Category:Eastern Light, Allentown, Pennsylvania

The Eastern Light Building at 520 Hamilton Street was originally one of Allentown's early skyscrapers. It was a five-story building built about 1894 for C. B. Krause & Company, a furniture dealer. In 1899 it was taken over by Dugan & Fry, another furniture store who remained until 1905. It was then taken over by Henry S Hartzell, who established the Prince Furniture Company in the building. The Prince Company remained in the building until 1933 when it went out of bushiness during the Great Depression. The Block Brothers Furniture company took over briefly, but it also failed in 1935.

After being used as the headquarters of the Allentown Community Chest for two years, but mostly vacant, The Eastern Light Company moved into the building in September 1937. Eastern Light had begun business in May 1920 at 1010 Quebec Street in East Allentown, electrifying homes and also installing heating systems. In October 1961, a general-alarm fire destroyed the building and its contents. It re-opened in 1963 as a two-story structure. The company also operated Eastern Furniture at 614-618 Hamilton Mall until furniture operations were consolidated at 520-524 Hamilton Street in May 1984. In March 1988, Eastern Light Appliances agreed to be acquired by Dee's Appliances of Delran, N.J., and closed in May 1993. An electronics discount store operated in the building until it also closed in 1995. The building was then vacant for several years.

In 1998, Joe Clark, an entrepreneur bought the former Eastern Light property for $100,000 and converted it into the Crocodile Rock, a 2-story nightclub and live concert venue which opened in August 1999 with a capacity of 1,100 along with two smaller concert venues in the basement. It became one of the nation's top concert venues, drawing top music acts and selling an estimated 50,000 tickets a year. The club began a downward spiral in 2009 when a shooting occured outside the venue after a rap concert prompting the city of Allentown to enforce them to install security cameras. The venue refused to comply. Then it was cited numerous times for selling alcohol to minors which let to the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board to to label it a “nuisance bar” which resulted in it losing it’s liquor license in 2013. Without a liquor license, Clark couldn't make a profit booking top acts, and the venue was sparely attended until hosting it's last live concert in January 2016, and again became vacant.

The property was purchased by the City Center Development Corporation for $1.6 million dollars and it was razed in September 2017 as part of the NIZ redevelopment of the Central Business District It will be replaced with a six-story mixed-use residential and office building which is being called “520 Hamilton Flats.”