Built about 1932, the Armstrong Building is located at 110 East Peachtree Street. It is a one-story brick building. The original facade has been altered. On the left is a side—single, multi-light window. The wood panel door is flanked by carriage lights. The right side of the building is a glass paneled door and a plate glass display windows. The building is currently the site of two businesses: Tommy Armstrong, Attorney at Law and Carolyn’s Custom Interiors.

Bob Hodges wrote this about the Armstrong Building in his 1950s “Walk Around the Square”: “Down the street there is the Palace Cleaners, owned by Horace Armstrong, one of my dad’s favorite targets. Mr. Wallace Gross, the town mayor, would come into the Palace, step into a dressing booth, shed his suit, and wait while it was pressed. Horace had a delightful black man named Milt, who worked for him, and was exceedingly loyal. You could never convince Milt that the governor of the state was not Horace Armstrong. Knowing Horace, I figure that once he convinced Milt that he was working for the governor, Horace could get away with low pay on the ground that Milt was providing a public service. Once I was in the hospital and Horace visited me and brought me a half pint of lime sherbet. I thanked Horace for it, but was curious as to why it was only a half pint. He shrugged his shoulders and. said, “Milt didn’t want the rest of it.”

Charlie Armstrong was the founder the Palace Cleaners, but brother Horace took over the business from him. The business was located on the square but moved some time between 1960 and 1964 to a building on Appletree Street. This building was one big building until 1978 and when it was divided into two sides, with Attorney Tommy Armstrong’s office on one side and the other side rented out. This tenant was Maples Rugs during the late 1970s and early 1980s.

When the building was Palace Cleaners, the two windows boarded up on the side of the current building were used as a drive thru for the cleaner. There was an additional building to the left of the cleaners in the 1960s that housed the Moon Light Cafe that was torn down in the late 1960s.

This aerial photo taken in 1957 shows this white frame building between Armstrong Cleaners and the Lad’n Lassie that was known as Bertha’s Moon Light Cafe. Notice the space between this building and the Armstrong Building, used to accommodate a drive-in window.

Reba Casteel remembers that this building has also housed J. D. Chandler Cycles before the business moved to the back of the block and fronted Appletree.

In the 1956 phone book and 1961 phone books, this building still housed Armstrong Sanitone Cleaners. By the 1965 phone book, Top Dollar was at this location, where it remained until in the 1975 city directory, this site housed The Peachtree Shop.

Current view: Law Office of Tommy Armstrong and Carolyn’s Custom Interiors

Palace Cleaners in this space, 1930s to 1960

Horace Armstrong

Walt Hammer found this photo of Horace Armstrong standing behind Hodges Drugs Store. The old Methodist church that sat on the site of the post office (which was building 1937) is seen behind him.

Ad for Armstrong Cleaner from the 1956 phone Book