Thursday, February 19, 2009
Retail / Travel Advisory And Stay Out of the Woolsworth!
Posted by Nicki Wood on Thu, Feb 19, 2009 at 1:10 PM
Someone sent this copy of an old Woolworth's menu -- I must be a magnet for historic food stuff these days.
Nashville had a couple of Woolworth's, one in 100 Oaks and another in Hillsboro Village (yes, hipsters, a Woolworth). I'm just old enough to remember eating there: ordinary sandwiches and pretty good fountain treats. Click here for the full menu in a large format.
Honestly, I was surprised, returning from college, to find the 100 Oaks Woolworth's still operating. Though it was well-trafficked (it was the only general retail store for miles), its low ceilings, parquet floors and dusty shelves looked like a relic from another century. Always on the hunt for hidden restaurant gems, so I ordered a sandwich, thinking, "Maybe there's an old lady baking real hams back there!" Supermarket ham, yellow mustard on white bread. Disappointing. The store closed a year later.
England still had thriving Woolworth's in 2001 when we moved there. "Woolies'" food was pretty good, and the tea service was a bargain. Also, it was a good stop for getting out of the weather. But it was a retail concept that had finished its life cycle and they all closed late last year.
Now Bites-ers, a few of you probably had a Woolworth's in your past. If not, show your parents this blog post (it's a good excuse to explain blogs to them) and ask if they remember the Woolworth here or somewhere else in their past.
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There was one downtown into the 90s, complete with intact lunch counter and escaped five-dollar parakeets flying around downstairs. Good grilled cheese for two bucks.
A Woolworth in downtown Nashville in the 1990s? I worked downtown in the 1990s. Where was it? Sorry: Where was it AT?
For a few years around the time I started school, my grandfather worked in the 100 Oaks office tower (yes, office tower). Every now and then we would meet him at quitting time in the upstairs level of the mall, which featured an overwhelming amount of dark stone-was it brown marble?-that I thought was be-yoo-tiful. Then he'd take me downstairs to the Woolworth's for a milkshake at the counter while my parents...walked around, enjoying a rare moment of kidlessness, I guess? I don't know for sure, I was too young, but those jaunts down to the Woolworth's were a total highlight. I remember the look of the counter, the tall milkshake glasses, etc. very clearly.
The downtown Woolworths right next to the failed Church Street Center, where the library is now. It fronted Church Street and shared a building with Watkins, when Watkins was mainly adult education.
It had the word's narrowest escalator down to the basement level.
