Giant Tiger 1968 Shoppers Gift Guide Euclid & Willoughby

Black Friday 2018 has come and gone, so take a break and live (or re-live) Giant Tiger's Christmas Shoppers Gift Guide from 1968 featuring clothes, toys, gifts, Christmas trees and more.

Pro-tip: Click the first image to be able to click through all full sized pages!

1968 Giant Tiger shoppers gift guide from 36225 Euclid Ave., Willoughby and 22801 Lakeshore Blvd., Euclid.

Euclid (and an RTA) Buses of Yesteryear

No big post, just some a couple of photos of old buses. Enjoy!

 Blue and yellow city of Euclid bus

25 High Quality Pictures from Chase Copper and Brass Productions in Euclid, Ohio Circa 1942

Because it's important to keep dirt and moisture from refrigeration tube, it is packaged in individual envelopes.

Bank One: Revisited

I first went and took pictures of the Bank One on the Euclid Square Mall property in  January of 2006. It was long abandoned and it looked as such. I went back this past March (2011) and tried to get a few more shots to show how this building is, well, "progressing".

Fast forward 5 years and 2 months of sun, rain and snow and this is what you're left with:

I would have gotten more pictures but I sort of got chased away by the boys in red (Ford Rangers). I don't know why they care... it's not like I'm some dumbass spray painting "Outlaw" on private property. That one must have slipped through their fingers.

I'll get more, though. I have a lot of revisiting to do. Lots of pictures to come this summer.

Chilling to see it in person though... kind of actually scary to walk under this as it's dripping and generally sagging and looking sad. Water is really attacking this place.

2006 vs. 2011

The Plaza on Shore Center Drive

Here's a few pictures I shot off the same day I took the Arthur Treachers photos. This plaza is where Dave's supermarket was before it took over the old Tops grocery store building. This is on Shore Center Drive in Euclid, Ohio.

New Restaurant to Open in Old Coffeehouse

Remember my Arabica joy in 2006? We went there a few times, it was nice but didn't last too long. If memory serves, 26598 Lakeshore Blvd. was also home to restaurants Boardwalk and Waterfront Cafe.

It sat empty for a spell and a restaurant called Steve's Grill has been threatening to open for a while. According to a blurb I found they were slated to open in October of 2010.

I don't know much more than can be figured out by driving by the place, but it'll be nice to have another spot to enjoy.

And please do read the comments left on this post, as there is even more information to be found there, loads of thanks to those leaving behind info!

Lake Shore Plaza's Facelift.

Looks really great. Posting these for those readers who are curious about how Lake Shore Plaza looks now.

Lake Shore Plaza is home to Euclid Marc's and a state beverage store amongst others I can't remember. Formerly home to a social security office and I-deal Tobacco.

In case you had forgotten, and I already had, here's a glimpse of just how nice the new facades actually look, from September 2006:

Arthur Treachers Closes, Appears to be Abandoned for Hundreds of Years

A new skeleton has been added, this time it's on Lakeshore Blvd. and it just recently happened, because when I drove by a week or two ago, Arthur Treachers Fish & Chips looked like this.

 It was up for sale and they got outta town!

So the Arthur Treachers Fish & Chips at 23900 Lakeshore Boulevard has gone bye bye. I guess this means Lent at Long John Silvers this year.

A Brief History of Clarkins Department Stores, Part I

Clarkins stores, 1971 and 2004.
Clarkins was a chain of discount department stores that was headquartered in Akron, Ohio. Co-founded by brothers-in-law William Clark and Elza Hopkins (Elza E. Hopkins 27 Aug 1921 - 15 Nov 2004) in 1946, the origin of Clarkins name can be quite easily guessed.

Clark was a tire builder at the time and Hopkins, a University of Akron Alumnus, a mechanical engineer. The chain started out modestly by selling surplus materials at what was at one time a filling station in Akron. In that first year of operation the men had begun to add more to their inventory, including tools and other hardware, and moved to a larger location. In addition, they opened the Canton location.

In 1950 an entirely new store was built in Akron while the Canton store was expanded. May 1959, the Kent, Ohio Clarkins was opened, making three locations in total. The Kent store moved from University Plaza in 1968.

1965 saw another company purchasing Clarkins, Unishops. The purchase didn't seem to change much, at all, from November 23, 1965...

