An unusual and unlocatable Kroger store (Beckley, WV)
Posted: 09 Sep 2016 23:16
Since my local library provides me with access to Newspaper Archive, I've been entertaining myself lately by doing a little research on landmarks and retail stores here and there...including those in West Virginia, where I used to live. That's how I found this:
This Kroger store was located in Beckley, and opened on March 11, 1959. It had a street-facing rectangular sign, similar to the ones jutting above the entrance doors of some of the other stores in the chain hailing from the same time.
But my, what an unusual building! The roof and storefront were arched, like those on a Safeway, Penn Fruit, or Kohl's store. You can also see a flat-roofed wing for the entrance that was accompanied by a decorative "quarter-arch" meeting the main roofline at a V.
The windows are just a small strip along the bottom of an opaque wall, making the store seem cheaper and less attractive than it could be; more like a quonset shack than a Safeway marina. Nevertheless, I'm extremely intrigued, and I had no idea that Kroger had ever built anything like this.
The sign is also visible in this 1974 photo, by which point a SupeRx drugstore had been added to the property: There's one huge constraint on my knowledge, however: I have no idea where this store stood.
* The address given for this property was 307 Valley Drive (or North Valley Drive, as the case may be). This street no longer exists: Near as I can remember, it was renamed Robert C. Byrd Drive in the 1990s.
* Except, there's another complication: All the address numbers on Robert C. Byrd Drive today have four digits, not three. So Beckley may have gone through a address numbering system change at some point; at least on that street.
* Furthering the point, if I punch "307 Robert C. Byrd Dr" into Google, it comes back with a location north of the city where no retail development existed in 1959 (and scarcely any is today). I doubt the store was there.
* The Crossroads Mall is relatively close to Google's location, but it opened in 1983. I can find references to SupeRx surviving at 307 Valley Drive as late as 1992...so they couldn't have torn down the 1959 Kroger and acres of adjacent retail and built the mall on the spot.
* A Kroger Superstore opened at the Raleigh Mall on July 2, 1974, but it did not replace the Valley Drive store. Both locations are listed in period ads as being open simultaneously.
* The Beckley newspaper archives cut off after 1977. So, they're of no help at offering any answers.
Where was this store, and what was its fate? I wish I knew. Your guess is as good as mine.
As a side note, I will say that pinpointing locations in Appalachia is absolute madness. Nothing outside of city downtowns is on a grid, and the roads curve, meander, and wander in every direction. Address numbers have a tendency to get reassigned, or float from one number to another...if locations are given any address number in the first place. Quite often in rural areas they don't, and directories and ads will list a store by the road it's on, the post office it's assigned to (which may not even be nearby), and nothing else.
This Kroger store was located in Beckley, and opened on March 11, 1959. It had a street-facing rectangular sign, similar to the ones jutting above the entrance doors of some of the other stores in the chain hailing from the same time.
But my, what an unusual building! The roof and storefront were arched, like those on a Safeway, Penn Fruit, or Kohl's store. You can also see a flat-roofed wing for the entrance that was accompanied by a decorative "quarter-arch" meeting the main roofline at a V.
The windows are just a small strip along the bottom of an opaque wall, making the store seem cheaper and less attractive than it could be; more like a quonset shack than a Safeway marina. Nevertheless, I'm extremely intrigued, and I had no idea that Kroger had ever built anything like this.
The sign is also visible in this 1974 photo, by which point a SupeRx drugstore had been added to the property: There's one huge constraint on my knowledge, however: I have no idea where this store stood.
* The address given for this property was 307 Valley Drive (or North Valley Drive, as the case may be). This street no longer exists: Near as I can remember, it was renamed Robert C. Byrd Drive in the 1990s.
* Except, there's another complication: All the address numbers on Robert C. Byrd Drive today have four digits, not three. So Beckley may have gone through a address numbering system change at some point; at least on that street.
* Furthering the point, if I punch "307 Robert C. Byrd Dr" into Google, it comes back with a location north of the city where no retail development existed in 1959 (and scarcely any is today). I doubt the store was there.
* The Crossroads Mall is relatively close to Google's location, but it opened in 1983. I can find references to SupeRx surviving at 307 Valley Drive as late as 1992...so they couldn't have torn down the 1959 Kroger and acres of adjacent retail and built the mall on the spot.
* A Kroger Superstore opened at the Raleigh Mall on July 2, 1974, but it did not replace the Valley Drive store. Both locations are listed in period ads as being open simultaneously.
* The Beckley newspaper archives cut off after 1977. So, they're of no help at offering any answers.
Where was this store, and what was its fate? I wish I knew. Your guess is as good as mine.
As a side note, I will say that pinpointing locations in Appalachia is absolute madness. Nothing outside of city downtowns is on a grid, and the roads curve, meander, and wander in every direction. Address numbers have a tendency to get reassigned, or float from one number to another...if locations are given any address number in the first place. Quite often in rural areas they don't, and directories and ads will list a store by the road it's on, the post office it's assigned to (which may not even be nearby), and nothing else.