Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

Well, I don't really need much of an excuse to visit Fernandina Beach, one of my favorite places, so when my sister noticed that there was an Amelia Island comics, steampunk, gaming and anime convention, , I decided to check it out.

Compared to the Charlotte Heroes Convention, Ameliacon was quite small. There was one exhibit hall, in the park on Atlantic Avenue which houses the municipal swimming pool, with gaming and presentation events in the town womens' center behind the park. It seemed to me also that the convention focus was definitely more on gaming, costuming and cosplay than on comic books, though there were some authors and artists there.

I certainly felt out of the loop on some issues! Magna/Anime character design generally hurts my eyes, so I was pretty clueless about one of the properties that seemed to be a very big thing Attack on Titan. There were a number of costumers basing their characters on that. I was also completely in the dark about what is apparently a very popular podcast Welcome to Night Vale, something the contest winning cosplayers based their presentation on.

I missed the morning presentation on Steampunk, having somehow convinced myself that it was in the afternoon, but did catch an interesting presentation by Joshua Johnson on doing video special effects on, basically, zero budget.

The audio for the presentations was the most problematic facet of the convention. I got the impression from listening to one of the organizers talk during the costume contest that someone had promised the convention a PA system and then left them totally in the lurch. I could follow ok during the effects presentaion, and parts of the Marvel/DC artist's presentation, but I gave up during the Homestruck panel where the panel were all using their indoor voices, and where I was only sitting in to try to figure out what Homestruck actually was anyway.

The costumers were out full force in the exhibit hall, and then at the closing costume/cosplay contest.

During the costume contest, it was announced that the convention would be shifting out of the fall and into February, so there will be no Ameliacon 2015. The next will be Ameliacon 2016 though they did announce a sequence of local get-togethers in advance of that. I certainly enjoyed myself -- I don't know that I would have driven that far for a convention of that size in a place I didn't have other motives to visit, but in the event, it was a nice trip.

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How do they even tell?

Well, Happy New Year folks!

When I don't spend the New Year in SC, I like to ring it in in Fernandina Beach, my father's hometown. My own little mini-tradition dating back a decade or so was to hit O'Kane's Irish Pub on Centre Street for the live music and champagne toast at midnight. So, I was rudely surprised when I ambled down from the hotel New Years Eve, and found the storefront dark. The next day, I asked another merchant on Centre Street what had happened, and she indicated that she had heard the owners divorced then couldn't agree on handling the lease. Whatever happened, the place seems to have closed in November.

Here is the place on New Years Eve/New Years Day 2012/2013:

In the event, I ended up next door at The Courtyard which was a smaller, a more sedate venue with an older crowd (ie: my age). I was quite impressed with the music though. Local artist Nora Ricci was performing, and she is quite good, with entertaining stage patter (very important for a small venue) as well as solid singing and playing:

I wish I had gotten better pictures of this place. Heavens knows I had enough opportunities over the years, but I never thought about it until quite recently, and the last few times I was in the area, it was either evening or heavily overcast, otherwise it might have been a picture on my Roadside Florida calendar.

This fruit stand was on A1A in Yulee Florida between I-95 (exit 373) and US-17. If you look closely on the door, you can see a Master Charge logo which dates the place to before 1979, when Master Charge changed to Master Card.

I like the shape of the building from the sides, and the wood cutout lettering and fruit shapes. It's the type of place that, while you may find its like still in service, is not being built anymore.

The fruit stand and an abandoned service station of the same vintage (about which I may do a closing eventually) stood on adjacent lots. As you can see in the later pictures, both have now been knocked down and the land is for sale (apparently interest is not high, as the price has been reduced).

And not to worry about being able to find Indian River citrus and Florida souveniers in Yulee.. Across the street from this stand's former location, a converted Stuckey's still offers all you could wish for:

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You'll recall that we discussed the announcement a few months back about how Sears & Kmart have announced a round of store closings which largely left South Carolina stores (except for Sumter) untouched.

Well, I was recently in Fernandina Beach, and found that their Kmart is one of the ones which got the ax. The store is on Sadler Road, which is the first major connector between 8th Street (the bridge road onto the island) and the beach, an area which is in general doing *quite* well, with lots of new upscale shops (both there and on the other side of the bridge).

