Mr. George Ramsey built the two-story brick building that once occupied the Northwest corner of 15th and Delaware Avenue. The Renaissance Neighborhood sometimes called it the “Bead Merchant building.” Mr. Ramsey was born in Missouri in 1895 and was in Tulsa by the mid nineteen teens. He built the building and operated the Ramsey Market out of the first floor. It is believed that he also built and lived in the home directly North of the two-story building on Delaware Avenue (still there today). The building contained a grocery through the 1950’s. Children attending Wilson School would stop along their way to and from school. From left to right: John Warren Holderman, George Ramsey and his sister, Safrona Ramsey Holderman. Picture from private collection of John Holderman. Over the years the building housed a variety of businesses. These included a printing business, Rhodes Antiques and the Bead Merchant. The buildings to the west of the grocery, now torn down, were re
The Renaissance Neighborhood is defined by 11th Street on the North, 15th Street on the South, Lewis Avenue on the West and Harvard Avenue on the East. This is the heart of midtown Tulsa.