Fascinating footage of downtown Charleston from early 1980s (Huntington, Teays Valley: loans, hotel)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
This is simply amazing. How can such a small city have so much energy, only to have that decimated by the development of the Town Center Mall (?) (and subsequent destruction of historic buildings) and suburban sprawl? I figure the traffic is largely local residents, but also people coming in from the suburbs, working in state office buildings, etc.
Charleston had probably 65000 permanent residents in the early 1980s. The energy of the streets in this video is as much or more than downtown Sacramento (pop. 420000 city, 2000000 metro) today.
Did the development of the mall, sprawl, etc. really hurt downtown after, say, 1982-83? I am a (self-)student of urban planning and learning about this type of stuff fascinates me.
Well the Town Center first killed this part of downtown. All the stores moved there and left Capital street a ghost town. Then the Southridge area started developing strip malls and big box retail and started killing the Town Center. And Now both the Town Center and Capital Street are growing and flourishing again, as well as Southridge area. Downtown isn't anywhere near as busy as it is in this video, but it has made a strong comeback and is seeing some cool restaurants open up. A totally different vibe than in the 80's, but still a nice place to enjoy an evening meal. Lunch time has always been busy in downtown though!
Charleston and Huntington only hung onto their downtowns as long as they did because they were more than 20-30 years behind other cities in constructing malls and then having downtown merchants flee to the malls. Huntington Mall opened in Fall of 1980. Charleston Towne Centre opened summer or Fall of 1983, I think. And for decades, both cities were also meccas for shopping and culture for the people who lived in the coalfield areas. People used to pour into Charleston every Friday night in the early '80s.
Beaten by the suburbs, then globalization and the loss of industry and well-paying jobs:
'80s development of Teays Valley into subdivisions sucked a lot of the well-heeled middle class population and family people out of both Charleston & Huntington. From that area, it's probably easiest to shop the Huntington Mall.
Union Carbide started shrinking, not hiring as many new people past '83 or so. Then Dow Chemical decimated what was left of it and gave away the Tech Center.
Columbia Gas was sold and resold and resold and many jobs lost.
C&P Telephone sold to Bell Atlantic and then Verizon and many jobs lost to automation as well as cut due to the buyout.
DuPont, FMC, Monsanto, Clearon, etc., all chemical companies - Where are they now??
Coal mining took a nosedive in the early '80s, too. It doesn't employ nearly as many as it used to.
Last edited by SorryIMovedBack; 05-04-2013 at 08:43 PM..
The Levee parking lot in the video's opening was turned into a riverfront park. There is no parking there now, so it can't look anything but empty, haha. The Terminal Building (tall bldg on the riverside) was offices then and now.
In a way, what you see is an anomaly for that time period, imo. There was a lot more to bring people into town back then. Everything was still there. Charleston was still stuck in the '50s going into the '80s, in a lot of ways. It was shopping mecca for the coalfields as well as the local populace. Everything was concentrated on Capital, and some other shopping was within 1-2 blocks on Virgina St East, Quarrier St East, and Lee St East.
Capital St. was THE major street for shopping. Go one block west to Summers or over east to Hale or Dickenson, and there was not as much on those streets.
Phone co., the tall tan building on the left at 7:08, probably was full of employees, as were other office buildings. Hale St. had a beauty school that took customers. And had a paint store.
The Kanawha County Library of Charleston is on the corner there, Capital & Quarrier, across from the McDonalds. The Cube is in front of it, I think.
There were many bars and restaurants on Capital St that served good lunches. And Lauries restaurant, too. People who worked at the Tech Center and other business went downtown for a lunch and/or a couple of drinks, lol.
Had stores and eateries around the corner to the east on Lee St. too.
Downtown had all the dept. stores for the area: Stone & Thomas, Ardan's, Ward's, Penney's, Sears, The Diamond, Cox's, Embees, McCrory or Kresge or G.C. Murphy, I can't remember what all was there before the Mall.
There were at least 4 movie theaters downtown then, too. I think the demolition at 10:14 is an old theater on Lee St.
The major and best furniture stores and jewelers were all downtown.
Best clothiers were all downtown.
The law offices were downtown.
The Daniel Boone Hotel, 405 Capital was still a hotel then, not offices. Elk River Holiday Inn, and the Holiday Inn across the street to the north of the Elk River Holiday Inn, and also the Charleston House Holiday Inn on the Kanawha River were where visitors stayed and all were within walking of Capital & Summers & Lee Streets.
Lots of banks and investment firms were downtown. They probably employed more people then than now.
There were lots of little stores, too.
A Western Auto. The major bridal shops. Shoe repair. Tailor. Sak's Shoe outlet in one of the big old brick buildings on Capital.
Greyhound Bus terminal and Kearse movie theater were one block west on Summers St. B&B Loans was one block west on Summers and Fife st. -- sold jewelry and guns and musical instruments & all. It was a full-service estate jewelry and pawn shop that started in the '30s.
There was a flophouse hotel, the DuPont? that spanned the entire block between Summers & Quarrier, too. That closed later. Part of it was torn down.
The Spice Rack gentlemen's club was also on Capital St. Not sure if it was open during the day or not.
Did the development of the mall, sprawl, etc. really hurt downtown after, say, 1982-83? I am a (self-)student of urban planning and learning about this type of stuff fascinates me.
EclecticEars,
This video and topic has actually been discussed before in the room. So that duplicate threads do not exist, please refer to the link below and continue the discussion there (and read past ideas on the topic as well). Thank you.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
