In the 20th century, a 30-block stretch of Broadway, extending mainly between Times Square at 42nd Street and Sherman Square at 72nd Street, formed part of Manhattan's "Automobile Row". Before the first decade of the 20th century, the area was occupied mostly by equestrian industries and was "thoroughly lifeless", but by 1907, "The New York Times" characterized this section of Broadway as having "almost a solid line of motor vehicle signs all the way from Times Square to Sherman Square". In the late 1900s and early 1910s, several large automobile showrooms, stores, and garages were built on Broadway, including the U.S. Rubber Company Building at 58th Street, the B.F. Goodrich showroom at 1780 Broadway (between 58th and 57th Streets), the Fisk Building at 250 West 57th Street, and the Demarest and Peerless Buildings at 224 West 57th Street.