Thursday, April 23, 2026

Turnpike Lanes Revisited


It might be hard to believe that a bowling alley was once located right at the intersection of Griswold Road  and State Route 57. But that's where Turnpike Lanes was located, right at what was then called Turnpike Plaza.

I wrote about Turnpike Lanes back here in 2019, noting that it had opened back in 1961. Here are clippings that tell the story leading up to the Grand Opening on Nov. 3, 1961.

March 18, 1961
April 22, 1961
June 21, 1961
August 4, 1961
August 26, 1961
Sept. 29, 1961
Oct. 6, 1961
Oct. 20, 1961
Nov. 3, 1961
Nov. 3, 1961
And sixty years ago this month, Meyer Goldberg took over the property, opening the fourth store in his grocery empire.

April 5, 1961
April 6, 1966
Looking at the location today, few Lorain Countians probably remember that Turnpike Lanes or Meyer Goldberg were ever there. They're more likely to remember (like me) when Booksellers Paperback Exchange called it home.

Sept. 2025 view of the property
at

3 comments:

  1. -Alan D HopewellApril 23, 2026 at 5:35 AM

    I spent and earned many a dollar at Booksellers over the years, buying and trading in books, renting videos (with those bulky orange players), and buying cassette tapes; I particularly remember a rainy Sunday afternoon in 1989, going to Booksellers to buy a cassette of Todd Rundgren's newest album.

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  2. Don HiltonApril 23, 2026 at 3:53 PM

    40 lanes - wow! That would've been something to see - and hear. Our local bowlery (I made up the word) had only 10. But it was open only 5 years. Elyria didn't have the bowlers Parma did, I suppose. Plus, back then, it was sort of an out-of-the-way place, wasn't it?

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  3. AnonymousApril 24, 2026 at 2:08 PM

    I always wondered about the weird floor layout of Bookseller as halfway in the store you would step down into the floor.It kept on having different levels as you would walk along looking at books and such and go down deeper and deeper into the floor.That had to be where people could access each bowling lane.And yet another mystery is solved.I still have a poster of The Doors front man Jim Morrison that I bought at Bookseller.

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