Now that Lancaster Museum of Art is yanking off the chrome and whatever-that-stuff-was façade at 215 N. Queen St., the organization's wondering just what history lurks behind it.

The museum bought the former Empire TV & Appliance store in February 2005 and is just beginning a top-to-bottom renovation to all 25,000 square feet of it to turn it into its new digs.

As the façade started to come down in recent weeks, the building's lineage started showing through. It's been years since the "M. Lurio & Bros." that's etched into the slab above the entrance has seen the light.

"It's just one of the little quirks about this building that's cool," said museum marketing coordinator Christina Duncan. "And it proves what we kind of suspected before about its history."

Tax records show the building was last owned by a member of the Lurio family in 1955. At some point after that, probably in the 1960s, the building became Empire TV and took on a "modern" look that covered much of the original building's ornaments and historic features.

But what happened in between — and how the building looked before its modernization — is unknown. Now the museum is asking for help filling in the blanks of how the building originally appeared.

"It would be wonderful if someone had a head-on photo with the 'M. Lurio' visible," Duncan said Friday in front of the building that's now wrapped in scaffolding for the renovation.

The museum, for now located in a historic mansion at 135 N. Lime St., was awarded an $85,000 matching grant from the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission to restore the façade of the new space. The aim is to return it to its original splendor: a glass-block front with a pressed tin roof that matches the ceilings inside.

What is known is that the original owners, Meyer and Benjamin Lurio, arrived in the United States from Russia and became citizens in 1884 and 1888, respectively.

The brothers started selling notions at 143 N. Queen St. before building and moving to 215 N. Queen St. — just two doors down from the former site of Lancaster train station.

Records indicate the business' name changed to "B. Lurio & Son," in 1931, and at some point, the business expanded to selling shirts and other garments.

But after 1955, there are no tax records showing the Lurio brothers had a business in downtown Lancaster.

Today, the business remains in existence. It operates in Reading under David Lurio as Elbeco Co., primarily manufacturing uniforms for police, fire and postal workers.

LMA's new executive director, Stanley Grand, recently completed a similar renovation project at his previous post as director of the Rosemary Berkel and Harry L. Crisp II Museum at Southeast Missouri State University in Cape Girardeau, Mo.

As an art professor with particular interest in architecture, Grand appreciates the Queen Street building's prosperous history.

"Two-fifteen North Queen is a building of dreams," he said. "It was the culmination of the Lurio brothers' dream of founding an enduring business. Subsequently, as the home of Empire TV, the products sold there epitomized the good life in post-World War II America. Now, in its new incarnation as the future home of the Lancaster Museum of Art, it will house the artistic dreams and visions of the community and region."

Although there is not yet a timeline for the renovation project, Duncan said another part of the project — construction of a 10,000-square-foot building in the empty parking lot just south of 215 N. Queen St. — is in the planning stages and should be moving quickly.

In the meantime, Duncan hopes someone will contact the museum with historical photographs or other information about its history.

"The museum is committed to making this building as successful as it's ever been," Duncan said. "It's really a tribute to this building."

Anyone with historical photos or information about the history of 215 N. Queen St. is asked to call the museum at 394-3497.

E-mail: slindt@lnpnews.com