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Dayton Memories > Favorite Rike's Moments
Favorite Rike's Moments
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RIVERDALE RAT
360 posts
Sep 23, 2009
7:56 PM
dquartz: No, it was NOT IN the alley. it sat on the corner of an alley. west side of Jefferson between 2nd and 1st.
Becky73
154 posts
Sep 24, 2009
9:24 PM
I loved Rikes. Loved the danish from the bakery with walnuts and white icing. Also the hot nuts you could buy. They put them in a little white paper bag. I think Rikes is where I got my best photo with Santa. They had the best Santas. The windows at Christmas time are a whole other topic. There were lines for that full service resturant - Gold Coin? Maybe. I remember the white tablecloths and heavy silveware. I also remember that crazy circular exit from the garage. You could see paint markings on the wall from all those people who had problems knowing where their bumpers were. I recently found my Mother's old charge plate from Rikes - the metal one, in her old jewelry box where I put it when she died.
Marck1957
80 posts
Sep 24, 2009
10:02 PM
Could it have been called "The Coin Room"? The "Gold Coin" was across the street where the sorta new Gem City Savings Building is now,at Third and Main.
Since we are trying to think of names, what was the name of the restaraunt inbetween the American Building and The old Home Store entrance on Main? It's sign was a 3-D sailboat above the entrance.
Keugene48
65 posts
Sep 25, 2009
8:11 AM
I have been waiting for someone to mention that restaurant. I ate in it once, mostly because of the ship sign. I think it was called "The Clipper Ship" or something like that.

I think it was "The Coin Room" at Rikes and the mezzanine was "Charley's". I used to eat there a lot when EF MacDonald/Carlson was in the Rike's building.
RIVERDALE RAT
370 posts
Sep 25, 2009
6:23 PM
Marck1957: the Rikes dining room was the Coin Room, you are right, the Gold Coin was a seperate establishment but I cant remember exactly where. I can close my eye's and picture the Ship Sign that you are talking about but I cant put a name with the sign right now. Could the Gold Coin have been in the old Dayton Inn at 3rd and Ludlow ?
Marck1957
81 posts
Sep 25, 2009
8:48 PM
The Gold Coin was on the east side of North Main Street, between Second Street and Third Street. There is an alley that splits that block, and the Gold Coin was right on the corner of the alley and Main Street, on the south half of that block. On the other side of that alley is the Third National Bank Building.

Last Edited by on Sep 25, 2009 8:49 PM
RIVERDALE RAT
374 posts
Sep 26, 2009
8:40 PM
Marck1957: Thanks, I have it pictured now.
dquartz
237 posts
Sep 26, 2009
8:58 PM
i think the gold coin restaurant had a gold coin, or maybe 3 gold coins overlapped on their sign. i dont remember a picture of a ship.
LINDA09
2 posts
Sep 29, 2009
10:02 PM
Every Sat my girlfriends and I would take the bus to Dayton. We would stop at the record shop at Mayors,go to a movie at the Victory or the Lowes(?),go to Rikes to ride the elevators and then we would top it all off with a banana split at McCroys. There we would bust a balloon to see what price we would pay.We were only 11 or 12, but it was a different time and we felt very safe. One of our parents would take us to the bus-stop in Drexel( we lived in Trotwood) and they would think nothing of letting us stay downtown all day. I wish my grandchildren could feel that free!! This was in the early 60's.

Last Edited by on Sep 29, 2009 10:03 PM
Keugene48
70 posts
Sep 30, 2009
7:59 AM
dquartz: it wasn't just a sign for the restaurant, it was a 3-D of either the side or front of a clipper ship in full sail over the restaurant entrance. It wasn't there too long that I remember. But the store front sure impressed me.
RIVERDALE RAT
388 posts
Oct 02, 2009
7:23 PM
I remember the banana splits at McCroys. you could pop the Balloon and pay anywhere from a penny to 39 cents (full price at the time)
jan26
5 posts
Oct 03, 2009
9:02 AM
Rike's book dept. was on the fifth floor, right outside the Coin Room. The dining room was also on the fifth floor, west end. The Gold Coin restaurant was on the east side of Main along with another restaurant, the name of which I cannot remember. Used to get a great open-faced steak sandwich for about $2.00. Had a bar. Gallaher's was on the SW corner of Second and Main - had a mezzanine. On the SE corner of Second and Ludlow was Miami Jacobs College upstairs. A Chinese restaurant was downstairs (Chung Suns) and the King Cole was around the corner on Second St. The Purple Cow restaurant was on the NE corner of Second and Ludlow, at the back of Rike's. There was no Elder-Beerman's on West Second Street. There was a Beerman's on East Third St. and an Elder's Dept. store on SW corner of Fourth and Main. Adler's Dept. store was across Main St.

