In 1917, the Francis family sells the Bellevue Hotel to Wilson Tibbetts, who starts an automotive garage in the building. Tibbetts soon sells to Case and Lee Hepler and, sometime around 1919, the front of the old hotel is removed and a new one-story brick structure is built to house a Ford sales and service center. This view is looking eastward down Mill Street, now known as Sunset Way. The concrete paving of Mill Street, which occurred in the mid-1920s, has yet to be done in this photograph. Later, the dealership becomes Hepler Motors, where model-T Fords cost $365.
