McGhee Block

Front: This seven-storefront brick building was built in 1920 by African American contractors and cousins William M. McGhee and Albert B. McGhee. Known as the McGhee Block, it housed such businesses as stores, dry cleaners, restaurants, and the McGhee & McGhee company office. Among the firm’s notable projects were the Aiken Hospital (1917), the Aiken Prep and Fermata School gyms (1926, 1929), and the Hopelands Gardens serpentine wall (1930). Both McGhees died in 1938. Reverse: One of the McGhee Block’s first tenants was Johnson’s Drug Store. It was owned by African American physician Dr. Charles C. Johnson, a civic leader who came to Aiken around 1905. Johnson’s store sold medications, toiletries, stationery, and other goods and included a soda fountain. The store employed Black pharmacists and served Black and white customers. It remained open after Johnson’s 1928 death and relocated in 1940.