Last Edited by on Oct 03, 2009 9:03 AM
Mikey
55 posts
Oct 03, 2009
1:54 PM
Now, I'm not trying to start a holy war of The Elder and Johnson Co. vs. The Rike-Kumler Co., but Rike's was always far more elegant and fashionable than Elder's. More floors (nine at the height of the downtown store, I think) better customer service and more varied inventory. Heck, in the fifties, when Harley-Davidson was owned by the American Machine and Foundry Company (AMF) and was on the ropes, they sold Harleys in the sporting goods department!

Free alterations, even for the ladies and home deliveries of your purchases so that the ladies could have tea at the Maud Muller Tea Room, next to Lowes, unburdened by their recent purchases and not soiling their white gloves on those dirty $0.05 shopping bags.

In my humble opinion, the area north of Third Street was the most genteel and fashionable area of downtown, probably because of the proximity to Rike's.

The area south of Third was far more bohemian, qaint and generally interesting to a young teenaged boy.
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Mikey, Gatlinburg, TN
RIVERDALE RAT
392 posts
Oct 03, 2009
4:28 PM
jan26: "Gallaher's was on the SW corner of Second and Main" this will be welcome news for dquartz, he has been posting for ages trying to find information on that drugstore, I was pretty sure it was a Gallaher's but I was not positive. the other things that you mentioned, I remember like yesterday. I was also shocked to see a Beerman's on 2nd street near the Hullman building.
RIVERDALE RAT
397 posts
Oct 03, 2009
8:30 PM
Mikey: I agree that the area north of Third Street was the most genteel and fashionable area of downtown, they even had the Met. but as a kid I remember a having a lot more fun on the other end of Main. I never felt like Elders or Beerman's was on the same level as Rike's, but I loved them all at Christmas. looks like Beerman's is the only one that stood the test of time though.
dquartz
255 posts
Oct 03, 2009
8:49 PM
jan26...thanks for the information on the drugstore. thats been bugging me for a long time.

Last Edited by on Oct 03, 2009 8:50 PM
dquartz
256 posts
Oct 03, 2009
8:51 PM
mikey... i think the top floor of rikes was all corporate offices. i cant remember having ever been up there.
Mikey
56 posts
Oct 04, 2009
2:01 PM
Hmmm... now that I have ruminated on it some more, you're likely right. I do remember that you could go to the top (remember the skinny escalator?) and there was a cashier station where you could pay your bill, but no merchandise.

The south of Third area was far more interesting to a kid, except for the "dreaded" Fidelity Building.
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Mikey, Gatlinburg, TN
RIVERDALE RAT
400 posts
Oct 04, 2009
4:26 PM
dquartz: I agree with you, the top floor of Rikes was mostly offices and/or storage area. this was probably where the Buyers and all of the corporate executives were officed.
bevy
24 posts
Oct 04, 2009
7:09 PM
2nd an Ludlow was Gallagers, then the Mead Bldg,now Key bank ? Was the Purple Cow a nite club?
RIVERDALE RAT
406 posts
Oct 04, 2009
7:11 PM
bevy: The Purple Cow was a restaurant that was in the old Miami Hotel which later became part of Rikes.
RIVERDALE RAT
407 posts
Oct 04, 2009
7:15 PM
if memory serves, Driver or one of the guys posted a long time ago and in another thread about a movie that he may have watched/downloaded from PBS called "Let's Go Down to Rikes." I found the movie but not a way to watch it ? Driver did you pay the $100, or did you find a link to a freebie ?
Mikey
57 posts
Oct 04, 2009
8:27 PM
Ha! If you loved the odour of the Fidelity Building, buy a bottle of regular old standard liquid Lysol. That's what I use to clean the cat box!
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Mikey, Gatlinburg, TN

Last Edited by on Oct 04, 2009 8:27 PM
dquartz
262 posts
Oct 04, 2009
9:12 PM
riverdale..that old post was from driver, it was an answer to a suggestion that i gave to newsnot on going to pbs.org for information on the wildcat roller coaster. i found it and pasted it below but it dont say how to access the video.

dquartz - I wanted to get a DVD of a show on PBS and was told I needed to pay $100 first to become a PBS memeber. Needless to say, I passed on that.
But, after a little search, I did find you can download videos. I downloaded the show, "Let's Go Down to Rikes."

