I can't remember the name of the restaurant next to McDonalds on S Dixie acreoss from the old Frigidaire. I think it was angelo's. They used to have some killer subs there.

The hat shop at Catalpa and Fairview was called "Engleberts Hat Shop."

Ray's is still going stong along with "Rinaldos Bakery." Remember the fire station on the corner?

I remember the old front entrance at Good Sam. It was on Fairview when the street use to run all the way to Salem.

I'm in that area a lot as I live just south of Salem and Catalpa.

Last Edited on Apr 4, 2008 9:50 AM

I remember when the front part of Ray's was a Sohio station. It's a beer drive-thru now.

What else do you remember about that area?

I remember those two buses and they had alot of miles on them.

The Dixie Electric was a busy place and I could never figure out why they closed it down.

CHS class of 1979
Some great memories from that school

Didn't the different color skirts represent the different grades of students?

The same building that houses Ray's had a barber shop next door and (I think) a beauty salon next to that. Used to get haircuts at the barber shop before switching to the barber that was inside Stumps on Salem. (Anybody remember Sandy the barber there? I think his real name was Sandoval and he was from the Philippines)

Further down Catalpa on the other side of the street was a small dry cleaning place. I think Capitol eventually bought them out, but I'm not sure.

Down at the corner of Hillcrest there was another drugstore (was it Bettman's?) that actually had a soda fountain. Next to that was another barber shop.

Around 1965 or so they built a small strip center next to the barber shop that originally had a Lawson's store, a beauty salon and a laundromat. (When they were building this place, I stepped into the wet cement of the foundation while horsing around. So my footprint is in there somewhere...)

Across Hillcrest was Knife's market. I thought the half-size shopping carts they had were cool. I understand Pepito's is there now.

Going back the other way, at Salem & Catalpa there was a Frisch's restaurant. It closed pretty early in the 60's and was eventually replaced by a gas station. I think driver62 said that it's an empty lot now...

The barber shop next to Ray's is still there. It sat empty for years until someone reopened it.

You are correct about the dry cleaning place being bought out by Capitol. It was run by an elderly couple who finally shut it down as they got tired of being robbed. After sitting empty many years, another barber shop opened in the building but it closed down after a few months. The building is still empty.

I don't remember a drugstore at Hillcrest and Catalpa. The place was a upholstering(sp) place for a long time. It's empty now. I don't think it was Bettman's as they were in Miracle Lane shopping center on Salem for as long as I can remember.

I remember Lawson's. They had great deli meat. The little strip mall was remodeled and now has a beauty shop there. They may be a tax service there also.

I do remember Knife's and you are correct, it's Pepitos now.

Frisch's at Salem and Catalpa was before I moved to Dayton. The southwest corner was where Stoney's Marathon was located. It's an auto repair place now.

The northwest corner was an industrial uniform place at one time. Cintas comes to mind. After sitting empty, it was bought by Troutman Enterprises. After they left, it sat empty until the city tore it down.

The northeast corner had a few small shops on it. I remember a donut shop being there. After that, it was a BP station for many years. It's an empty lot now.

The southeast corner had a Famous Recipe chicken place for years. They shut down several years ago and the building was torn down. It's another empty lot.

Still waiting to hear if anyone grew up in the Victory apts. on San Rae Drive. I need photos from the 1950's and also memories.

Roll on, Big O.
Get that juice up to Lawson’s in 40 hours.
Well, the oranges ripen in the Florida sun.
Sweet on the tree they stay.
Then they pick ‘em and they squeeze ‘em just as quick as you please.
And the Big O leaves the same day.
Roll on, Big O.
Get that juice up to Lawson’s in 40 hours.
Well one man sleeps while the other man drives on the nonstop Lawson’s run.
And the sweet sweet juice in that tank truck caboose stays as fresh as the Florida sun.
Roll on, Big O.
Get that juice up to Lawson’s in 40 hours.

We also drove Hickorydale Elementary where I went to Kindergarten and first grade. It looks like it was bombed out! Are they just tearing the whole thing down? I was so thankful to go there on that day and see it one last time, for I'm sure I will never look upon that building again. How sad.

As for the school, a tax levy was passed several years ago to build new schools so many of the old ones are being torn down. New schools will be built on some of the sites and some sites will remain empty as school enrollment has dropped along with the population.

I agree the city has gone downhill a lot but that's what happens when the jobs leave. Sad but true.

