At his core, San Jose builder Jim Salata is a cross between an artist and a junk man. And no job has demanded more of his palette and his peculiar talent than the rebuilding of the old Faber’s Cyclery, a city landmark on South First Street just south of Highway 280.

We may as well begin with the cold, hard facts: A lot of people thought, and maybe still think, that Salata, 60, embarked on a quixotic mission when he agreed to restore the old Victorian after fire had nearly destroyed the building two years ago.

But with the vision of turning the blackened embers into a beer garden and saloon — the latter its original purpose, way back in 1882 — Salata imported the boards and glass and tin that he gathered in dozens of salvage jobs to restore one of old San Jose’s best-known buildings.

Salata attributes it partly to the karma of having another job at the same time that provided him with the right material. “We had a demolition job down the street,” he told me as we walked through the saloon. And we discovered that one of the houses there was of the same era as this building, so we wound up deconstructing that. I sent the guys out there to take a piece of siding out, and it matched exactly.”

It is not a completed work, not close. The interior needs finishing. Salata has to find a place for the bathrooms. And there are more hurdles to surmount with city bureaucrats. But this much is clear: Jim Salata has saved a building most people thought lost.

The history

To know why that matters, you have to know something about the history of the building at First and Margaret streets, which has served as a saloon, grocery store, blacksmith’s shop, soft-drink stand, and cyclery.

The premises have been the scene of a fatal shooting, a mysterious burglary, a nineteenth-century fire. Put another way, it’s a survivor with scars, a place that exudes the stories that animate a good saloon.

The first record of the building from 1882 shows it as a saloon and grocery store run by Antone Milasich, a veteran barkeep who had once run establishments in Weaverville and Gilroy. When Milasich died in 1890, his wife, Richehen, married a man named William Ellert.

Three years into their marriage, the Ellerts were the victims of the first strange event to befall the building. In August 1894, they took a trip to Capitola. While they were gone, a fire erupted on the roof and front walls of the saloon. Investigators came to believe that the blaze was set to cover a burglary.

The saloon passed through several hands before it wound up with the Benjamin family — the brothers Joseph, Nuncy and Peter, who had come to San Jose from Louisiana.

Fatal shooting

The Benjamins were running the saloon in 1904, when, according to news accounts of the time, a patron named William J. Singleton shot and killed another customer, Simon Bojorques.

The testimony in court showed that the bullet entered Bojorques’ cheek and ranged down into his chest — an unusual angle even in the litany of bar fights.

No one seemed to blame the Benjamins. Peter Benjamin went on to become a beloved San Jose police officer. When he died in 1920 of appendicitis after a decade on the force, his death shocked the department and drew a crowd to his funeral.

By then, Prohibition had already closed down the saloon. After a short period as a soft-drink stand, it became the home of Faber’s Cyclery in 1923, a business begun in San Jose by Jacob Faber 11 years before.

The Faber family sold the business to Alex LaRiviere in the 1970s. The building stayed a cyclery for 90 years. Generations of kids bought their bikes there.

Benjamin’s saloon

Salata, the owner of Garden City Construction, intends to pay tribute to that era by decorating a tin-roofed room behind the old saloon with bicycles and bicycle posters. But he has adopted the theme of “Benjamin’s Saloon,” with Benjamin Franklin as its marketing face. The building flies a 13-star American flag.

The San Jose builder has included pieces that fit the era but were not original, like an embedded glass floor prism illuminated by a light underneath, or the “dental” adornments around the windows overlooking the rear garden. The piece de resistance might be the reconstruction of the cupola: It relied largely on old photos.

Salata won’t say how much he has invested so far in the project, but he does explain that he’s looking for investors to take it farther. “There’s always been a feeling about this place,” he told me. “I tried to get it before. I could see the potential. I’m half-crazy, ask my wife.”

Though it’s still a tough neighborhood — trash is often dumped in the alleyway — I believe Benjamin’s Saloon will be a draw someday in San Jose. But in a way, the victory is already won. The building is standing, straighter than it did before. It should probably be called the Phoenix.

Contact Scott Herhold at 408-275-0917 or sherhold@mercurynews.com. Twitter.com/scottherhold.