posted by driver52 Sep 06, 2009
5:33 AM
dquartz
263 posts
Oct 04, 2009
9:16 PM
mikey... i remember the old fidelity building, my dentist used to be in there. i hated the place too, after all these years i never knew what the smell was until now. thanks for the info i will be sure never to buy any liquid lysol..lol
RIVERDALE RAT
410 posts
Oct 05, 2009
12:23 PM
Mikey: I am thinking it's Johnson, the reason I say this is because I remember a discussion some years back where someone wanted to know if he was any relation to the Johnsons of Johnson & Johnson (the First Aid company)
Llewellyn
1 post
Oct 05, 2009
1:08 PM
New to this site. Born in Dayton in '49. When I was three I caught my hand in the escalator railing at the bottom where it goes back in. they had to stop the escalator to get it out. Took me to First-aid and gave me ice cream.
RIVERDALE RAT
411 posts
Oct 05, 2009
2:02 PM
Llewellyn: Welcome to the site. The same thing happened to me, except it was a shoelace and it was at the top of the escalator. I was around 6 years old at the time, I was sure that I was going to be sucked underneath and never heard from again.
Mikey
60 posts
Oct 06, 2009
1:24 PM
Silly Me! I should have done this before asking...it is "Johnston"

From Wikipedia:
"...In 1883, Elder-Beerman history began when Boston Dry Goods Store opened in Dayton, Ohio, and was later incorporated under the name Elder & Johnston Company. In 1930, After a short career with Elder & Johnston, Arthur Beerman, founder of Elder-Beerman Stores Corp., branched out on his own and by 1945 Beerman Stores was incorporated. In 1953, Beerman formed a partnership with Max Gutmann and together they established the Bee Gee Shoe Corporation, which operated the El-Bee Shoe Outlets and Shoebilee! stores for many years before its recent sale. Beerman and Gutmann spent ten years opening Beerman Stores in suburban areas and expanding their product lines."

Mikey sez...I remember as a kid, the rumor that EJ Co had fired Beerman and the he said that he would bury them with his own store and put them out of business. I think that he initially bought "The Home Store" at SE corner of Third and Main. What a wierd little store! It wound through many floors of different buildings and like a rat maze.
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Mikey, Gatlinburg, TN

Last Edited by on Oct 06, 2009 1:30 PM
dquartz
265 posts
Oct 06, 2009
7:46 PM
i hate to argue with wiki, but i agree with riverdale i could have sworn that it was elder and johnson... i could be wrong.
riverdale...did the tipp city bus stop there alongside rikes and if so was that their main pick up point ?
RIVERDALE RAT
417 posts
Oct 07, 2009
3:25 AM
dquartz: I am not positive (allthough Wikipedia has given me incorrect information before, I think they have cleaned it up a bit) it well may have been Johnston. I just remembered getting in on the tail end of a Talk Show one night and hearing a discussion on the Johnson & Johnson thing. if it really was Johnston, none of those people had a clue (including the host) thats hilarious.

No the Tipp City Bus never stopped beside Rike's (at least in my era) their main pick-up point in Downtown was at 1st and Wilkinson (beside Frisch's)

Last Edited by on Oct 07, 2009 3:25 AM
dquartz
274 posts
Oct 07, 2009
6:49 PM
i remember hearing that rikes had been bought out by federated department stores. seems like this happened several years before they closed, is this true ?...anybody ?

riverdale thanks for the bus info.
driver62
266 posts
Oct 08, 2009
8:45 AM
Yep, it was bought out and the name changed to Shillitos/Rikes and then I think it was just Shillitos. After that, it became Macys but that might have been after the downtown store was gone....not sure on that.
Bill68
70 posts
Dec 25, 2009
12:13 PM
There was a newsstand right outside Rikes in the late 60s/early 70s. I was walking downtown once and the proprietor was shouting "Shot Down With No Mercy" over and over. When I naively asked "Who Was Shot Down With No Mercy?", he brusquely told me to buy a newspaper and find out. I briskly told him where he could put his newspaper. To this day I still wonder who was Shot Down With No Mercy. Shudda bought the paper, I guess.
Bill68
71 posts
Dec 25, 2009
12:32 PM
I googled "Let's Go Down to Rikes" and found only this board. What is the URL?
Bill68
75 posts
Dec 25, 2009
5:02 PM
Kind of a Rike's story: I was working downtown in the 1980s and there was a family of Peregrine Falcons living on a ledge of a building. One day one of the young ones was trying to fly and it got hit by a car and landed in the intersection of 2nd and Main. No one would stop and 30 cars ran over it but luckily the wheels didn't hit it, but it had one of its wings spread out and it was screeching terrified squawks. I walked out and stopped the traffic and tried to pick it up but it tried to eat me alive with a very sharp beak. Several guys yelled at me to get out of the road as I was apparently holding them up for several minutes from some very important business. Being in my 30s and athletic and PO'd because that bird was trying to remove my fingers, I dared any and all of them to get out of their cars and make me move. None did and a nice woman ran into Rike's and bought a Rike's bag and ran it out to me so I stuffed that homicidal falcon in the bag and a friend took it to a raptor hospital in Englewood or somewhere.