Last Edited on Apr 9, 2008 11:37 AM

How is Huber Heights these days Kasiermom? I haven't been over that way in quite some time.

Were they class of 1979 Carroll?

I remmeber going to Jimbo's with my parents and grandparents and eating then playing indoor miniature golf.

Heading out of downtown on Main as you crossed the river there used to be a billboard with neon lights that would flash "Mabel - Black Label - Carling Black Label Beer".

Anyone else remember when Elder Beerman was two different stores? Elder's was located on the west side of Main between 4th and 5th (I think). It was a multi-floor department store similar to Rike's but only about 4 floors instead of Rike's 8. They also had Christmas displays but they were inside the store. I can remember a pretty elaborate model train setup.

Beerman's was across Main from Elder's. It had an oval display window on the 2nd floor. That building became the first Elder Beerman's when Elder's closed down. (This was before the EB off Courthouse Square).

Speaking of Rike's, it would be interesting to see what folks can remember about what was on each floor. I can remember jewelry on 1st, toys on 8th, furniture on 7th? Gold Coin on 5th.

Also, do you remember the numeric signs in Rike's that (presumably) the security folks used? Different combinations of numbers would light up. And there would periodically be the "morse code doorbell" sound.

Do they still have "Downtown Dayton Day"? DDD was huge back in the 60s. Large crowds stampeding for bargains.

Last Edited on Apr 14, 2008 2:06 PM

Books on five. Electronics, records, and TV's on four. Tykes store at Christmas on four. Menswear and women's colognes on one. At one point, they had an indoor newsstand on one and a couple of small sandwich shops. Sporting goods was on eight with the toys. Remember the elaborate Marklin HO scale train layout on eight each year at Christmas time? My mom used to take me to the toy department around Christmas time because that was the only place in Dayton to buy Corgi and Dinky diecast cars from England. They had a big display case like the old Matchbox Car cases. As I remember, it was also the only place in the Dayton area to buy Steiff plush animals from Germany. I used to buy comic books from the newsstand on the first floor. I believe there was also a cafeteria style restaurant on the mezzanine where I ate in the early 80's when I worked downtown for the telephone company. I worked at the 369 W First Street building across the street from the Holiday Inn (which is no longer there). We would walk to Rikes, Beermans or the Arcade every day for lunch.

Last Edited on Aug 24, 2008 7:52 AM

Thinking about shopping also brought back another old memory: tax stamps. Remember when you got these after making a purchase? You could collect them and give them to your school so the school could redeem them for cash. If you Google "Ohio Tax Stamps" there's a site where you can see pictures of them.

I live close to Salem and Catalpa and my neighborhod use to be called Upper Dayton View. Now it's called the Dayton View Triangle as the boundaries form a triangle. The area further down Salem towards the river was Lower Dayton View and is now just called Dayton View.

As for days long past, The mini-mart at Hillcrest and Catalpa was a Gulf gas station at one time. Across the street, where Bettman's is now located was either a Marathon or Mobil station. Rite-Aid bought the land and built a pharmacy there. When they built a bigger one at Main and Fairview, they closed the Capalpa store. It sat empty until Bettman's moved there from Miracle Lane. The land at the Main and Fairview store use to have a Cassano's pizza place there.

If you drive Catalpa heading towards Siebenthaler, the area where you leave the Dayton city limits was called Shiloh. Now it's just Harrison Township.

I can think of more things about the neighborhood that have changed but don't want to write a small novel.(lol) I'm sure Bulldug can add lots more as he lived in the area before I did.

Last Edited on Apr 15, 2008 7:32 AM

At the back of the parking lot on Fairview (next to the FROC board) was a barn-shaped building. That was Dayton View Sheet Metal (at least I think that was the name). It was run by a Mr. Narcter. He installed siding and downspouts. He was still there when I left the neighborhood in the early 80s.

At the southeast corner of Cherry & Catalpa was a 1920s-era phone company building. I'm not sure what you'd call the architectural style, but it was typical of Dayton at the time. Sort of elaborate but not Art Deco. There were really tall windows that you could look thru and actually see the phone switches operating. They had a neighborhood open-house once and I got to tour the building.

Speaking of phones, the old exchange name for the area was "Crestview". So your phone number was something like CR7-1234.

I see that Google has finally obtained decent satellite imagery of the area. For many years all you could see was blur. Now that I can see how blighted the area is, maybe the blur was better. :^(

Bulldug - Yep, I remember Hoot Gibson's station at the corner of Philadelphia and Salem. If I recall correctly, the big hat on the car was red. There's a pharmacy there now, either CVS or Walgreens.

