The land on which the building stands was given to Samuel Sanborn by the U.S. Government in 1850.  Soon after, he sold it to Henry Wheeler who used this and surrounding land on which to farm.  Wheeler sold it to William McCumber in 1887 and that deed required McCumber to build and maintain a fence around his property to protect it from the farmland around it.  Dr. Storrs Hall came to Rosendale in 1851 to practice medicine and around 1870 his son, Dr. Sidney Hall joined him in practice.  They had a drug store in a small building in front of their home.  The 1874 plat book shows a small building in front of that property and labels it a Post Office.  So perhaps it was a drug store plus a post office.  William McCumber had purchased the harness shop property in 1887 and his son, Charlie or C.E. McCumber opened a "general mercantile store" the same year.  Our building has 2 sections, so we assume that one was there earlier and then the Drug Store/Post Office building from the north side of the street was moved to the south side and attached to the small building previously there.  C.E. McCumber had a store and post office in that same building.  His father sold the land to his sister, Josephine Perry in 1893, but stated that he had the right to use and control the premises as long as he lived.  In 1908 Josephine Perry sold the land to William & Johanna Koehntopp, so we assume that is probably the year that C.E. moved his store to 201 Main Street (the former Masonic Lodge) and would have had no use for the older building on Division Street.  In 1908, when Mrs. Perry sold the land, is also the year that Chauncey Nellis opened a harness shop where he made harnesses, did leather repair and some carpentry.  He never owned the building, but rented it from the Koehntopps from 1908 - 1941.  He died in 1945.  In 1945, Johanna Koehntopp sold the land to her daughter & son-in-law, Otto and Mary Petrich.  In 1941 when Bluemke's Hardware & Implement store burned to the ground, they rented that building until they could build a new store.  They continued to rent the building until in 1965 Bluemkes bought the "Harness Shop" and used it to store appliances. 

As of 2024, Rosendale Historical Society owns the building, so this takes us thru 173 years of history!