1963 Motel Listings in Lorain Phone Book

Lorain and the surrounding cities had a great selection of motels back in the 1960's. Check out all the various choices that were available to travelers in the 1963 motel listings shown above. (Give it a click!)

I love looking at old ads like these. Some of these places will get the full blog treatment here eventually – some very soon!

Sadly, most of these are no longer motels. Anchor Lodge is now a nursing home; the site of Aqua Marine is now a luxury condo development; Vian's is long gone, replaced by the Residence condo development; Beaver Shore Motel has closed. The Kayann Motel & Apartments is still there and looks exactly the same, but no longer advertises itself as a 'motorist motel'.

However, not all of the motels are gone. The Elyria Holiday Inn is still around, as is Motel Plaza in Vermilion. Foster House Motel is now the Lake Motel; the Beachcomber is now the Erieview Motel. And as I pointed out in my previous entry, the Grandview Motel is now Parkview Motel. And the Shoreway Motel is still there too.

I remember looking at these motel listings in the phone book as a kid, wondering what it would be like to vacation in Lorain rather than live here! The ads sure made it look like a vacation wonderland!

Grandview Motel

A few weeks ago (back here), I mentioned my fascination with the Mom & Pop motels along US Route 6 (West Erie Avenue) on the western approach to the city. I guess you can attribute it to my fondness for the heyday of American automobile travel, back in the 1950's and 1960's.

Here's another one of those local motels that is still in business: the Parkview Motel, which is located just west of the undercut where Route 611 meets West Erie. It has gone through several name changes over the decades, but for most of those years it was known as the Grandview Motel.

The Grandview Motel first appeared in the Lorain phone book in 1949 as Grandview Court, and listed its address as W. Lake and Fullmer Roads.

It's interesting that motels were originally called 'motor courts' or 'motor lodges'. Anyway, Grandview Court quickly became Grandview Motel in the phone book in 1951.

Here's a postcard from the early days.

As the years went by, there seemed to be several owners. Later, the buildings received a makeover of sorts as shown in this newer postcard.

The makeover included a new paint job and the addition of large MOTEL signs on the roof at both ends of the building.

Here's a 1963 phone book ad that corresponds with the new look.

The Grandview Motel briefly became the Lakeview Motel around 1989, before settling in with its current name, the Parkview Motel, sometime in the late 1990's.

And here's how it looks today, photographed from the former Garwell's parking lot.

With the Ohio Turnpike and Route 2 siphoning off most of the east-west traffic, things are a lot slower on US Route 6 these days. But it's good to see that apparently there are still enough travelers and customers to keep the Parkview Motel open for business in the new millennium.