East Side History Series: Bischoff’s Square

by Susan Millar Williams, Ph. D.

The row of four more-or-less identical houses that line Columbus Street across from the Cigar Factory were built in the 1880s as part of Bischoff’s Square, a subdivision created and financed by Jennie Bischoff. There are also at least four of these houses still standing along Drake Street, and two on East Bay. Mrs. Bischoff, the widow of Henry Bischoff, lived in an older, grander home which was located on the same block as the Josiah Tennent House. (That structure, called the Tucker House, is long gone.)

Mr. and Mrs. Bischoff were both born in Hanover, Germany, before the Civil War. Like many of his fellow German immigrants, Henry sold groceries and liquor, but he also developed a profitable sideline concocting patent medicines. In addition to the South American herb for which it was named, Carolina Tolu Tonic contained lots of sugar and whiskey, which no doubt made it pleasant to drink, if not particularly healthful. Bischoff took advantage of the relatively new art of chromolithography, invented in Germany, to promote his products. The blog Bottles Booze and Back Stories, includes wonderful images of Bischoff’s whimsical trade cards, which were often collected in scrapbooks by children and ladies.

In 1874, during Reconstruction, Henry bought three rice plantations along the Edisto River near Jacksonboro, South Carolina and renamed them collectively as Rice Hope. He died four years later, in 1878, leaving Jennie to manage his fortune. She invested some of it in these modest but attractive frame single

houses, each of which includes six rooms and an upper and lower piazza. The ones on Columbus feature a bay window, but as far as I can tell, the others do not.