P.H. Mueller Sons hardware store has been a fixture in downtown Hammond for more than 120 years and has held steady at it current location since 1902, its owner said.

The business's adjoining store, added early in the 20th century, has been through several incarnations -- saloon, sheet metal shop and, until a few years ago, automotive paint business.

Today it's an art gallery, one its owners hope will help bring people back to downtown Hammond.

MORE: See photos of, and hear the story behind Paul Henry's Art Gallery

"Art has a wide reaching attraction," said David Mueller, co-owner of Paul Henry's Art Gallery. "We were here when downtown Hammond had its heyday, when downtown Hammond attracted business from all over Lake and Porter counties and from Illinois and Chicago too."

The business is named after his great-grandfather and founder of P.H. Mueller Sons, Paul Henry Mueller.

"I wanted to link it to the past, to the hardware store and its founder," Mueller said.

David and his wife, Rita, also a co-owner, chose art to accompany their historic hardware business because they wanted something with a distinctive nature within the historic walls -- something as original and unique as the structure itself.

"It's a lestigial leftover from decades ago," Mueller said. "People enjoy seeing art in this space."

More than 70 artists are displaying art at Paul Henry's Art Gallery. The initial presentation to artists from the Muellers included a history of the business and the P.H. Mueller building.

"We gave them an idea of who we really were -- our past and plans for the future," Rita said.

Paintings, sculptures, clay and ceramic pieces, wood and glass fill the artistic space in the 106-year-old building. Colorful paint splatters dot the floor in the back room -- now an art studio -- remnants from the automotive paint shop.

"The artists said not to clean that up, to leave it there," Mueller said.