tushek serving as the central hub for city services, Lake Village was “able to shut down four different city buildings, so we saved money there. And having all that in one place made it really accessible [to the public].”
Remembering her time “pestering everyone for grants,” Bush said she encourages municipalities and “all mayors to take advantage of all the resources out there. I believe in grassroots — from the bottom up, not the top down.” A decade ago, with the Tushek freshly renovated, Bush’s initial inclination in setting up her office was for the mayor’s desk to face the lake. She changed her mind. “I decided to put my back to the lake, so maybe some who come in here who were not happy were made happy by looking at the lake.”
Saving the Tushek “was just the thing to do,” former owner Mihalyka noted.
“Now, we just need more people to invest in Lake Village and Main Street.”
Stephen Koch is an award-winning journalist in both broadcasting and print. Author of “Louis Jordan: Son of Arkansas, Father of R&B,” he’s also writer/host of “Arkansongs,” heard on public radio stations all across Arkansas, in east Texas and Louisiana.
