Many of Anderson’s downtown businesses no longer exist.
To a degree that’s expected as business owners retire or relocate. But sometimes they simply aren’t replaced, at least with businesses in kind.
Some come quickly to mind. Remember the Anderson Camera Shop, and Odell Photo? There is no longer a store in town that deals exclusively in cameras and photographic equipment.
Likewise Anderson Sporting Goods and Decker’s are gone forever. So is Bob’s Pro Shop. A couple of places, such as Dunham’s, deal in traditional sporting goods, along with lines of clothing and such that have become more marketable than mere athletic wear. But the market has changed.
Remember the meat market on Meridian Street? They’d wrap custom cuts of your favorite meat for you to take home. Now if you’re lucky you can find a supermarket that actually mans a meat counter, though most of its sales are the prepackaged variety.
Several shoe stores in downtown Anderson, such as Thom McAn and Schiff’s, are long gone. You’d go in, a clerk would greet you and bring you the kind of shoe you were interested in, try it on your foot and, if it didn’t fit, bring you another.
And there isn’t a shoe repair shop left in Anderson. I recall at least four – two downtown, one in Park Place and one across from the old Anderson High School.
Star China, the last complete housewares store, also is gone, the business converted to a photo finishing store.
The difference? Superstores handle everything that used to take you from store to store. Now on a trip to Wal-Mart or Meijer you pick up everything you need, including major appliances, even your groceries. And you can do your banking and develop your photos (including digital) and even get your eyes examined.
Neighborhood pharmacies have all but disappeared. You can fill prescriptions at the superstore or the supermarket. Or you can go to a traditional drug store, such as CVS or Walgreen, which now carries everything from cosmetics to grocery items to film developing in addition to regular drugstore purchases.
Strock Brothers and Kaufman’s Hardware downtown and Keesling’s in Park Place handled most hardware needs in the 1950s. Now traditional hardware stores, where clerks helped you find just what you needed, have largely disappeared (Tru-Value is the closest thing these days), replaced by home improvement centers such as Lowe’s and Menards. The latter also handle lumber, along with Carter Lumber and Stottlemyer Lumber, the last of Anderson’s traditional lumber yards.
And when’s the last time you tried to get a typewriter serviced? Miller Huggins gave that up years ago, and Eads Typewriter Repair no longer functions, a concession to the computer and word processing age.
Times change, and with it come new kinds of businesses to replace the old. Items we once couldn’t do without have gone the way of the buggy whip.
Jim Bailey’s reflections on Anderson’s past appear on Sunday. His regular column appears on Wednesday. He can be reached by e-mail at jameshenrybailey @earthlink.net.
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