Gene Patrick’s Other Comic Strip for the Journal

Anyone who has read this blog for a long time knows that I’m a fan of the late Gene Patrick and his Passing Scene comic strip that ran in the Journal for several years beginning in the mid-1960s and right into the 1970s. At times it must seem like I’m attempting to post the entire run of the strip.

The Passing Scene was great because it commented on the happenings of Lorain County. Politics seemed to provide an endless supply of material for Patrick and his strip included funny caricatures of local politicians such as Lorain Mayors Woody Mathna and Joe Zahorec.

But Patrick must have had an urge to do a classic style strip that would feature his own material and humor, independent of any local angle. He found that outlet in a strip he started a couple years after the Passing Scene was underway.

And that new strip was called Ollie Odd. It was odd all right, and done in a gag-a-day style format.

Here are a few samples of the strip that ran in April 1967 on the 5th, 6th and 14th. This first batch was focused on Ollie’s attempts to come up with a good mode of transportation.

Perhaps it’s fortunate that Patrick's Ollie Odd didn’t take off, as its success might have deprived Journal readers of his well-remembered Passing Scene.

Paul & Bill’s Sinclair – April 1957

Here’s an ad for a service station located at an intersection that I’ve written about before. The service station was Paul and Bill’s Sinclair, located at Ohio Routes 58 and 113.

Paul Cuenin and Bill Bodnar had taken over operation of the service station located on the southwest corner of the intersection and were holding an open house of sorts. The ad for the big event ran in the Lorain Journal on April 11, 1957.

The ‘get acquainted’ event featured all sorts of prizes, including a large boneless ham and free gas. The ubiquitous Anchor Hocking glasses were also given away at the event. (J. F. Medder was giving away the same glasses at his Sinclair station in Sheffield Lake in 1957, as was Bill Thomas at his Lorain Sinclair station.)

By 1962, the service station had become Bob & Bill’s Sinclair Service. Within a few years after that, it became just plain Bob’s Sinclair.

It appears that Bob ran the station for many years, switching to the Arco brand in the 1970s and Marathon in the 1980s. It remained open right into the 1990s, when its address was officially listed as 46005 Telegraph Road.

Today, the former service station at Routes 113 and 58 is shuttered.

Courtesy Google Maps

Edna’s Restaurant – April 13, 1957

Edna’s Restaurant on Route 6 west of Lorain is one of those topics that seem to pop up on my blog again and again. Above is a full-page ad for the Grand Opening of the business that ran in the Lorain Journal on April 13, 1957.

It’s a strange ad. No photo of “the newest most modern family restaurant” – just a bunch of clip art of hands with some space-age graphics thrown in.

As you can see, even in 1957 – decades after the Lake Shore Electric went out of existence – the only address in the ad is still Stop 111 West Lake Road. But after writing about Edna’s Restaurant several times (including this most recent post), I know that the new building in the ad is what we now know as the old Tiffany’s Steakhouse next to Skate World.

Here’s another ad (below) for Edna’s that I found recently. This one ran in the Lorain Journal in the big 125th Anniversary of Lorain edition in July 1959. The ad mentions that Edna had been serving truckers since 1953, but I have no idea where the business was located then; I was unable to find any listing of Ed or Edna Mitchell in any of the older directories.

As I’ve noted in a previous post, by the time of the 1960 city directory, Edna had moved her business to the south side of the highway to a smaller building and acquired a real address: 4875 West Erie.

Why did she move her business? I don’t know; maybe she lost her lease.  I hope to find out someday, or at least find an ad that acknowledges the move.

By the way, there’s been some activity at the former restaurant building on West Erie in the last month, with a dumpster stationed outside for a while. 

Happy Easter!

The scene down at Lakeview Park on Saturday afternoon

Here’s wishing all of my readers a Happy Easter!

Nothing says Easter like an Easter Bunny scanned from a 1957 Harry Volk Clip Book of Line Art!

Loading up the Lakeview Park Easter Basket – 1957

If there’s one photo that you can count on seeing almost every year in the Morning Journal and Chronicle-Telegram at Easter, it has to be the ceremonial placement of the large, concrete eggs in the iconic Lakeview Park Easter Basket.

It’s a tradition going back decades. I posted the 1958 edition back in 2011.

Here’s the photo (below) from 1957 as it appeared in the Lorain Journal on April 20th, the day before Easter. The caption reveals that David Shukait, the man who designed Lorain’s giant concrete easter baskets, had recently received a patent for the process he used to create them.

