The Lobster Shop at 6912 Soundview Dr NE, Tacoma, WA 98422 will be closing on March 15, 2014. It’s a little out of the way for my family, but still we dined there a few times and always enjoyed it. The site was originally native land and had been the Dash Point Grocery. In 1977 it became the Lobster Shop.
Blockbuster Video at 3833 Pacific Avenue, Tacoma, WA 98418-7897 is closing. It is the last Blockbuster Video in Tacoma and once gone, the closest store will be in Kent. I use to get my dvds there and found the parking lot to be difficult to maneuver. This month (November 2013) it was announced that the remaining stores will be closing.
Van Lierop Bulb Farm at 13407 80th St E Puyallup, WA 98372 is one of two bulb farmers left in the Puyallup Valley and it is closing its door on May 15, 2013. I stopped in today and it made me kind of sad because the store seemed rather empty. The fields are full of daffodils poised for blooming.
At least nine Save A Lot Stores in the Puget Sound are closing including the one at 1105 Martin Luther King in Tacoma’s Hilltop. I remember in July 1999 when the building was a recently constructed as a Rite Aid drug Pharmacy. An entire block was demolished to make way for the Rite Aid. In January 2005 the Rite Aid closed and in September 2006 the Save-A-Lot Extreme Value Grocery Store opened.
Larsen Pharmacy had been on the site (or part of the site) as of 1938 and Harold Meyer Drug Store was there as of 1944. Kellogg & Ford Building was there as of 1905. The J. Anton Mueller store was there in 1916.
From the Washington State Liquor Board website
With the passage of Initiative 1183, the Washington State Liquor Control Board (WSLCB) will cease state liquor store and liquor distribution operations by June 1, 2012. Contract liquor stores – which are operated by small business owners – may continue to sell spirits, but state-run liquor stores will be closed. The Seattle Distribution Center – which supplies state and contract liquor stores with spirits – and its assets will be sold.
I didn’t really go into the liquor store at Tacoma Central Shopping Center today. Come to think of it, I haven’t been in a liquor store in years! Not that I have anything against them, I just don’t seem that interested. Last time I sent in I bought some rum for a rum cake.
But I was wondering about when the stores would be closing and this was my excuse to find out.
I knew when I read the paper yesterday that I needed to drive through the 1912 Ruston Tunnel one more time, honking all the way! And so I did, — four times actually, two in each direction. And there were plenty of other cars there too and everybody was honking and yelling and taking photos. The Tacoma News Tribune produced a nice write up about the tunnel which can be found here:
http://www.thenewstribune.com/2011/07/11/1741529/honk-if-youll-miss-ruston-way.html
Be sure to check out the historic photo which is part of the article.
I’ve been meaning to stop at Nalley’s Fine Food at 3303 South 35th Street, Tacoma for a while. When I went to write up it up as the new place of the day, I found an article in today’s newspaper discussing how the company is closing soon. Nalley Valley was named after the Nally’s Fine Food, which was established in 1918. When the plant closes, 160 people will lose their jobs.
http://www.thenewstribune.com/2010/12/04/1451025/nalleys-fine-foods-to-close-after.html
I really debated using Borders Books in Tacoma as one of my new places of the day. But today I stopped in to say goodbye. This is the closest bookstore to my house and my family has spent hours here. Its practically a family tradition to go on a rainy Sunday for a cup of coffee and to read the magazines in the cafe. And of course, we’d always end up with a book or two. I’m pretty sure my daughter has never walked out of the store without a book!
But our Borders, which is almost always busy, is closing no later than the end of May. The cafe is closed, items are heavily discounted and some of the shelves are pretty empty. The GIg Harbor and Federal Way Borders are also closing with only Puyallup Borders to remain open in Pierce Co. Across the country Borders is closing 200 of its 643 locations as part of a bankruptcy reorganization.
So, goodbye Tacoma Borders. We’ll miss you.
Bryant Montessori, located at 717 S. Grant Ave., Tacoma, WA 98405 is one of the Tacoma Schools that might be flux. In 1998, this school received a grant to become a public school using the Montessori method. It now provides preschool to 8th grade education.
The original Bryant building was constructed in 1891 and was named after William Cullen Bryant who is remembered for writing Thanatopsis (alright I don’t actually know that poem, but here it is)
https://www.msu.edu/~cloudsar/thanatop.htm
The original building was lovely and held elementary through high school classes and also housed the school board offices and administration. High school students in the late 1800s paid tuition fees and in 1897 it was reduced from $2.50 to $1.50 per month. In any case after 70 years, the building was demolished and the “new” Bryant opened in 1962. A photograph of the original building can be found here. http://search.tacomapubliclibrary.org/buildings/bldg1image.asp?j=2&o=2&n=15872&i=3774#text
The district proposal currently on the table is to close nearby Franklin Elementary School and use that building to house the Bryant program. Originally the intent had been to house the entire Bryant program at Franklin, but now it is looking more likely that the elementary portion of the Bryant program will move to Franklin and the middle school program would join Geiger Montessori which will move to the vacated Hunt Middle School. This would allow at least some of the Franklin students to at least have the option of staying in the Franklin Building if they wanted a Montessori style of education. Per the newspaper article below “A variety of programs, including Head Start and others, would move from the old Madison School site to the Bryant Elementary site”. Everybody clear?
http://www.thenewstribune.com/2011/03/10/1579446/tacoma-district-leans-toward-closing.html
Update 7/11 Bryant Montessori is staying put.
As of January 31, 2011, Tacoma Public Library System will have eight locations instead of its current ten. Both Swan Creek Branch and M.L. King, Jr. Branch will be closed. The main branch will also have its hours reduced from 66 to 54.
Swam Creek is the smallest of the libraries and shares its space with Tacoma Community House, which runs a literacy center for the local population. Per the library’s website, Tacoma Community Center has significant experience working closely with persons with little or no English language and comprehension skills, or without significant education experiences. Classes include English as a Second Language and computer skills. The library has an expanded foreign language materials selection and bilingual assistance is available in Russian and Cambodian, as well as Spanish and Vietnamese upon request. The door count (patrons entering the building) was over 4,000 in November, the last full month available. Many of the patrons walk to the branch and will soon need to take one or more buses to reach the next closest branch. It is true that Swan Creek had the lowest circulation statistics, which makes sense since they also had the smallest collection size.
http://www.tpl.lib.wa.us/Page.aspx?nid=58
Library materials and equipment from this branch will be redistributed to other branches, but the fate of the building and the Tacoma Community Center lease remains unknown. Although the building was built in 1989, there is deferred maintenance.
The closing of these two branches made me think of this Asimov quote. “When I read about the way in which library funds are being cut and cut, I can only think that American society has found one more way to destroy itself.”
More info about the Martin Luther King Library closure can be found here
