This five-story utilitarian brick mill building was built in 1885 by the Dover Improvement Association as a factory space for small footwear manufacturers to operate in, representing an organized effort by city businessmen to attract this type of business.

It is five stories in height, 29 bays long and five wide, with a central brick firewall dividing the building into two roughly equal-size parts.

The interior as originally built features exposed brick walls, wooden floors, and heavy post-and-beam construction.

[2] Dover's 19th-century economic success was primarily due to the development of textile mills along the Cocheco River, with shoemaking little more than a cottage industry.

The building continued to be used for shoe-related manufacturing, under a variety of owners and occupants, until 1979.