Tuesday OT: a business from your childhood that is extinct

NWICY

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Sep 2, 2012
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Bee Vee's hamburger stand / diner at 24th and Grand .. Ames Fruit and Grocery Store with the produce Mgr having a raised office to overlook the small produce department. His office was big enough for a stool and a slanted writing desk. But when he saw a small child he would step down and give out a tootsie roll to each child .. Green Pepper Pizza in campustown .. downtown JCP in Ames .. waldenbooks (?) In downtown ames. It had two aisles with a small book rack in the middle. Walk up one side and down the other. Dad would go there to get out of town newspapers .. Country Seat denim store at the mall .. Sports Page at the mall .. so many more .

What were the A frame gas stations along the early interstate? You still see some of the buildings with other businesses in then and most are really run down?

Aren't the a frame buildings left over Stuckey's?
 

8bitnes

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Nov 21, 2010
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Who can forget Richman Gordman's with all the giant animal toys to play on in that room in the back of the store. I think they had a Nintendo sitting out to play too.
The giant animals are now at the Omaha children's museum and they no longer look or feel giant. Just makes you realize you got bigger. it was surreal when I walked up on them
 

TBT

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Jacks was a big one in SE Iowa, in FM. Strangely I've only seen 2 Kempkers True Value Hardware stores, in FM and Huxley. I'm sure there's more but strange distance between the two.

To add to that, it's been going this way in the US for a while, but seeing the Westland Mall in Burlington being less than a shell of itself is awful. KB toy stores, FYE music store, Rex electronics. Can't remember the name of the store but every time I used to walk by as a kid I would see racks of the Big Johnson t-shirts and to this day I always expect to see them.

Oh, and Paul Revere's Pizza. Still open, but they're very rare now.
 
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RING4CY

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Rocky Rococo Pizza. There was a location right next to the UNI-Dome growing up in the Cedar Falls area. Now it's a UNI admin building or something.
 

JP4CY

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Testifying
Jacks was a big one in SE Iowa, in FM. Strangely I've only seen 2 Kempkers True Value Hardware stores, in FM and Huxley. I'm sure there's more but strange distance between the two.

To add to that, it's been going this way in the US for a while, but seeing the Westland Mall in Burlington being less than a shell of itself is awful. KB toy stores, FYE music store, Rex electronics. Can't remember the name of the store but every time I used to walk by as a kid I would see racks of the Big Johnson t-shirts and to this day I always expect to see them.

Oh, and Paul Revere's Pizza. Still open, but they're very rare now.
Big Johnson T shirts right next to the Coed Naked shirts!
 

exCYtable

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Apr 15, 2010
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Back in the early 80s, North Grand Mall had a Hardee's with a big plastic train in the middle where kids could sit and eat on. The engine, middle, and caboose each had its own booth style seats. The food sucked, but when you are 7 years old you really don't give a rip.
 

Die4Cy

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K-Mart has been mentioned a lot. The one in DBQ had a parrot that would talk to you when you ewnt in that department, had it for years. Also Zayre's, since that's an odd one, went there a lot.

Warehouse Market in Dubuque - write the price yourself on the item with red grease pencil, ride around on pushcarts with steel wheels that take the fingers right off your kids!

Also Irwin's in Marion. Got my first adult suit there, great suit, great service. Out of business now...

We were a family of 8. We shopped at the Warehouse Market all the time. I don't remember the parrot. I do remember when the Kennedy Mall had a Woolworths lunch counter. What was the name of the dime store downtown with the big green and white sign?
 

Die4Cy

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There used to be a pet store in campustown, between Welch and Hayward behind Cy's Roost. There was a laundromat we used there as well, the plastic tokens could be tied to a string and pulled out after starting the machines for re-use.
 

somecyguy

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Jun 19, 2006
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There used to be a pet store in campustown, between Welch and Hayward behind Cy's Roost. There was a laundromat we used there as well, the plastic tokens could be tied to a string and pulled out after starting the machines for re-use.

The only pet store in that area I can think of was The Ark. It was underground and you entered from the parking lot behind the store fronts on Lincoln Way. Before it was a pet store, it used to be a pizza place called Minsky's.
 
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