2 more years passed and in 1967 Clarkins opened offices and a large warehouse on Arlington Road, also in Akron. Stores were then opened in Cuyahoga Falls and Canton. In November of 1970 Clarkins in Youngstown opened.

Construction on three more locations, Bedford, Elyria, and Euclid, Ohio happened and two of those locations opened on October 27, 1971. By Christmas 1971 Bedford and Euclid Clarkins were in full operation. These two locations were ninth and tenth for Clarkins. Elyria Clarkins opened later.

Regular business hours at Clarkins in the early 1970's in the Cleveland area were 10 am to 10 pm Monday through Saturday, and Noon to 7 pm on Sundays.

What did Clarkins sell? You can pack a lot into 100,000 square feet, and departments included: Clothing, housewares, health and beauty, domestics, tools and paint, toys, auto parts, photography equipment and cameras, jewelry, pet supplies and live fish, lawn and garden and of course, records.

Clarkins department stores were located at the following addresses:

Akron, Ohio
3200 Arlington Rd.

Bedford, Ohio
380 Rockside Rd.

Canton, Ohio
3200 Atlantic Blvd.

Canton, Ohio
2905 Whipple Rd.

Cleveland, Ohio
12800 Brookpark Rd.

Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio
4075 Akron-Cleveland Rd.

Elyria, Ohio
1016 East Broad St.

Euclid, Ohio
26100 Euclid Ave.

Kent, Ohio
1600 S. Water St.

Lorain, Ohio
3000 Leavitt Rd.

I'm primarily interested in the Euclid, Ohio location, as you can probably guess, and for now I will leave it here. A very brief (and partial) history of a rather long standing company that seems to be almost completely forgotten about 39 years later.

Look for Part II very soon.

September 26, 1971, a Clarkins store is coming soon...

Burlington Coat Factory

Burlington Coat Factory at the old Euclid Value City. Click them for bigger versions.

Pictures!

Some are worth a thousand words. These? At LEAST 10 or 15. Click them for bigger versions.

I was hoping they'd unboard the windows, not just put white stuff over them and then 93.1 plastic signs. SOMEONE HIRE A DESIGNER *snaps fingers*

Look at all the cars in the parking lot. This makes me sad, seriously. I remember the parking lot looking like this when it was actually a Toys R Us. I got my Precious Places mansion from here!

Happy customers leaving. Without... stuff.

This one can, should and will speak for itself.

All joking aside, the whole thing makes me a bit emo and I look ridiculous with a messenger bag.

Thanks to Guy for the photos

Euclid Square Ads + Some lolz.

Here's some mall eye candy for you ESM junkies.

Click them and they get heap big.

This is from some sort of promotional pamphlet. 1977. I love that "may co." can be seen in the background.

This is from the same pamphlet. It's hard to believe now that the mall had so much to offer.

I've got a few more things to put up here eventually.

Now onto something I personally found to be rather amusing.

Checking my traffic tracker I see 3 consecutive links from http://www.middlebass.org/News.shtml!

I go to check it out thinking I'm in trouble AGAIN and what do ya know. Turns out I was providing a forum for fans of Ed!

Yes! Click here is the Dead Euclid blog!

Now it wouldn't be so funny if all 6 comments were pro-Ed but only one is and the moment I got it I though honestly he, or a close buddy, wrote it. Just sayin'.

I got a brand new camera (the best one ever, an SLR, not a point and shoot) and I totally know what I'm doing with it now. Once the powers that be get done with me, I'll try to get out and shoot some stuff. Lots has changed (the Dollar General complex got a new facade. Weee hee!) and there's stuff I never got around to shooting in the first place.

Finally, a whole new layout is in the works, so click those freaking feeds for a change.

Thanks.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Aren't you guys sweet.

A nice anonymous commenter told me the giant, empty building at the corner of East 260th and Euclid Avenue was built as a Clarkin's (good luck finding anything out about this place if you're simply not old enough to remember it yourself) turned K-Mart. Closed as Clarkin's in the mid to late 1970's, vacant for a few years and then opened as a K-Mart in the 1980's. I have no clue when it closed and I don't think it's been anything since.

So of course, I uploaded photos. Click the picture to get there:

Also! The boy toy found this link which I think a lot of readers will find interesting... we certainly did: Municipal Finance and Sustainable Development, a case study of Severance Town Center and Euclid Square Mall.