The phone company building is still there and is still in use.

Last Edited on Apr 16, 2008 5:19 AM

Downtown:

My dad would tell me about how he was on an elevator with Bela Lugosi when the latter was playing at a theater downtown.

The Yardley Counter at Rike's downtown - virtual heaven for a tweener or teen girl. Slicker! Pot 'O Gloss!

The record store inside the arcade - I don't think it had anything to do with Elder Beerman - it wasn't connected. My mom was a Rike's person but I had to wear Edwards Corrective Shoes and we got them in the children's shoe department at EB at the old location. They were all basically saddle oxfords but you had different colors - burgundy leather, black suede with black leather saddles, etc.

Getting my picture taken in the booth at McCrory's - the cosmetic counter with Constance Carroll 59 cents (hey! I just realized my keyboard doesn't have a cents symbol like my dad's old Royal typewriter did!)
The cut-out 45 RPM records I always wanted to put in alphabetical order
I also often frequented McCrory's at Miracle Lane but more on that area in a bit.

Paparazzi Boutique at a corner of the Arcade - maybe on Fourth Street? The coolest clothes. I got a pair of navy brushed denim jeans with snap-up bells and a pair of brown elephant leg bells.

Sitting on the courthouse steps with the hippies - a little too young, so I would sit on the fringes and hang out for a little bit - partly because my babysitter always forbade me to do it!

Going to the WING studios on First Street to get pictures of the Lively Guys and Top 40 surveys. "Flyin' High!" Does anybody remember the identifier they used about the time the Grassroots "Sooner or Later" came out? They overdubbed the opening notes with "W-I-N-G, Sooner or Later!" Johnny Walker was so dreamy then! And I remember when they brought in Richie Allen, "The Duke of Dayton," who was not from Dayton but they had a huge media blitz for him as the prime-time evening jock. Steve Kirk always loved Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons and hated my favorite group, Paul Revere and the Raiders, so I listened to Jim Scott on WSAI in Cincinnati. WTUE used to be WONE-FM but WVUD at the UD campus, with all student jocks, really rocked my world.

Media:
The cartoon show that was before Clubhouse 22 was actually on Chanel 16 before it was a PBS station. It was called Kim's Kartoon Kapers. She was just a little girl and I always wondered what happened to her.

Yes, everyone said Uncle Orrie (Joe Rockhold) was a jerk, but of course when he died you would have thought he was St. Nick incarnate. They were sponsored by Farhnbacher Toys. I got picked for "Ferdy Says" (our Brownie troop met on Monday, and that was Orrie's day off, fortunately) but was the first one "out." I still won a ton of stuff including a huge round tub of cheap waxy crayons and best of all, a Gumby. His wires broke, though.

The 3.2 Beer Scene:

The Bookstore on Jasper Street. "Mom, I'm going to the Bookstore!"

Altering my first driver's license in 1974 - they gave you a paper copy to drive on until they mailed you the plastic - I gently erased part of the 8 in 1958 and made it into a 6. Might as well take two years rather than just one!

The She's dress code: No jeans, no painter's pants, no cycle colors, no hats. At first, I didn't even know what cycle colors were!

The Echo on Brown Street, where Sinclair Student Government would often hold TGIF Parties. That was when I didn't like coming out of a bar drunk to discover it was still daylight outside.

Where was the second incarnation of the Walnut Hills Bar? I frequented all of them - from the Wayne Avenue store where Tank's is now (it was started by expatriated Walnut Hills people). Seems like it was on Monument Avenue but the memories are fuzzy. Wonder why? haha. The newest one on Brown Street near Panera, Oodles of Noodles, etc. must not have made a go of it. The last "real" location at Brown and Wyoming was awesome for a long time. I remember Mason the bartender and his "anti-dent" spray (a can of Glade). For those of us past college age, the proximity to UD and the infiltration of the "Dents" aka "students" was often annoying.

Outside downtown:

The Kuntz Cafeteria
A Hungarian bar and restaurant on what was then Western Avenue near the St. John's Transportation bus yard.
The Har-Vel buffet in downtown Miamisburg, where it was all you could eat for $1. They had signs saying, "Take all you like, but eat all you take." "Two pieces of chicken per person." The fattest people I ever saw often ate there. I was kind of embarrassed we even went there!
There was also a cool old record store on the opposite side of the street in Miamisburg closer to the center of downtown.

