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Clinton Lanes
This bowling alley at 3520-3526 North High Street between Dunedin and Oakland Park, has been on my “wish list for photographs” forever. So glad to finally come across a picture of it. This picture is from 1964. Clinton Lanes was open and at that location from approximately 1955-1978.
This photo includes nice images of other businesses on this strip as well: Rexall Drug, Dorothy Bloom Dance Studio, and Benjamin’s Jewelry Store owned by Floyd J Benjamin.
Prior to Clinton Bowling Lanes, the space was mostly occupied by an Albers grocery store.
Here‘s the story of its closure: the owners’ (Bud Davidson and his wife Marie) lease was not renewed, the owners were of retirement age…and so it goes.
Sadly, I’m sure there were a lot of unemployed pin-setters afterwards.
[Photo courtesy of the Columbus Metropolitan Library’s MLS real estate collection. The newspaper article about the Clinton Lanes’ closing is from the Columbus Dispatch and the citation can be found by clicking through my link.]3361-3379 N High–The Whole Shebang
Inspired by the demolition of the Clintonville Electric buildings on North High Street, I’ve posted a lot–perhaps too much–about the individual businesses along the 3361-3379 North High Street block. For those who are interested, here’s a spreadsheet of the businesses that have occupied those storefronts, based on business directories (aka telephone books) at the Columbus Metropolitan Library.
[Thanks to Loraine at the Columbus for her extensive help with researching this area. And while I’m giving credit, I hope you’ll make a donation to the library–the staff and the collections are an amazing community resource.]Whetstone High School
Here’s a nice article from August 20, 1961 about the construction of Whetstone High School. I found it while researching the house at 165 West Como. One of its residents, Robert F. Darrow, was Whetstone’s first principal.
[Courtesy of the Columbus Dispatch, Sunday Dispatch, p139-142]The design of Whetstone High School presented some problems, said school architect David Schackne. The site is in something akin to a large depression. Originally, to insure that the building would be above the 1959 flood crest, Schackne considered building the structure on stilts. It would have cost too much, Schackne explained. Instead, the building is on a terrace, raised approximately 30 inches above the 1959 flood peak, which was the worst flood since 1913.
Metzger Electric Shop (3367 N High)
3367, 3369 and 3377-3383 N. High St. were mostly derelict in 2010 when a car crashed into the buildings and caused the city to insist on demolition. One of these was the building described below; another was the old Clinton Theatre, and another a dance studio and a jewelry store. Because the 3 or 4 buildings formerly occupied by Clintonville Electric are finally disappearing from the Clintonville landscape, I’ve been writing several posts about them. This post is about 3367 North High, which was demolished in 2010.
An electric company was at the space (3367 North High) as early as 1929; that year someone named Walter Ernest “Tom” Metzger (b. 1897-07-24, d. 1980-10-22) purchased the business M Cupp & Son and renamed it Metzger Electric Shop. (There is no mention of appliances at that listing in the City Directory that year.) M Cupp & Son had occupied a variety of nearby North High addresses, selling assorted drugstore items, paints and eventually “radiolas.”
Metzger himself had earned an electric engineering degree from The Ohio State University and played on their Big 10 championship football and baseball teams in 1916 and 1917. He later started his own electrical consulting firms: Walter Metzger & Associates and Metzger & Blackburn. He also worked for the City of Columbus as assistant superintendent of the City Division of Electricity.
In 1939 Metzger was still listed at 3367 N High, but the business was described as an appliance shop. By 1940, the business was called Clintonville Electric, with Metzger described as in charge of the Construction Department, and LB Hinton over the Appliance Department. By 1945, only Hinton was listed for this business, and members of the Hinton family continued to own it until it went out of business. In 1945, Lloyd Hinton lived at 35 West North Broadway (but it seems he was renting that home) and later at 541 Walhalla (and eventually on Teteridge.)
[Newspaper clipping courtesy of the Columbus Dispatch, accessed through the Columbus Metropolitan Library’s Newsbank database. The receipt for the stove is all mine. I gotta say, I miss that stove–but still have that washer and dryer.]Oelgoetz Plumbing (3365 N High)
From September 1924 until 1955, the address 3365 N High was occupied by J.L. Oelgoetz Distributors (later calling themselves Plumbing and Heating Contractors). There’s an old post with a photo of Mr. Oelgoetz’s storefront here.
While researching this, I happened on this amusing article about the theft of both a bathtub and a boulder. A bathtub, for $20?
The “coal strike” in this Oelgoetz ad referred to a series of strikes in the bituminous coal mining regions of western Pennsylvania, and also to the anthracite coal strike in Northeastern Pennsylvania. The bituminous coal strike, which lasted from 1925 to 1928, was a flashpoint of racial, ethnic, and class conflict in the industrial North. The anthracite strike, which began in September 1925, involved 148,000 miners and threatened a coal shortage.
3365-1/2 was occupied in 1938 by William R. Barnhill Candy, and in 1939 by J. Howard Lyford Confectionary. Candy! Sadly I was unable to find out more about these sweet businesses.
[Newspaper clippings courtesy of the Columbus Dispatch, accessed through the Columbus Metropolitan Library’s Newsbank database.]Clinton Inn Restaurant (3363 N High)
For many years, the addresses of 3361 and 3363 North High were a single res-taurant space owned & managed by Sam Spandos and his brother.
In 1946, though, the space was divided and 3361 became part of Clintonville Electric. The space at 3363 continued as a restaurant under various names–Sam Spandos Restaurant, Lee’s Restaurant, Far North Restaurant, and Mrs Rose DeMatties Restaurant.
In 1950 the space reopened as the Clinton Inn. Described as “under new management by Rose and Tommy,” it was a 24-hour restaurant (just as, I believe, its predecessors were). I am not sure who Tommy or Rose are, but the restaurant had variously been listed as Mrs Rose DeMatties Restaurant from 1947 to 1949 and I assume there is a relationship.
The restaurant was destroyed in a massive fire in 1953; you can read more about that here. In March 1954, Hinton announced the opening of a new sales room at 3361-3363, taking over the space after a fire had destroyed the businesses at those addresses.
I’m sure this is when the architecture of the buildings became more streamlined; for comparison see here.
