Cedar Rapids man fills in pieces of former Brosh funeral home's history

Mystery solved.

Historians seeking a missing piece of the former Brosh Chapel's history didn't have to look far.

Steve Van Fleet, 55, of Cedar Rapids, owner of Papa Juan's/Stefano's, 5505 Center Point Rd. NE, wants to open a second Mexican/Italian restaurant in the former chapel, 1028 Third St. SE.

The building is in the historic New Bohemia district, but the structure itself is considered “non-contributing,” so Van Fleet and his partners would not be able to access financial incentives that come with rehabilitating historic buildings.

They plan a $900,000 redevelopment of the flooded structure that could open within four months of obtaining permits.

State officials said enough evidence didn't exist to consider the building historic, however, and local historians could find no information from the site's early years.

In stepped Harvey Viall, 83, of Cedar Rapids.

The building housed the Cedar Rapids station of the Denver-Chicago Trucking Company, where Viall worked from 1945 until it closed in 1955.

Viall filled in the missing details needed by Robyn Rieckhoff, executive director of the Czech Village/New Bohemia Main Street District.

Rieckhoff is sending in a new application to see if the building qualifies as historical, based on its ties to an historic event: World War II.

Viall moved in 1945 to Iowa from Montana, where he had been living with his grandmother.

His mother died and he and his sister suffered severe burns when a gas stove exploded in their home when Viall was 10.

Their father, also named Harvey Viall, remarried and moved to Cedar Rapids.

Both men began working at the trucking company at the same time.

At 19, Viall was the youngest mechanic and believes he is the only survivor of its employees.

“I knew I was one of the last ones left,” Viall said. That's why he decided to call Rieckhoff after seeing an article in The Gazette, requesting information about the company's history.

Viall told her that not only did the business ship C-rations for the war effort, but carried “hot loads” of military weapons shipments, accompanied by armed guards.

He used a Kodak camera given to him by his father as a wedding gift in 1948 to shoot photos at the company. Viall provided those to Rieckhoff, as well.

“I'm just glad I could help,” he said.

If the building is deemed historic, developers can recoup about 50 percent of rehabilitation costs in the form of tax credits. They also won't have to raise the structure above flood level, which would make the project cost-prohibitive.

“This story could have died with him,” said Rod Scott, president of Preservation Iowa, who is also working on the state application. “Now we have pictures and now we have a story.”