North of downtown:

Whatever happened to the Ticketman? I used to work at that Goldenrod on Main Street - on South Dixie, too.

Icelandia - nothing like an outdoor ice rink just below the snow belt. As this was one sport I could not even approach. I remember falling on my ass in slushy sections not under the roof that were exposed to the sun.

Salem Drive-In - American Graffiti - maybe six or seven times. Genesee Cream Ale.

I wonder if the footprints in cement outside the old Peaches store at Northtown Shopping center are still there. They were the imprints of visiting rock bands.

The Village Inn Pizza Parlor, with its tinny player piano and the great jukebox when the piano wasn't playing. Copping leftover beer and pizza from people who had left.

Kettering Field - the Happy Hunting Ground for girls who liked jocks. Howell Field, too.

Char-Burger on Salem Avenue. It was on the east side of the road - seems like Parkmoor was around there, too. Frisch's at Salem and Philadelphia - my dad would never go because he hated the "mayonnaise" (tartar sauce) on all the sandwiches. I loved it.

Where was Shakeys? On Salem Avenue north of Shopper’s Fair and A&P?

Where was the Owens Market on Main Street? I remember it dimly – I walked or rode my bike to the one on Cornell Drive and Shelton’s Pharmacy on a regular basis – Miracle Lane, too. At one time, there was a little store on Park Hill kind of behind Kroger’s (now Ohio Loan) where they sold all kinds of flavors of soft drinks. It didn’t last long but it was way cool. I bought my 1971 new age foodstuffs at Nutra Foods at Miracle Lane, and my favorite haunts were McCrory's and Bettman's. I remember a furniture store there as well as some kind of variety store in the middle. David's Buffet later.

On Salem Avenue, Hasty-Tasty was next to the Atta Boy station – about where Wendy’s is now.

Swimming at the pool at Sinclair Park on Shoup Mill Road. My dad was a YMCA member and I think I got in for 50 cents.

It was a big dare when I was in high school (Northmont '76, Cornell Heights Class of '72" to go to "The World," a gay bar on Main Street. I did go with friends to Studio One - I think it was the old Suttmillers. The Stage Door must be one of the oldest gay bars in Dayton - wonder what the history of that is? My late associate Ron Guy loved to take straight girls to gay bars. There was one place that was a private club on Salem Avenue north of Fussnecker's. I can't remember exactly where it was.

My friends and I bought alcohol underage at the W&W Carryout on Gettysburg. There was another place where kids got caught all the time over by the Davue Building on Salem . . . The House of Spirits. I would also try to dress "professionally" and a la American Graffiti, I would buy some incidental "adult" items like lighter fluid, etc. and wear my friend Pam Hershey's Rike's badge. I would carry no purse - just a cash envelope like I had just cashed my check at the bank - and buy beer at Rinks. Of course, we had to chill it. I found out after I made my fake ID that all I really had to do was confidently show my ID to a clerk and they never even really read the age - or they didn't care. The penalties were nothing then, and few of us got caught.

driver - Submarine House is still in business? That makes my day. I rarely get back to Dayton and the last time I did I saw that the Huber Heights location was gone. I assumed they all were. Next time I'm back I gotta get one of those subs!

Last Edited on Apr 16, 2008 7:43 PM

I worked at Goldenrod on Main Street and on South Dixie, and National Record Mart (NRM) at Northwest Plaza, Salem Mall and Dayton Mall and for a few minutes at Headquaters in New Carlisle.

If anybody wants to contact me my email is Mothra@woh.rr.com and my Myspace is www.myspace.com/elizabethkey

I am just so thankful to have this incredible resource!

You wouldn't recognize N. Dixie out that way now. It's all 4 lane road and is really built up with fast food places, a Wal-Mart, etc.

Martha - Was the Village Inn Pizza located on Siebenthaler close to Bowlero Lanes or was it located on Salem? If Siebenthaler, we use to stop there for pizza and beer after bowling on Fridays. I seem to recall the Forum. Didn't they spell it FORVM? I guess they wanted it to sound Greek.

Last Edited on Apr 19, 2008 7:01 AM

And yes, FORVM! Wow, you are good! I remember a rather rowdy place on North Dixie called Scalley's - it's so hard to remember which bar was which name - so many bars, so little time, haha.

I used to go to the Fireside Tavern a lot - now it's called Chances Are, and Doober's was on the other side of Salem and a bit south of there. Those places were fun. TJ's in Englewood was happenin' for a while, too.