When I was growing up, Fernandina was still quite a small town, and this would have been a major blow. Now there is a Wal-Mart a few blocks away, and Target within a mile.

The store is still open for now, and while the inventory is starting to hollow out and the vacant space to spread (as in the Dutch Square Kmart) there is still while until the final days when the fixtures start to go..

UPDATE 10 October 2012 -- As these pictures from 5 August 2012 show, the place is closed and all the logos and branding is gone:

UPDATE 7 October 2019: Add map icon, update tags.

Home Is the Sailor

Home is the sailor, home from sea:
Her far-borne canvas furled
The ship pours shining on the quay
The plunder of the world.

Home is the hunter from the hill:
Fast in the boundless snare
All flesh lies taken at his will
And every fowl of air.

'Tis evening on the moorland free,
The starlit wave is still:
Home is the sailor from the sea,
The hunter from the hill.

A.E. Housman

Normal posting resumes tomorrow if I can get recombobulated.

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Tonight it's time for one of my "out of area" posts, which is the category into which I throw everything that's not Columbia or The Grand Strand. I was trying to get some pictures I took back in February into shape to upload, and came across these of Topsy Smith's Topsy's Downtown Gulf on Centre Street in Fernandina Beach.

This was where we always got our gas when we were visiting Fernandina, and where we got our car worked on when we needed it. (In those bygone days, driving US-301 all the way to Florida could take a lot out of a car). The station was around the corner from my Aunt's house and I'm sure I walked past it most every day I was there, either going to the Atlantic Avenue park, or just generally wandering around town (as kids could do in those times). this appreciation of Topsy Smith says that his was one of the only two stations in town at the time, and I can believe it, at least for the town proper -- I'm sure there was something way out on 8th street as well. It had the drive-over air hoses that would 'ding' as you pulled in (a sound you don't hear anymore) and which would alert the service staff to come out, pump your gas, wash your windows, check the radiator and battery levels and inspect your tires.

The linked article says that Smith retired in 1997, though I suspect it may be off a little as this link says that an operation called Richard's BP took out an SBA loan in 1996.

After the follow-on BP station went under, the building didn't really settle on anything solid. I believe it was a bike-rental operation at one time, and then the last business in there, the remnants of which were still visible, was a beachwear/casual-wear store called apparently Island Breeze Shop. I don't believe that lasted any longer than one season, and the building is currently still empty.

I see that Topsy Smith is remembered yearly at the Shrimp Festival with The Topsy Smith Memorial Beard Contest

UPDATE 21 July 2010 -- Apparently it's going to be a Philly cheese-steak operation next:

UPDATE 3 January 2012 -- Well, the Philly Cheese-steak thing didn't last long at all, and it was in a state of tear-down last time I went through (Aug 2011). There were also scooters there, though I saw no sign of anyone actively offering them for rental:

UPDATE 4 March 2012 -- It's now a burger joint called Tasty's. Note how the logo looks like an oldtime Gulf sign:

Welcome Facebook users 11 July 2017: I see a lot of hits on this old page from Facebook today. Welcome to Columbia Closings. Normally this site focuses on Columbia South Carolina, but there are some other Fernandina pages you may be interested in:

A1A Gas Mart, 816 South 8th Street (Fernandina Beach FL)

Amelia Con 2014, Fernandina Beach Florida

Amelia Con 2016, Fernandina Beach Florida

Island Cinema 7, 1132 14th Street (Fernandina Beach FL)

Kmart, 1525 Sadler Road (Fernandina Beach)

O'Kane's Irish Pub And Eatery, 318 Centre Street (Fernandina Beach)

Sonny's Real Pit Bar-B-Q 2742 South 8th Street, Fernandina Beach FL

Topsy's Downtown Gulf, 710 Centre Street (Fernandina Beach)

A1A Gas Mart, 816 South 8th Street (Fernandina Beach FL)

Indian River Fruit Stand, A1A (Yulee Florida)

And check the Alphabetical Closings page for other Florida references.

And now back to the original post:

Well, I'm on the road, and didn't get all the pictures I wanted to take done beforehand, so I'm going to throw in a few ringers this week.

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