Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

There were two problems with my ever visiting Biscuit House on Bluff Road behind the stadium: A) It was way on the other side of town and B) That whole waking up before absolutely necessary breakfast thing.

Of course, lots of other people don't have those problems, and the Biscuit House apparently developed quite a reputation over the years. In fact, there was a spate of newspaper articles when its closing was announced, and even a video documentary.

In the end, the problem was the same as for the Farmers' Market: USC bought up all the land for football parking. The good news is that apparently the Biscuit House recipies will live on in franchaised kiosks in local convenience stores.

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I'm not quite sure about this spot on the West side of Sunset Boulevard between I-20 and Pizzaeria Uno. The street number on the trailer at the back of the lot is 4845, which comes up as Graceland Buildings of Lexington. This makes sense given the two outbuildings set beside the trailer. The place may even still be in business though if so, the stock is pretty limited.

However, the sign by the road does not match up with the Graceland listing. Most of it is obscured by a realty paste-up now, but it cleary says something like South Carolina ****** ***** LIquidators **** and the verbiage at the bottom of the sign sounds like it was a sales lot for reposessed mobile homes. Trying reverse lookups on the 359-2989 phone number doesn't return anything useful.

Curiously, the South Carolina state flag homage on the sign has the moon on the wrong side of the palmetto..

Studebaker's was something of a Myrtle Beach landmark, from the same era as Mother Fletcher's and Xanadu (which both predeceased it). The club started in 1981 and celebrated their 28th anniversary in 2009.

I'm not much of a club person, but I was vaguely aware of Studebaker's as a Shag venue where the National Shag championships were held.

As of now, the web site is still up (they must have paid for a full year..) and has a number of videos taken inside the club. This story from the Sun News gives some details of the closing and blames it (or the owner does) on the anti-bike rules Myrtle Beach instituted a few years ago. I can certainly see the we want peace & quiet residents' point -- the annual rallies certainly are noisy and obnoxious, but on the other hand it's probably a bad idea for a tourist town with no industry to take steps to keep people away..

The storefront is in the process of being converted to a Dollar General.

I noticed this one last week when I was heading over to Atlanta Bread to see if they had pumpkin soup this year (answer: apparently not). Pioneer Machinery was on the West side of Sunset Boulevard in-between I-20 and I-26.

From the looks of the roadside placard, there were apprently several other businesses in the building, or at least suites for several other businesses.

I don't know anything about Pioneer but they were apprently in defense contracting and won contracts as recently as 2007.

If you click through to the high-res picture, you can see a lost-dog poster on the phone-pole. Hope he got home.

Cussin' Bill's is another place I would hear about but never go around to going to. It may be just as well. From the name, I always assumed it was mainly a restaurant, but this 1997 Administrative Law Court judgement makes clear that at least by 1996 it was operating as one of South Carolina's ubiquitious video poker malls.

At this remove, it's easy to forget how pervasive video poker was in the state at that time, and how odd the operating conditions were. Video poker was legal, but only just tolerated and the ostensible rule was that no one business could operate more than 5 machines. This, of course, led to many places implementing the "mall" concept. Each room of 5 machines was operated, on paper, as a separate business. In this case, it was found that Cussin' Bill's did not have employees in each room to maintain the fiction, and they got landed with a $5000 fine and lost most of their machines.

I'm not sure when Cussin' Bill's closed. I don't think that ruling was the end for them, but I could be wrong. At any rate, after they closed, the next operation in the building was BAWA Oyster Co about which I know nothing, other than presumably they served oysters (something I have less than no interest in).

I don't even know that much about the most recent tenant, Cadallic's, which folded earlier this year. Judging from Have Your Say notes by commenters Joel & O'Reilly, it was connected with the 360 Sports Bar (also now closed) on Bush River Road, and may or may not have been a strip club.

I have to say it's a fairly attractive building (across Woodland Hills road from the old Steak & Ale and behind the old Na href="http://columbiaclosings.com/wordpress/?p=421">Steak Out) with a very nice deck. There is a lot of traffic, of course, on nearby I-20 and Saint Andrews Road, but the building is well off of those, and is fairly quiet. It seems to me that some sort of casual restaurant could do well there -- I certainly wouldn't mind having a burger or burrito out on the deck in the spring or fall.

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Not really a closing, but I was at Bruegger's Sunday, and happened to notice that the building housing Be Beep and The Happy Cafe is being re-roofed.

The Be Beep area was roped off, but they aren't open on Sunday anyway so I doubt they'll have any downtime.

For Sale By Bank the sign reads at this colorful strip mall on Knox Abbott Drive.

It appears that Sandy's Famous Hot Dogs is pretty much the only business left here, and I'm sure they will probably continue under the new owners when and if.

I'm not exactly sure why this place didn't prosper. I find it rather attractive, with all the bright colors, and it's not particularly hard to get to, or to get in and out of.

I don't believe the Taco Bell building on the west side of the plaza is officially part of it, but its re-incarnation seems to have gone wrong, leaving it empty as well.

UPDATE 27 August 2011: The plaza has been sold and Sandy's is gone.

UPDATE 5 April 2012 -- The Chinese immersion charter school is up and running:

This interesting little building is on Sunset Boulevard just south of the chicken plant. According to LoopNet it's now off the market, though the realty sign was still out front a few days ago when I took this picture. (The picture at LoopNet still has the WPC signage up).

I don't know anything about First Source or WPC Engineering or what happened to them, but apparently the town of West Columbia offices are also at 130 Sunset. I'm not sure if that means in the back of this building, or somewhere else on the lot. The utility-sounding West Columbia filtering plant is supposed to be at 130 as well.

UPDATE 5 Nov 2010: See the comments -- It was also the Free Times building for a while, so I've added that to the post title.

UPDATE 7 May 2012 -- This place is now Kickstand Studio a wedding and commercial photography studio. Looks like they got the kudzu or whatever off the building and power pole too:

Well folks, it looks like 2010 is on the homestretch now. The Fair is over and Thanksgiving is looming. All that means, of course, that it's time for the 2011 Columbia Closings wall calendar!

That's right, for a single moderate expenditure, you can have 12 months of Columbia Closings images with a special 13th cover image thrown in at no extra charge! Such a deal!

I have looked at a copy of this year's calendar, and am quite happy with how it came out, and I think you will be as well!

And if you don't want to let 2010 go, the 2010 Columbia Closings wall calendar is still available at the same link for a limited time.

But why stop at calendars? The Columbia Closings store is always available for all your holiday shopping needs..

Commenter Bill Chisolm has this to say about Eden's Foods:

Anybody old enough to remember the old Edens Food Stores in Columbia and around S.C. They sold out to Winn-Dixie around 1955. I worked for them as did my father.
Several of the old buildings are still standing, among these are the ones on Rosewood Drive, North Main Street, Devine St, Harden St. and I am sure there are others. They were the place to shop for groceries in Columbia during their hey day

Being born late in 1960, I had never heard of the place, but the city directory for 1953 does list eight locations for the store, with this building being one of them. I would say it has been remodeled several times, but it does seem about the right shape and size for an older grocery.

Apparently the company was run by a local family as the city directory also lists

J. Drake Edens President-Treasurer
Joe Edens, Executive Vice President-Assistant Treasurer
J. Drake Edens, Jr., Vice President

I wonder if there is any connection there with Edens & Avant property management?