The First Lakeview Park Bathhouse

Courtesy of Lorain County Metro Parks

Right now on Ebay is something I've never seen before: this postcard of Lakeview Park's original pre-tornado bathhouse (above).

There aren't a lot of photos of that particular bathhouse available these days (unless you count the ones where it's been destroyed by the tornado). At left is a nice one from the Lorain County Metro Parks website. (Here's a link to the portion of the website about Lakeview Park with a history of the bathhouse.)

Anyway, the back of the postcard is postmarked just a half-dozen days before the tornado, which struck on June 28, 1924. Kind of eerie, knowing what would happen in a matter of days.

Contrast the first bathhouse with this postcard of the third bathhouse (below) which we all remember so well.

Vintage postcard postmarked 1943

Did you know there was a second bathhouse in between the one that was destroyed by the tornado, and the one we all grew up with? What did that one look like?

Stop by here tomorrow to find out!

Avon House Move – January 1964

Moving a house to make way for a commercial business (such as a gas station) always interests me. It's a considerable undertaking, and says alot about a homeowner that they value their home so much that they want to go to the expense of having it jacked up and relocated.

Not surprisingly, the photo and accompanying caption above from the January 30, 1964 Journal caught my interest. The house – which was located at the northeast corner of Detroit and Center roads in Avon – was to be moved to make way for a gas station.

But thinking about that area now – unrecognizable in 2014 from what it was even a mere 10 or 15 years ago – made me think that surely the house would be gone by now. There's no way it could have survived the massive changes that occurred with all of the commercial development at that intersection now.

But I 'd almost forgotten that with the construction of I-90, Center Road had been cut in half – and that a new spur of Route 83 was built to carry traffic over the new highway. That meant that a small, sleepy dead-end chunk of Center Road was still there, oblivious to the shopping centers, banks and drug stores that were merely a few hundred feet away.

Of course, I had to drive out there late Sunday afternoon to see if the house was still there.

I was glad to see that the house was indeed still there in its new location (below). According to the Lorain County Auditor website, it is listed as being built in 1900 – so that means that it predates that generic date.

The view from yesterday

However, once again my determination to get a "now" photo almost got me into trouble.

As I slowed down in front of the house and took the picture, I noticed somebody in the house looking out the window.

"Aw, jeez," I thought as I kept going down the dead-end street, knowing I would have to turn around and pass the house again on my way back to Detroit Road. Would the person looking out the window be outside the house when I drove by again? 

Sure enough, in the time it took me to turn around, the same young man that was looking out the window was now down at the end of his driveway, staring at me when I slowly approached the house again.

I briefly thought of stopping, showing him the article and giving him an explanation of what I was doing. But I decided that he probably would think I was some kind of nut so I kept on going.

Maple Inn Grand Opening – Jan 1964

Courtesy Lorain County Auditors
website

Many of us are familiar with the Maple Inn, located at the intersection of Route 254 and West River Road, having passed it on the way to Midway Mall many times. Well, here's the Grand Opening ad for the newly remodeled Maple Inn. It ran in The Journal on January 29, 1964 – 50 years ago this month.

I've never been in the Maple Inn, but I've always admired the outside of the building. It looks like a nice, cozy place to hang out.

It's not an easy place to research, though. It's located in a kind of No-Man's Land between Lorain and Elyria, and its city directory listings shifted around between cities, depending on the year.

The earliest Lorain phone book listing that I could find for the Maple Inn was 1953.

Superior Chips are mentioned in one of the congratulatory ads. They were a regional brand out of Detroit, Michigan.

Hey, I just noticed some of my favorite beers were available at the Maple Inn back then: Old Dutch and Black Label!

Anyways, the Lorain County Auditor's website has 1900 as the year that the structure was built, and that usually means that the real date is unknown and predates that year. So there's been a business at that corner for a long, long time.

In recent years, a sign with the words "Frank and Ellie's" was added above the iconic sign with the large maple leaf. A colorful standalone sign was also installed, ushering in a new era in the inn's history.

The view last weekend

1012 E. Erie Avenue

The house fire at 1012 E. Erie Avenue on Dec. 9 that claimed the life of Vicky Kwasny and several family pets was a terrible tragedy. (Here's the link to The Morning Journal's coverage.)

According to The Morning Journal, the house has been traced back to 1894 by the Ohio Historical Society. The house was interesting to me, because for decades it was right across Idaho Avenue from the Ebeneezer Gregg/Myron Foote House (which I wrote about here).

I looked up the house in the city directories to locate the earliest listing. As usual, it wasn't easy, because of the renumbering of many of Lorain's street addresses in the early 1900s. It appears that the house started out with an address of 1004 E. Erie.

The 1903 directory had the house as the home of John and Catherine Snitzler and their family. John Snitzler was a contractor and carpenter. The family also included daughters Kathlyn, Louise ("Lou") and son Jay, who was also a carpenter.

I don't know if John Snitzler built his own home, but it would seem to make sense. It was a beautiful house.

Members of the Snitzler family (spelled 'Schnitzler' in later listings) – specifically "Lou" Snitzler as well as Jay and his wife Ida  – would continue to call the house home until the late 1920s.

Interestingly, in at least one listing (the 1921-22 edition), Jay Schnitzler was listed as being a writer.

Oberlin Avenue Carpet Shop Proposed Storefront

To close out my look back at the building at 1705 Oberlin Avenue in Lorain, here's an architectural rendering that was featured in an ad for Oberlin Avenue Carpet and Drapery Shop.

