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Immigration on the High Plains
Diverse business on one Garden City street
In Garden City, KS, English is not the only language of business. On a stretch of 8th street south of Buffalo Jones, several Hispanic businesses have sprung up selling clothes, meat, and baked goods. 8th Street is a downtown street complete with brick paving and handfuls of leafy trees lining its sides.
(nat break)
That's Ana Renteria. Her parents opened the bakery on 8th street in 2002. Like many of the other businesses on 8th street, it's family owned. It's a sunny yellow corner building. The bakery is a few buildings south of the Tinker Shop.
Earl Whiteley: Yeah, the bakery is a half a block south, that used to be the bus depot, that's where the buses came and went from.
Earl Whiteley who says the Tinker Shop has been running him for over 50 years has seen not only the depot become today's bakery, but a lot of other changes along the way.
Earl Whiteley: Western Kansas Sporting Goods was next door north, across the street was Western Kansas Sporting Goods and big A, further north than that there weren't any buildings. Mr. Demmett had his nursery over there in the early 50s across the street and there were three more houses over there in the middle 50s.
Although Whiteley has had his business in the same spot for more than 30 years now, it wasn't until more recent years that he saw Hispanic shops opening for business.
Whiteley: The Spanish influence didn't happen until after, god the last ten years is when those guys started showing up.
There is also a little temple, the Templo Calvaro, a little further South of the Tinker Shop and the bakery. Whiteley didn't seem surprised at the new presence of Hispanic businesses on 8th street in the last several years or the change in the customer base.
Whiteley: Just like the rest of the town 50 percent of the town are white and 50 percent of the town are not white, it's only changed in respect to the population.
As Whiteley points out, there has been a shift in the population of Garden City. The immigrant population has increased and that's been reflected in local businesses. Ana Renteria cited other Hispanic businesses as a reason why her parents located their bakery on 8th Street.
Renteria: Basically garden is a lot of Hispanics now, but we kind of did see that more of the Hispanic stores were kind of coming towards this way. Because if you look on Main there are a couple of stores there, meat shop, place with the dresses, the meat shop, the restaurants on Fulton, too, so I guess we thought this was just kind of a good location.
Other Hispanic businesses also helped draw Victoria Ramos to 8th Street to open her store El Encanto.
Ramos: You know the traffic and I think it's a nice and good street for business and we have more business, you know the Hispanic business.
El Encanto has only been open for a year and a half, it's a little shop with a bright blue colored storefront.
Ramos: I sell like dresses, blouses, jeans, shoes, and kids clothes.
Earl Whiteley of the Tinker Shop says that the new businesses have not affected his sales, only the economy has. In fact, the influx of Hispanic business has helped revitalize that section of 8th street.
Whiteley: After 9-11 this was a death zone, there was only us and the body shop and one business across the street everything else was closed. And since the Spanish stores have gotten here the business, it's a viable area again where prior to that it was just a void.
From the tree-lined stretches of Garden City's 8th Street, where businesses have become a little more diverse, I'm Lindsey Fields for HPPR.
© Copyright 2012, hppr
(2008-10-24)
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GARDEN CITY, KAN.
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In Garden City, KS, English is not the only language of business. On a stretch of 8th street south of Buffalo Jones, several Hispanic businesses have sprung up selling clothes, meat, and baked goods. 8th Street is a downtown street complete with brick paving and handfuls of leafy trees lining its sides.
(nat break)
That's Ana Renteria. Her parents opened the bakery on 8th street in 2002. Like many of the other businesses on 8th street, it's family owned. It's a sunny yellow corner building. The bakery is a few buildings south of the Tinker Shop.
Earl Whiteley: Yeah, the bakery is a half a block south, that used to be the bus depot, that's where the buses came and went from.
Earl Whiteley who says the Tinker Shop has been running him for over 50 years has seen not only the depot become today's bakery, but a lot of other changes along the way.
Earl Whiteley: Western Kansas Sporting Goods was next door north, across the street was Western Kansas Sporting Goods and big A, further north than that there weren't any buildings. Mr. Demmett had his nursery over there in the early 50s across the street and there were three more houses over there in the middle 50s.
Although Whiteley has had his business in the same spot for more than 30 years now, it wasn't until more recent years that he saw Hispanic shops opening for business.
Whiteley: The Spanish influence didn't happen until after, god the last ten years is when those guys started showing up.
There is also a little temple, the Templo Calvaro, a little further South of the Tinker Shop and the bakery. Whiteley didn't seem surprised at the new presence of Hispanic businesses on 8th street in the last several years or the change in the customer base.
Whiteley: Just like the rest of the town 50 percent of the town are white and 50 percent of the town are not white, it's only changed in respect to the population.
As Whiteley points out, there has been a shift in the population of Garden City. The immigrant population has increased and that's been reflected in local businesses. Ana Renteria cited other Hispanic businesses as a reason why her parents located their bakery on 8th Street.
Renteria: Basically garden is a lot of Hispanics now, but we kind of did see that more of the Hispanic stores were kind of coming towards this way. Because if you look on Main there are a couple of stores there, meat shop, place with the dresses, the meat shop, the restaurants on Fulton, too, so I guess we thought this was just kind of a good location.
Other Hispanic businesses also helped draw Victoria Ramos to 8th Street to open her store El Encanto.
Ramos: You know the traffic and I think it's a nice and good street for business and we have more business, you know the Hispanic business.
El Encanto has only been open for a year and a half, it's a little shop with a bright blue colored storefront.
Ramos: I sell like dresses, blouses, jeans, shoes, and kids clothes.
Earl Whiteley of the Tinker Shop says that the new businesses have not affected his sales, only the economy has. In fact, the influx of Hispanic business has helped revitalize that section of 8th street.
Whiteley: After 9-11 this was a death zone, there was only us and the body shop and one business across the street everything else was closed. And since the Spanish stores have gotten here the business, it's a viable area again where prior to that it was just a void.
From the tree-lined stretches of Garden City's 8th Street, where businesses have become a little more diverse, I'm Lindsey Fields for HPPR.
© Copyright 2012, hppr
