1930s Cedar Rapids Gazette Newspaper Piggly Wiggly Ad including location 2500 16th Avenue SW, The History Center clipping files.
With all the new neighborhoods forming around the new Jefferson High School, there was a need for groceries. Piggly Wiggly, a national chain that had been in Cedar Rapids in the 1920’s but left the area, became attracted to this growing community. Three Piggly Wigglys were built in Cedar Rapids, but this one was the only one that was built specifically to serve this developing neighborhood. It opened in the mid-1950s, but as grocery competition in the area intensified, it closed before its 10th anniversary in this building. Rockwell Collins used the site for warehousing in the 1960s until it became the home of the Gifford-Brown Company, an electrical components wholesaler. They changed their name to DeeCo and are now known as Dee Electronics and have occupied the building for nearly 50 years now.
Mark W. Stoffer Hunter, Research Historian, The History Center