The ad appeared in The Lorain Journal on June 21, 1955, and the rendering represented a proposed new building front by the Lorain architectural firm of Meyer & Fauver (who also did the Lorain Public Library – which this rendering resembles just a little bit).

Unfortunately, the proposed storefront renovation did not occur. It's too bad, because it was quite modern and attractive for the 1950s, and might have helped development along that stretch of Oberlin Avenue.

Marks Cleaning Works

Jeremy Reynolds' job requires him to travel around Lorain County, and he is always emailing me photos "from the road" that are great subjects for blog posts, as well as alerting me to things I might be interested in.

He recently made me aware that the "Unfinished Furniture" sign for The Board Room on the building at 1705 Oberlin Avenue (former longtime home of Oberlin Avenue Carpet and Drapery Shop) had been removed, and the building's original name – Marks Cleaning Works – was now exposed. He recommended skedaddling over there to grab a photo before the inscription was covered over again, and I did just that on Saturday. (The sign was actually lying in the snow, a possible casualty of last week's mini-blizzard.)

Marks Cleaning Works first showed up at this address in the 1924 city directory, but the business itself was much older as revealed in this 1933 city directory ad.

"Founded 1909" means that it was one of Lorain's oldest businesses.

Marks Cleaning Works finally disappeared from the city directories around 1947. That's when the ad below appeared in the telephone directory, heralding the new Oberlin Avenue Carpet Shop business that so many of us passed on the way to Lorain Creamery.

1947 Phone  book ad

It's interesting that virtually all of the companies that called that building home from the early 1920s until recently were in the same or a related business.

Special thanks once again to Jeremy for his excellent blog post suggestion.

Memories of Woody Hayes

Ohio State played Clemson in the Orange Bowl over the weekend, and not surprisingly, the media used the occasion to remind sports fans that the last time the two teams had met had been in the 1978 Gator Bowl – Woody Hayes' last game as Coach of the Buckeyes.

I remember that game well. I was on break from Ohio State at the time, and was watching the game with some buddies in the lounge at Lake Erie Lanes in Vermilion.

After Woody Hayes punched the Clemson player who had intercepted the Ohio State pass (thus assuring a Buckeye loss), I remember my disbelief. Surely the player had taunted Woody, or provoked him somehow, I thought. But there was no plausible explanation as to why he did it, and Woody was fired the next day.

A few days later I was back on campus in Columbus, and it never really felt the same again. Woody Hayes was Ohio State, and I felt bad about his firing.

It was because of Woody Hayes – his great character and integrity, his personal interest in his players' educations, and what he stood for – that I wanted to go to Ohio State in the first place. Besides, his great teams of the 1960s and 70s (and their multiple Rose Bowl appearance) made Ohio State seem like an exciting place, and I wanted to be part of that excitement.

I know it was the wrong way to pick a college, but I've never regretted my decision. I look back on my Ohio State years as some of the best years of my life. In fact, I'm still good friends with two of my dorm roommates more than 30 years after graduation, and I keep in touch with a few other pals from the dorm as well.

Anyway, The Columbus-Dispatch covered Woody's firing extensively, and even offered a souvenir photo for sale (the one shown above). I bought one for Dad, who was a huge Woody Hayes fan, and stuck it in a frame for him. It hung in his basement for a long time. (I have custody of it now.)

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The combination of Woody Hayes and Bob Hope – another favorite of mine – form a special memory of my college days.

I'm somewhere in the crowd on the left
behind the glass.
(Photo by Tom Sines and courtesy
of Columbus Dispatch)

It was during late October of my sophomore year that Bob Hope filmed part of one of his TV specials in Columbus. The gimmick was that he was going to be filmed driving up to the Ohio Theater in a 1928 roadster.

So a bunch of guys from my floor in Siebert Hall Dormitory decided to witness it firsthand. One of them had a car, so we all jammed into it and headed Downtown, arriving at the Ohio Theater shortly before the TV cameras began filming. We proceeded to push and shove our way through the crowd until we were pressed up against the glass doors to the theater entrance.

It was almost surrealistic to watch Bob Hope drive up in his antique jalopy, get out, and then walk up to the theater, passing within a few feet of us.

But the real highlight was the next day, when Bob Hope dotted the "i" in Script Ohio at the Homecoming Game halftime show – and Woody ran out onto the field to greet him.

Courtesy Ohio State University Libraries collection

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I almost forgot to tell you my story about how I "met" Woody Hayes.

Although Woody had been fired as football coach in late December 1978, he was still a professor of military history at Ohio State and taught classes. So he maintained an office on campus, and despite his firing as Coach, I remained a big fan.

Now, my dorm (Siebert) was on South Campus, which to me is still the most beautiful part of the Ohio State Campus. I had the privilege of walking by Mirror Lake regularly, crisscrossing the Oval to get to class, and seeing fine old buildings such as Orton Hall and the Faculty Club.

I was walking back to the dorm one afternoon around 1979 or 80, and had taken a shortcut near the Faculty Club, when I noticed none other than Woody Hayes walking towards me. He was alone, in suit and tie, and obviously heading to the Club for some function.

I was pretty excited, and as I got closer to him, I couldn't help blurting out, "Hi, Woody!" He smiled, and said, "Hello, son!"

It made my day to be greeted by a living legend, as well as the man responsible for my wanting to go to Ohio State in the first place.