Westlake, OH: Former A&P?

[Daniel]

This is at the intersection of Dover Center Rd. and Detroit Rd. It operated as a Discount Drug Mart until they built a new store across the street. Am I correct in guessing this was originally an A&P?

[submariner]

This is at the intersection of Dover Center Rd. and Detroit Rd. It operated as a Discount Drug Mart until they built a new store across the street. Am I correct in guessing this was originally an A&P?

Difinitely the stereotypical Centennial design, so I'm going to say yes, this was an A&P.

[rich]

This was one of the last centennials built in the Cleveland area. One at the Mentor City Shopping Center, opp. Great Lakes Mall is a rough contemporary. The store at Rt. 20 & Rt. 528 in Madison was probably the only one that came later.

[Daniel]

Ah, thanks for that information! I was pretty sure this was an A&P, but since it's actually the first ex-A&P I have come across I wasnt positive.

[Daniel]

Since I made the original posting, a Tuesday Morning store has leased this space. I know the manager of the store, and had stopped by there yesterday to see how things were going for the grand opening. In the course of discussion, he mentioned there was a basement area in the building. Intrigued, I went down there to dig around. There was no trace of A&P left, but I am curious how A&P used the space. They must've kept a lot of inventory on hand, as the stockroom upstairs is just as large as this basement stockroom.


First door you came to, just to the right of this was a small workbench area.


The first room contained a small area for employee lockers and two really nasty bathrooms. Beyond this was a stockroom.




First stockroom, with a conveyor belt system to move goods from the first floor to the basement. The conveyor belt still works, too. There was a second stockroom similar to this through another door, then a third door lead to a staircase that went back to a small landing upstairs. This area was walled up once you got to the top of the stairs, so it obviously wouldn't be the original configuration.


There was just enough room to stand at the top of these stairs, and that was it. There was a wall safe you couldn't reach anymore, so I'm thinking these stairs were added at another time. The only thing I found was an old set of automatic doors leaning against the wall.





Someone offered film developing, I'm guessing it was Drug Mart.

There's a quick tour of the A&P basement. I don't know if another market operated here after A&P closed, but it appears Drug Mart did some alterations to this area at some point. Does anyone know if these basements were common to A&P stores of this era?

[rich]

Basements were common in supermarkets of that era (and before) even though they didn't make much sense (that store was built when the area was just starting to develop and land would have been cheap). It may be that they were goodplaces to keep things that were better off at a cooler temperature but which didn't need refrigeration. I would guess that these were not common places where basements were a rarity like Southern California or many parts of the Southeast..

[ajc47]

Basements were common in supermarkets of that era (and before) even though they didn't make much sense (that store was built when the area was just starting to develop and land would have been cheap). It may be that they were goodplaces to keep things that were better off at a cooler temperature but which didn't need refrigeration. I would guess that these were not common places where basements were a rarity like Southern California or many parts of the Southeast..

Here in NE OH, many houses built before the 60s did not have basements, so it makes sense that small retail stores wouldn't either.

[rich]

Basements were the norm where I grew-up: NE suburbs of Cleveland. The 1950s bungalows around Cleveland typically have a basement, as do pre-WWII houses in the city and inner suburbs. Slab houses were more typical of houses built in exurbs after the early 60s.

[Toby Radloff]

I recall a fire at a Value World thrift store in Euclid, OH several years back(this was in a former Pick-N-Pay)...the fire started in the basement. An early 1990's fire at the former Gillombardo's Bi-Rite on Broadway Avenue in Cleveland (a store built in the early 1960's) also started in the basement. Basements in 1950's/1960's-era supermarket buildings are more common than you think. Elevators and/or dumbwaiters were used to bring stock to the main floor. Both buildings have since been rebuilt; the former Value World, I think, houses a Family Dollar, and the former Bi-Rite later housed a series of auto parts stores (Nationwise, Western Auto Parts America, Advance Auto Parts), and a couple of different dollar stores...the building is currently vacant.