I’m late to the game here and am not exactly breaking any news, but the old Marsh Supermarket on Nichol Avenue in Anderson finally came back to relevance with its space split between the Needler’s Fresh Market grocery and Benge’s Ace Hardware. The west side of Anderson sorely needed something like this!
Continue reading “A new use for an old Marsh in Anderson”
If you’re aching for the chance to live in a one-room school but the old Lincoln Schoolhouse I wrote about a few weeks ago didn’t trip your trigger, you’re in luck: another schoolhouse long since converted into a house has been listed for sale. It’s the old Keller or Buttermilk School in Madison County’s Lafayette Township.
Continue reading “Another schoolhouse has hit the market”
I finally crossed a long-awaited destination off my list yesterday. Years after first learning about Madison County’s elusive Larimore artesian well and four months of corresponding with its owners, I had the chance to see it up close! The well sits inside Hidden Canal Nature Preserve, a fifty-acre tract protected by the Red-Tail Land Conservancy, and my visit was more rewarding than I expected.
Continue reading “Madison County’s Larimore well was well worth the wait”
When I worked for Ball’s home canning division, we always told customers to ask their neighborhood grocer to order any of our products they couldn’t find. Fruit Fresh? Talk to the manager. Unfortunately, it was advice from another era- could you walk into a Kroger and ask for something special today? Maybe, but first you’d have to find someone to ask. At Harvest Supermarkets, though, you can! March right in and talk to a real person who knows the store, recognizes its customers, and sometimes even knows your name. That’s one of the reasons Harvest has become my favorite grocery store. It’s a true neighborhood throwback.
Continue reading “Harvest Supermarket: an ode to a real neighborhood grocer”
On Sunday, my brother John and I experienced something extraordinary: a screening of the silent-film classic The Phantom of the Opera, accompanied by one of only three surviving Page pipe organs still in its original theatrical home. Better yet, that home was a bona fide atmospheric movie palace! The whole experience was every bit as spectacular as it sounds, and the best part is that we nearly missed it. A last-minute change of plans and a remarkable string of coincidences came together to make it happen.
Continue reading “The Phantom of the phenomenal Paramount”
East-Central Indiana got walloped by a hundred-year flood a few weeks ago. Anderson got the brunt of it: neighborhoods were placed under evacuation orders1 as the White River crested at a staggering 24.93 feet2! I don’t know if any commercial property took the floodwaters harder hit than River Ridge Plaza, just across Scatterfield Road from the abandoned Mounds Mall. Now, news reports suggest that all of its stores -including Roses- may never reopen3. If so, the news comes awfully soon after another Indiana Roses, the one in Marion, closed for good.
Continue reading “A second Indiana Roses may soon be shutting its doors”
Old neighborhood schools still dot Anderson, Indiana, nearly everywhere you turn. Some are old and some are more modern, but if you asked me to pick the most striking of them all, I’d have a hard time choosing anything other than Shadeland Elementary. With its elaborate Gothic Revival styling, castle-like appearance, and commanding presence, it’s still one of Anderson’s architectural standouts a century after it opened,
Continue reading “Anderson’s old Shadeland School”
I guess it shouldn’t come as much surprise for a place that closed in 2018, but Mounds Mall of Anderson, Indiana, isn’t looking that great. It’s become one of central Indiana’s most visible examples of the decline of enclosed shopping centers, and every year it sinks a little further into decay.
Continue reading “Mounds Mall isn’t looking so good”
I found flowing wells through sheer exploration until I used tips on social media to to expand my search. Eventually, I stumbled across Indiana University’s Interactive Petroleum Data Management System Map, an online tool that gave me the sites of old gas wells across the state! Some had since become flowing water wells, like the one I found near Anderson a few years ago. Unfortunately, I won’t get to see it in person for a couple more months.
Continue reading “I found another flowing well but won’t get to see it until October”
Soon after I wrote about the hidden remains of Holiday Inn’s old Great Sign in New Castle, reader decotriumph reminded me that the H&K Motel in Anderson was another old Holiday Inn. I used to pass it every day on the way to work and was aware of its provenance, but I’d never paid attention to the sign out front. D’oh! It, too, is another heavily-modified Great Sign.
Continue reading “More remnants of another Holiday Inn “Great Sign””