Archive for the ‘Virginia Street’ tag
(Nix's) Olympia Grocery (aka Nix's Grill & Grocery): 500 Bluff Road: 2000s 4 comments
This is a country store in the city.
I really have no idea when this place closed. Looking inside the back add-on section, it appears to have been in disrepair for a while. On the other hand, the ice company has not taken the ice lockers back yet. I wish SC would put dates on the "A" restaurant ratings stickers! Honestly, if you told me the place had closed in 1953 or that it was still open some days, I would probably believe either.
This Richland County conservation report PDF says the place was built in the 1920s and
There are nine commercial buildings in the Olympia village. Most of these date from the early twentieth century and are similar to Nix's Olympia Grocery, a one- story, gable-front building with a brick facade and stepped parapet. These small commercial buildings were community-gathering spots and supplied operatives with a place to socialize and purchase needed items.
You can see that at some point the Nix's appelation was dropped and the place became simply Olympia Grocery. The sign itself was apparently supplied by Coke, something once exceedingly common (with the Coke advertisement often as big or biger than the store name), but not seen now on new stores.
The first time I went to take pictures of the place, it was a nice sunny afternoon, but in the event, I couldn't get near Nix's since the laundry down the road was burning, and the street was blocked off by fire engines. By the time I got back out that way, it was the rather grey day you see here. (And the laundry looks like it may be salveagable)
UPDATE 28 March 2011 -- Well, it's gone:
