Wild West Sarsaparilla Follow-up

Last week I mentioned that there had been a big sign for Wild West Sarsaparilla (featuring the cartoon cowboy at left) down on West Erie Avenue just west of Leavitt Road on the side of a building in the 1970's. I remembered that you could see it from McDonald's. Unfortunately the building with the sign is long gone.

Fellow blogger Lisa posted a comment that the sign had been on the side of a beverage store – and wondered if the store had been an early version of Rite-Nau Beverage.

Well, I looked it up in the library tonight and she was right! Beginning in 1970, Rite-Nau Beverage was listed in Polk's Lorain City Directory at 2506 West Erie. For decades before that, it had been a private residence going back to at least the early 1940's. But by the late 1960's there seemed to be a front and back address designation with the property, with the front being the store and the rear continuing as a residence. The store later became Lakeside Beverage.

Here's the 1970 address listing of that area from the City Directory.