Joe Trifiletti and Charles Camera were the egg-bearers in the 1958 photo as well.

On the day after Easter 1957, the Journal published a photo of the crowd down at Lakeview Park.

MAIN ATTRACTION – The huge basket in Lakeview Park, as in other years,

was the main objective of Lorain’s Easter paraders yesterday. Traffic in the

vicinity of the park was slowed to a crawl as thousands gathered at the basket,

including many out of town and out of state visitors.

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A lot of people took advantage of the beautiful weather last weekend to get their Easter photos early by the basket in Lakeview Park. I noticed a small crowd every time I drove by there on Saturday and Sunday.

I would guess that the Lakeview Park Easter Basket is probably Lorain’s most-loved landmark, at least by locals.

More beloved than the Lighthouse? I think so. Many residents old and new have an emotional connection to the basket due to the tradition of taking family photos in front of it. It’s a lovely ritual that seems to be growing in popularity again, year after year.

It just wouldn’t be Lorain without its giant Easter Basket. And that’s something the Shukait family can always be proud of.

Happy Easter!

Central Bakery Easter Ad – 1957

I was fairly surprised to discover that I haven’t mentioned the longtime Lorain business Central Bakery too much on this blog over the years. So, it’s a good reason to post the above Easter-themed ad that ran in the Lorain Journal on April 15, 1957.

There seems to be two dates associated with the opening of Central Bakery. A full-page ad for the company that ran in the Journal on June 21, 1955 states that the firm has been “Serving Lorain Since May 15, 1915.” Other sources (including the Lorain Public Library’s online History of Lorain timeline) say that it was 1904 and that Edward Kowalski started the business.

Anyway, on December 11, 1963 an early morning fire destroyed the Central Bakery plant and offices at 2326 Elyria Avenue. The damage to the two-story brick building which housed the bakery, as well as a retail store in front of it facing Elyria Avenue, were estimated to exceed $250,000.

The bakery did not reopen, and a longtime Lorain business was lost to the ages.

How Lorain’s Highland Park Became Central Park

A scene at Central Park today

Last week I featured an article about Oakwood Park that ran in the Lorain Daily News back in late August 1939. Here’s another article that was part of that newspaper’s series on Lorain parks. This one features a short history of Central Park and ran in the paper about a week later on September 7, 1939.

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CENTRAL PARK TOO SMALL FOR AREA IT SERVES
third in a series of articles concerning the history and development of Lorain city parks
CENTRAL PARK

The wading pool at Central Park, located west of Oakdale ave. between West 27th and 30th sts., is constructed over an old quarry hole. The 16 1/2 acre tract purchased by the city in 1911 to be used as park land was all quarry and trees. Old timers in the neighborhood say it was a tale easy to believe that the quarry hole had no bottom. Several drownings occurred that made even the boys who persisted in using the hole for swimming, more cautious. So the city lost no time in filling up the old “death trap” with rubbish, tin cans and refuse, and after it had settled sufficiently, topped it with a thick cement wading pool.

The park was christened “Highland Park” by the city dads, and that name stuck until 17 years later. In June, 1928, persons owning lots adjacent the spot, petitioned the city to change the name to Central Park. The council acquiesced and by ordinance No. 3527, the new name became legal.

More people per square foot use Central as a play spot than any other place in the city, according to statistics provided by the City Recreation Commission. Many games of the city baseball leagues are played on the Central diamonds. The City Park Commission realize only too well, the need of more park space in Central Lorain. A few adequate spots are available, and have been considered pending the time when the city has funds for such a purchase.

The park as it is, has a number of improvements listed for it by the Park Department book of “must be dones,” according to Supt. Geo. Crehore. A new wading pool, a new rest room and shelter house, new baseball bleachers, more tennis courts, baseball diamonds, and more picnic tables and benches are necessary to equip the park satisfactorily for the use of the people it serves.

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I remember my father late in life expressing his annoyance at the park’s name change from Highland to Central Park.

I guess it was because he spent a lot of time playing there as a kid in the 1920s. It was only a block from the house where his grandparents lived on W. 28th Street, and just a couple blocks from where he grew up on Livingston. Thus the name change probably trampled on his memories.

Nevertheless, today the Highland Park name lives on as the name of the boulevard running east off of Oberlin Avenue towards the park’s northern limits.