VIDEO: Flood-damaged Freeway Express Lounge leveled

UPDATE: One person compared it to a dinosaur, the way the excavator ripped into the brick building.

Or maybe it was more like surgery, how the operator clawed with precision to control the debris.

Any way you slice it, a piece of Cedar Rapids history came tumbling down Thursday morning when crews demolished the Freeway Express Lounge, 801 Third St. SE. Kelly Demolition from Mount Vernon leveled the two-story brick structure in about two hours.

Before it was a bar, the 99-year-old building was home to Palumbo Grocery. Owners John and Rose Palumbo lived upstairs, according to local historian Mark Stoffer Hunter.

The store closed in 1972, just prior to the construction of Interstate 380 across the street.

“I always hate to see history go,” said Stoffer Hunter, as he snapped some photographs. “Every demolition has unique circumstances. This is the last piece of neighborhood history for this block.”

VIDEO:

As debris crashed down behind them, Julie Burnside, of Cedar Rapids, and her daughter, Taylor, walked away clutching a few of the bricks. Burnside owned the building for its last three years, before floodwater filled the basement and 6 ½ feet of the first floor in June 2008.

She knew then, it was gone.

“I knew, with that much water in there, and the building being so old, there was no way it could have been saved,” Burnside said.

The neighborhood bar had its regulars, Burnside said, and lots of them enjoyed tossing darts. At least two wedding receptions were held there.

Some historic items inside the building, including the tin ceiling, were removed before the demolition and taken to the Salvage Barn in Iowa City, where they can be purchased for reuse.

The site won't stay vacant for long. Later this summer, Linn County officials expect construction to begin on a new juvenile courthouse. It will house court functions previously conducted on the lower level of the Linn County Courthouse on May's Island.

Here's an archive photo of the building, in its former Palumbo Grocery incarnation: