Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

I think we're all Bozos on this bus.

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Commenter MrBill points out the Cayce "Arby's" is "temporarily closed".

I can't add any explanation to that, but I can say that there were staff inside, busily doing *something*, so I would expect that this closing really is temporary, unlike many so announced.

(Hat tip to commenter MrBill)

UPDATE 25 November 2014: Commenter Andrew reports this place as open again, so I have updated the post title to reflect that.

UPDATE 17 February 2023: Updating tags and adding map icon.

I noticed this pair of co-located derelict businesses driving US-601 through St. Matthews towards I-26 this Spring.

I wasn't sure at first what the restaurant was, but a close look at the menu board pretty well pins it down to a Sub Station II.

I can't think of any obvious reason why both businesses in this building would have failed at what seems to be more or less the same time. While the restaurant market is fickle, laundromats are places where you must go. I'm guessing early 2000s for the timeframe here, but the building does seem rather enthusiastically vine encrusted, and if the realtor posting the sign does succeed in selling the place, I doubt there's much that can be done beyond knocking the place down and starting over.

UPDATE 31 March 2022: Updating tags. I can't add a map icon because I have no idea where this was now.

UPDATE 1 April 2022: Commenter Andrew has located this place on Google maps (it was apparently still standing in 2018), and following his lead, I come up with the address of this place as (probably) 181 Harry C Raysor Drive, St. Matthews SC 29135. With that, I am able to make a map icon. Also, I will put that in the post title. Harry C Raysor Drive is the local name for US-601.

I thought I had a picture of this place in operation, but find I can't put my hands on it now.

This Richland Mall storefront is the old Eckerd's location, and I believe that up until the time Posh Pets grooming moved in, it had been vacant since the closing of that store. I am also pretty sure that for some reason, while it was Posh Pets the location had no interior signage or mall access.

I believe that Posh was only here for a year or two and has sinced moved out to Fort Jackson Boulevard and Sparkleberry.

UPDATE 11 November 2014 -- Here are those pictures I was looking for with the place in operation:

The Carolina's restaurant building at the Gervais Street Clarion is being razed as part of the upfitting of the property to become a dual branded Hilton Garden Inn / Home 2 Suites.

I never went there though over the years I heard it advertised many times, especially with New Years Eve packages at the hotel. I'm not sure exactly where the fancy spiral staircase fit in, but it doesn't seem like the sort of thing you would usually find in a hotel restaurant.

The State notes that the hotel was Sherman's Columbia headquarters and is a historic site. I confess I'm a bit confused about exactly what part of the property dates back that far. Surely the actual hotel building on Gervais is not that old.

(Hat tip to commenter badger)

UPDATE 4 November 2014 -- I had originaly titled this post Carolina's Restaurant, but according to the comments, that restaurant is still in service as part of the hotel proper:

The restaurant itself is still open. It closed temporarily during the construction, and then re-opened. The images that you've posted above were not the actual Carolina's Restaurant. That's actually inside the Clarion Hotel. That building was for banquet halls, conventions, and that sort of thing.

UPDATE 13 November 2018 -- Four years later and work is still ongoing, though things are shaping up:

Monterrey Knox Abbott are now closed and are working on their new location in the old Zeus Pizza location in Parkland Plaza (not Parklane Plaza). I believe this location started as a Denny's, though according to Monterrey's closing sign, they were here for 26 years, which is no small run for a restaurant.

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I probably should remember seeing this place more, as we drove past it on the way to the beach innumerable times while I was growing up. However, I always had my nose in a book, so I was only vaguely aware of the name Circus Room and couldn't have told you where it was. Or, for that matter, *what* it was. At this remove, my understanding is that The Circus Room was actually a circus style tent set up on the grounds of the Coronet Inn at the intersection of US-601 & US-378 in Eastover, and that the tent hosted a restaurant and nightclub. Even in these days of the metro area creeping ever outwards, this is a pretty rural area, and back in the day it must have been even stranger to find a well regarded hotspot here.

What was the attraction? Google pulls up this hint from the 2006 cookbook Cookin' with Cocky II: More Than Just a Cookbook:

Bright Stevenson:

I first met Bright in the Fall of 1956. Bright owned the Coronet Motel and Circus Room nightclub in Eastover. The Circus Room had the finest food and the only mixed drinks in the Columbia area at that time.

The two ads above are from the Sumter Register in 1974 and 1976 respectively.

Amazingly, both Coronet motels still exist and still are in operation, although under different names and ownership. The Eastover location is currently an Anyday Inn and is now combined with a convenience store run in the old office.

The topic has come up in Have Your Say from time to time, and here is what some people have recalled:

The Circus Room was in the old Coronet Motel near Eastover which I think was somehow related to the motel with the same name on North Main. I know they used to advertise a lot on the radio and had quite a business at one time. I drove out to Eastover a few weeks ago and what was the Circus Room was a seedy convenience store in a no tell motel.

Tom

Tom---You are right. One thing about the Circus Room was that it featured USDA "Prime" steaks which is a rarity even for today. You could call in the morning and they'd marinate your steak all day for you. I live in Kansas now which is beef country and know of only one steakhouse type place out here where you can get USDA prime beef. John.

John Merrell

I had forgotten all about the Circus Room. This was one of a few out-in-the-boondocks restaurants where we would eat on occasion when my father felt like driving out into the country (circa 1965-68). I remember the food being pretty good and it having a totally unpretentious atmosphere, but that was when gas was 25¢ a gallon, and it was easy to justify such a long trip for a good steak. I'm sure if the Circus Room had been a couple of miles down Trenholm Road, that would have been where we would have visited most often when we ate out, which at that time was once, maybe twice a month. Ancient and forgotten fond memories, thanks John.

Michael Taylor

The Circus room is still back there, but the entire back part of the motel is living quarters for the people who run it. The woman told me they took the tent down when they moved in.

She also said the guy who built the motel back in the fifties still drops into the convenience store every day.

jamie

Coronet Motel w/ Circus Room restaurant. Actually, that was out where US 601 intersects Sumter Hwy., but the restaurant was so good that folks used to drive from Columbia all the way out to Eastover to eat there. Bright Stevenson Jr owned it. His dad owned the Coronet Motel up out North Main St., going toward Blythewood.

Sid

UPDATE 24 October 2014: Added Yellow Pages graphic from the 1970 Southern Bell phonebook.

UPDATE 8 September 2021: Add map icon, update tags.

UPDATE 4 March 2022: I should probably add a link here to the final(?) fate of the Coronet building: Anyday Inn.

Taboo is the follow-on operation to Taco Bell in this little store that sits beside Gills Creek on the tail end of Devine Street.

Like the taco cart downtown, the place is something of a victim to the City of Columbia's zoning zig-zags. Regardless of what you think of the place, they followed the rules in place at the time to open, and ever since then the city has been trying to undo that -- which they finally have done. The place has been in court fighting, but lost their last battle at the end of September.

With the upscaling of the area, I don't see a future for this building, and would not be surprised if the next tenant took it down.

UPDATE 7 January 2020 -- This post turned out to be a false-alarm (one of many for the store). Here is a 2018 false-alarm, and Here is the final 2019 Closing. Also adding a map icon.

I did not know that Arizona's was a chain, but they had at least two restaurants in South Carolina, one here at Sandhill and the other in Greenville. Both were bought out in late July by a North Carolina outfit and rebranded as JP's 4 Corners.

When Arizona's opened, I looked over the menu, and could not see a reason to go, and so never did.

Apparently the general concept has not changed a lot:

Looking at the menu, I get the same feeling I had looking at Arizona's menu: How is this Southwestern?

Western, I certainly see, but I thought Southwestern was supposed to have a dash of Mexican. That's got to be more than just invoking chipolte in a sauce. The Free Times in fact lists JP's under Mexican, but don't see it.

(Hat tip to commenter Jason)

Here's another Cash-O-Matic, this one in a nice little brick building on Broad River Road next to the old George's Book Exchange.

Unlike a lot of small businesses on Broad, this building was not an old converted house, but I'm not able to guess what it in fact was (since clearly it predates Cash-O-Matic).

I have to say once again, that I really like the name which has a certain rat-pack snap to it.

UPDATE 21 June 2022: Updating tags and adding map icon.