Last Edited by on Dec 25, 2009 5:03 PM
Keugene48
87 posts
Dec 25, 2009
7:21 PM
Bill68: I enjoyed that story very much, thanks for sharing it!
Mikey
79 posts
Dec 27, 2009
11:49 AM
Regarding the newstand outside Rike's at Second and Main Sts...after the remodel to match the newly remodeled exterior of Rike's, the little newstand had a logo at the top edge that proclaimed..."we occupy the whole building"
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Mikey, Gatlinburg, TN
fishers1951
4 posts
Jan 02, 2010
8:44 PM
Favorite memory I have is buying my first Remington 870 pump shotgun at Rikes - in the sporting goods dept. in the 60's!
Peggy Gilbert
13 posts
Jan 03, 2010
5:34 PM
driver62
Rikes did become Shillitos/Rikes but never just Shillitos, it became Lazaruz (sp?) my daughter worked there in 87-89 while it was still downtown and she was a student at Patt/co-op. She worked in the basement mark-down shoe dept. later it did become Macy's but in the rural stores.
JohnC
102 posts
Jan 05, 2010
12:25 PM
My favorite Rikes moment (memory) will always be Christmas. Every year growing up my mother would take me to Rikes the day after Thanksgiving. My stops were always the same: 1) Check out the window displays 2) Go up to the toy department on the eighth floor and check out the great Marklin HO scale train display 3) Lunch with mom in the Coin Room 4) Do my Christmas shopping at Tykes. What great memories of such a wonderful part of my youth.
pamelakrest
1 post
Jan 09, 2010
8:05 PM
I would love to get a recipe for the bran muffins that Rikes made in their bakery. They weren't your usual muffins, I know they had pineapple in them and they looked like they were upside down.
Chuck61
1 post
Jan 13, 2010
1:22 PM
I have to agree with JohnC, Christmas was just the best. But, the puppet shows/ Marionette programs that were put on during the the holidays were just magic!
And we always dressed in our very best to shop at Rikes!
tnich123
1 post
Jan 31, 2010
8:07 PM
A trip downtown always meant going to Rikes. If grandma was with us, we had lunch in the 5th floor dining room. If it was only mom and me, we went to the Mezzanine. My sister met her husband in Rike's bargain basement. They both worked there. Another sister worked in the glove department.
Best memories are of Christmas. My grandfather was one of the Santas during the 50's. It was such fun. I remember one year when the line to see Santa was so long you had to wait on the floor below just to get up to the floor Santa was on. I went to the guy at the head of the line and whispered that Santa was my grandpa and they let me go right up. The decorations were alway so beautiful.
KKB
1 post
Apr 06, 2010
12:10 PM
I was 6 years old in 1960, my sister was 4. The greatest memories of Rikes has to be the Christmas seasons throughout the 60's. The Christmas display windows outside were probably my most vivid memories. Of course Santa Land with the Tike shop where the kids would go through a small short door to shop for mom and dad for their christmas presents with the Rikes elves. I remember that my mom was terrified of the "new" circular ramp in the parking garage but somehow she managed to get us out of there everytime. The only other store I really remember going to was the Metropolitan which I think was across the street from Rikes.
jstorybook
2 posts
May 20, 2010
8:36 AM
I see no one has posted for a while--I hope someone reads this. No one has mentioned the Rikes Candy. There were mints that they made--they were flat--flavours were: lemon, Lime, peppermint, and Cinnamon-I bought them particularly during the holidays as a special treat. They were still around when Rikes was bought out by Lazarus. I wonder if anyone knows where I can get the recepie?
Marck1957
109 posts
May 21, 2010
5:40 PM
jstorybook...The mint candies have been discussed here before. Search this site for "Pastel Mints from the Candy Counter???" for more info. I loved those things too!
delcodude
5 posts
Jul 12, 2010
11:11 PM
This is purely trivial but I went to Patterson Co-op in the '70s and for those of you who remember Rike's record dept. it was, well, HUGE. One day after school in '76 I stopped by and the whole record dept had each record display front depicting one album and one album only. A hundred or more, I know. The Album?.....KISS ALIVE! It was fanatical..saw them at Hara in '77. Hell, I was hooked..
RIVERDALE RAT
445 posts
Aug 16, 2010
4:29 PM
jstorybook:

This link was posted by pie8me on another thread about the mints. One poster claimed they are the same as Rike's. it may be worth a try.

http://www.oliverscandies.com/index.cfm/product/110_10/pastel-mints.cfm

My favorite time around the candy counter was Halloween. I still remember the gummy licorice Black Cats and the best candy corn in town.
JBlair
4 posts
Sep 18, 2010
2:00 PM
There were two restaurants on Rike's 5th floor. The Coin Room was a simple, quick place to have lunch. The dining room had a more extensive menu and the food was quite good. Frequently, lovely women modeled high-end clothing around and between the tables.
Also, there was a cafeteria on the mezzanine during some of the time the Coin Room was available. The dining room was there for decades.


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