Bay Village shopping opportunities of yesteryear

This ad for Roger & Wray's appeared in the "Bay Bluebook" yearbook in 1976.

In the 1960s and '70s, when I called the city of Bay Village home (for about twelve years), "online" shopping may have meant waiting in a long queue for one’s purchases to be rung-up. It’s doubtful anyone other than the most visionary among us would have imagined the concept as it exists today.

Still, back then residents of Bay Village didn’t have far to travel if they wished to purchase a surprisingly wide variety of items. A story of mine appearing in the Feb. 19 issue of this newspaper regarding some of the dining-out options that existed when I was a Bayite spurred further recollections of other retail businesses in the city during that era. This is by no means a complete list, but following is my recollection of many of those retailers:

Starting in the area of Dover Center Road and the railroad tracks, a then-relatively-new shopping plaza, now known as Dover Junction, housed a Kroger’s supermarket which featured a very comprehensive selection of produce, groceries and other related items. Just to the north of Kroger’s sat a Cunningham Drug store, itself offering a wide variety of products.  Other retailers located in that plaza were a D.O. Summers dry cleaner, a beauty salon and, I believe, a music store.

On the east side of Dover Center, between the railroad tracks and East Oviatt Road, the NAPA auto parts store (now located in Dover Junction), a florist, both Reehorst and Quen’s dry cleaners and maybe another beauty shop could be found.

Just a bit north on Dover Center, on the west side of the street, sat the old Sell’s store, which featured all sorts of candy, Matchbox cars and a wide variety of gift items. Malley’s Chocolates now occupies the site. The Bay Delicatessen sat just to the north of Sell’s and, for a time, a Lawson’s Dairy store could be found next to them but that retailer would eventually relocate to a modernized facility across the street (plus an additional location out east on Eaton Way). Nearby, a Marshall’s (I believe) drug store occupied a space next to the Bay Post Office. 

A little further north on Dover Center, then as now, a Heinen’s supermarket, featuring a wide variety of fine foods, made its home.

North of Heinen’s, on Wolf Road, the Bay Shopping Center hosted an impressive variety of stores in its U-shaped confines. A few of them included the very fine Avellone Pharmacy, Roger and Wray’s – which sold Schwinn bicycles and a "complete selection of indoor and outdoor needs," Bay Hardware, Barth’s Meat Market, Bay Travel, Grebe’s convenience store, Bay Pastry, Arthur’s Shoe Tree, a pet shop, the Bay Barber Shop and the Bay Sportsman Shop – itself selling an impressive variety of goods.

Add to the list a number of banks, realtors, service station/garages that called the city home, plus a superette on either end of town, and one could find almost anything one needed within the borders of Bay Village, Ohio.

With the very substantial number – and variety – of retail outlets that have found their way to Westlake over the many years I’ve called the city home, its easy to forget the comprehensive mix of stores that existed in Bay "back in the day."

Dan Hirschfeld

I'm a longtime resident of the Bay Village / Westlake area (Bay 1965 to 1977, then Westlake since) who has very much enjoyed living here while seeing lots of change over the years.

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Volume 5, Issue 6, Posted 10:48 AM, 03.19.2013