Frank Clontz, one of the young kids from the class of 55, wrote about his memories of Stanley's.....after they had moved into that Large space just to the left of the building where their original store was. They called it Stanley's Super Drug....I believe. And it was.
Frank also said,"...we lived on the second block of Central Avenue and my very young memories are of Central and 7th Streets where Lincoln's Drugs Stores was as well as a small grocery store and, of course, on the corner was a dry cleaner that was built at an angle and across the street was the Kayo Service station also built at an angle on the lot. "
Ellouise Diggle Schoteller also had some fond memories of the famous Stanley Drugs:
"Nice photo of the corner of Pecan and 7th Stree - it does look hauntingly the same, doesn't it. I too loved Stanley's Drug store. I never sat on those metal bars outside - but then I was a girl. But I read the comics there and Doc Stanley never made me leave or put them back. bought my first pair of roller skates, the old metal ones with the skate key you wore around your neck on a colorful shoe string. And on and on. The Starbucks that is in the space now is a good place to sit and "be" there again. And I am pretty sure that was a Colonial Store on the other side."
Thanks Ellouise. My memory kept saying "Colonial Super Market"....but my brain didn't think it logical that 2 grocery stores could exist almost side by side.
John Brock (Class of '50, and creator of that great video about Central that he did for his class's 55 reunion ( If you haven't seen it GO HERE) weighed in:
"..... the other grocery store on the other side of the old Stanley's and A & P was originally "Penders." And, yes, it was unusual to have two grocery stores almost side by side and the competition was fierce. I would play them against each other during the war when meat was scarce and I would sell rabbits I raised in my backyard on Morningside Dr. I would dress them and take them to the store offering the highest bid. The store would place them in their meat counter and they would be gone before noon. If something like that was tried today, we would all be in jail! I started my first bank account with the money I earned from my rabbit "farm."
John
I've got one more Stanley story and I'll shut up.....and hopefully let others of you in our vast audience chime in with your stories of places that meant a lot to you...growing up.
In 1941 my daddy bought one of the early "table model" radios. Most of them back then were rather large consoles. This was a small Philco "transitone" model. He bought it at Stanleys for $9. During WW2 this radio sat on a table next to the dining room table....and I remember listening to Edward R. Murrow and others reporting the war news.
A little later it became MY radio...and sat by my bedside for the rest of the time.
The face is a little cloudy. It once sported a paper decal of the Lone Ranger that I stuck on there to look at while I listened to the masked rider and his faithful indian companion.
That was my version of TV....which I don't think I had even heard of then.
It's with me now....and it still works.
All but one of the tubes are original.
-Ed
