On the corner of East Boston Street and North Massachusetts Street the building sits where it has for the past 112 years
The building that stands at 304 East Boston Street was built in 1910. At that time the primary means of transportation around Covington, Louisiana was horse and buggy and the ox lots were filled with oxen even though a Ford Model T could be bought for about $800. The Southern Hotel, just up the street, was just 3 years old and the tallest building in the world was still the Eifel tower.
According to the current owner of the property, the house that remains today was built by a local physician to be the residence for one of his daughters. It served its purpose and continued to be a family home up until at least the 1970s. Visitors who grew up in Covington have told stories of going to sleepovers with friends there and one guest even reported that she remembered seeing The Wizard of Oz debut in color in this home!
In the following era the town of Covington experienced what many of America’s towns experienced with the movement of department stores and general stores from the town centers to the higher traffic areas near interstates. This presented an opportunity for smaller specialty shops and professional services to revitalize the vacated buildings along downtown streets. 304 East Boston Street, no longer serving as a family home, seems to have been caught up in the influx of small-town commerce. A variety of shops operated in that location including a flower shop, a gift shop, and a health food store/restaurant. There was a time in the late 1980s, between retail tenants, that a group of friends rented the vacant property to host a haunted house for a couple of years. I, a youngster at the time, can remember being scared just driving past.
The property continued its back and forth between retail shops and professional services for a few years until it underwent a major renovation in the early 2000s to accommodate a law practice. The owner eventually decided to rent the space to another retail shop called 98 Cows who leased the property for about a year before returning it to the market. In the spring of 2020 divine providence had a hand in our finding the available location and opening Moshen.
There are many things to love about operating a physical therapy practice at this location, but its storied past is at the top of the list. Being rooted in a time gone by gives us the old-world charm that suits our practice well. We hope its residential history makes all our patients feel at home. I must say that there is no better place to come to work every day than downtown Covington.