It's a PDF so have Adobe Reader blah blah blah you should know how to use the Internet by now.

Additionally, the Wendy's turned soul food restaurant has closed as of April 2007. The grand opening sign is still hanging on the building.

Oh, and if you have any photos of anything that would excite me and is related to Euclid, please, send them to me.

Ok, that's all. Have a good holiday and don't blow all your fingers off.

Some Photos.. and a Video!

Last night, Dick Goddard told me we'd be getting 1 to 4" of snow today. He was right. So we decided to go out in it and take some photos. I get strange urges at stupid times because I'm an odd little monkey like that.

At any rate, have some visual candy compliments of me and my really understanding boyfriend who drives the very light red coupe in the snow for me.

Here's the old Wendy's fast food burger joint. Like I said a few entries back, it's back in business, just not as a Wendy's... so A+.

Here's our new Dollar General. This was a Euclid PD substation for a little while. Again, A+.

They knocked down our ratty old Taco Bell and built this shiny new one. I love tacos, and I love our new Taco Bell. They still mess up my order but that's become part of the Taco Bell Experience. A++!

Here's the old familiar exit sign that's adorned the top of this blog since 2005. If they ever decide to get rid of it, I hope they give it to me (and I'm a nice girl, so they should).

And here's a video, just driving around the mall with me running my mouth. I figured since a lot of visitors used to live here, they might get a kick out of seeing the mall again.



Also, I get a ton of comments at my Fotki photo albums... don't be afraid to comment here as well! I want opinions, memories, information or just yell at me, whatever peels the banana!

Notice I added some new options on every post, be sure to digg the post once in a while!

Thanks and enjoy!

Vacant: Pizza Hut and Wendy's

I said I'd cover more than the mall, and I recently got out and took some photos. For now, we'll take a look at 2 obvious and now unoccupied restaurants, both on Euclid Avenue.

This Pizza Hut eat-in restaurant, located at 26010 Euclid Avenue, has been closed since at least 2003. The building was transferred from a parent company to a limited liability partnership in the summer of 2000. I found a rather unfavorable review of this Pizza Hut from July 25, 2001.

Transfer history goes a little something like this: The land was acquired in January 1982 and sold in February 1983 to Ohio based Pizza Hut. In February 1996, the property was sold to the parent company mentioned above. It was transferred, as stated in the previous paragraph, in July 2000.

Like a lot of places, it's still filled with its furniture and sometimes, there are lights on inside. The sign is occasionally lit up on the outside.

The property is in semi-decent condition. The building, of course, is showing its age mostly due to fading paint.

A larger version of the image above and others can be found in the Pizza Hut gallery.


Wendy's restaurant, located at 26193 Euclid Avenue and built in 1985, has been closed for about 2 years now. They were open one day and closed the next. There is a sign on the door advising would-be customers to visit their other Euclid location.

Lights usually remain on in the hallway and back parts of the restaurant. Tables, chairs, and even salt and pepper shakers remain tidy and silent inside. I found a current for lease listing for this building, and ironically enough, in the list of other restaurants nearby, it mentions the Pizza Hut above.

Ownership changed hands in July of 2006. There are about 4 transfers on this building and 3 on the property before this Wendy's building was put up, in 1975, 1982 and finally, 1985. I am not sure if there was a structure on the land before the Wendy's was erected. The saddest part is the property (without Wendy's structure) in 1985 sold for $250,000... This past July (21 years later) it sold for $160,000, a staggering $90,000 less.

For more pictures inside and out, please give the Wendy's gallery a look.

I do have more photos and I should be getting those up here within the next couple of days.

Thanks and by all means.. pass it on! Euclid has a wonderful potential and I really hope it is realized soon by people who can and WILL do something about it.

Photo Links

2018: Major updates here. My old host died literally years ago, and I've been lazy. Below are updated *and working* links to my photo galleries. Enjoy!

Arthur Treachers

Bank One at Euclid Square Mall

Clarkin's/Kmart

Dollar Tree Plaza

Fazio/HomeTown Buffet/Super Buffet

Lake Shore Plaza

Pizza Hut/Asian Express

Red Lobster at Euclid Square Mall

Toys R Us at Euclid Square Mall

Wendy's