Coming back to life

May 20--Vicki and Tab Quisenberry are bringing the 60-year-old JDQ Building at 2625 Frederica St. -- once home to Johnson, Depp & Quisenberry Consulting Engineers -- back to life.

The company closed at the end of 2016 after 80 years in business.

Tab Quisenberry's grandfather, E.S. Quisenberry, was the Quisenberry in the engineering firm's name.

He said, "My father, Jim Quisenberry, and uncle, Bobby Quisenberry, worked at JDQ for the majority of their careers. My brother, John, worked at the company for several years, and I worked on the JDQ survey crew a couple of summers while in college."

Quisenberry said he and his wife "want to keep the JDQ history alive with the renovation."

Two tenants have already signed on and plan to move in soon.

Axiom Architecture will be moving in on May 31 -- or maybe a couple of days later, depending on the construction schedule.

And Worth Insurance Group will be relocating to the building on Sept. 1.

"We're moving quickly," Aaron Nacey, senior project manager at the four-year-old architecture firm, said last week.

"Our lease at the Centre for Business & Research says we have to be out in 90 days when they give us notice, basically at their whim," he said. "We didn't really think it would happen, but it did."

Nacey said, "I'm a fan of repurposed buildings. And the JDQ Building is mid-century modern. When you're trying to sell architecture, it's good to have a building with interesting architecture."

And, he said, "We get to design our own space there. We've been in three locations here and haven't had a chance to establish our own studio."

The new location, Nacey said, gives the firm room to grow.

"We'll hire at least one more person and maybe two in the next couple of months," he said.

Jason Worth said his family's insurance business has been at 601 Carlton Drive for at least 40 years,

"Back then, this was going to be a hot area," he said of the area east of south Frederica. "But it's not so much now. We want better visibility. The JDQ Building is the center of town. Kentucky 54 is a mad house and I don't want to be out there."

Worth said the business has outgrown its two-story building.

"We have 14 people now," he said. "We want to be all on one floor. The JDQ Building is awesome space. We'll have room for three more people there. Hopefully, we'll eventually fill the whole first floor."

Axiom will move into the rear of the first floor temporarily.

It will eventually move to the second floor.

The Quisenberrys added a front porch and a digital sign to the property.

They're planning to add a 10,000-square-foot area to the back with elevators.

"We might make a residence back there," Tab Quisenberry said. "We like this part of town."

There's an 8,700-square-foot building at the back of the property.

"We're working with a possible tenant for that," Vicki Quisenberry said.

There's a board room, which can be rented, on the second floor of the front building with a view of Wesleyan Park Plaza.

Rent-by-the-hour office

The second floor also has a small office and conference room that can be rented by the hour for people who work from home and need a place to meet clients and by out-of-town people who come to Owensboro occasionally on business.

About half of the building is still available, the Quisenberrys said.

The 1950s-era ceiling tiles are gone now, exposing concrete beams.

Through the years, JDQ designed sections of Interstate 75, Interstate 65, Interstate 64, Interstate 71 and most Kentucky parkways.

It also designed bypasses at Owensboro, Bowling Green, Hopkinsville, Hardinsburg and Cloverport as well as the Scherm Road detention basin, the Owensboro Riverport and the Martin Luther King Loop in Owensboro.

Vicki Quisenberry said J. Sam Johnson started the company in the Sohio Petroleum Company Suite in the Damron building on the southeast corner of Fifth and Frederica streets in 1936.

The next year, O.L. "Larry" Depp Sr. -- actor Johnny Depp's grandfather -- joined the firm.

In 1946, Quisenberry said, the firm moved to 521 Frederica St. -- now the Campbell Club.

Three years later, Everett S. Quisenberry became the third partner in the firm.

It moved to 951 Frederica St. in March of 1951, Quisenberry said.

The JDQ Building was built in 1958.

During its peak, Quisenberry said, the company employed more than 100 people in several states.

For more information, call Vicki Quisenberry at 270-302-7330 or check the Facebook page for The JDQ Building, LLC.

Keith Lawrence, 270-691-7301, [email protected]

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