The location for which they had been planned, at the junction of Main Street and Monument Avenue, had been occupied since Dayton's earliest days by a still-standing log cabin.

This building had been used for numerous purposes over the past century, including serving as the first courthouse and jail for Montgomery County, the city's first school, its earliest church, and even its first tavern.

Opposition to its demolition arose for fear that children might lose the last of what today would be called the built environment of their great-grandparents' day, including this log cabin whose walls still bore bullets from Indian raids.

[2]: 91  Built of brick on a stone foundation and covered with an asbestos roof,[4] it was constructed to permit Williams to advertise it as "the only fire-proof apartment in southwest Ohio" upon its completion at the cost of $168,000.

For many years, this scheme worked admirably, but the chaos during and after the Great Flood of 1913 completely upset it,[2]: 114  and Williams' banks foreclosed on the Insco and other Williams-owned properties as a result.