Powers 60 Minute Cleaners / Boland's One Hour Martinizing / The Clock Doctor / Brinson's Quality Cleaners / Haywood Electrical Corp / B C Bike Inc / Jomacies Cafeteria / etc, 3618 Covenant Road: 2000s 13 comments
I have to admit I'm drawing a blank on this building. It's on Covenant Road just below the final Forest Lake TV location, and just above the former Danielle Le Shay Gallerie. In fact, google searches on "3618 Covenant Road" turn up the Danielle Le Shay name, but that was 3620.
Anyway I'm sure I've driven past it hundreds of times since 1969 and must have seen it in operation as a number of different businesses over the years, but none of them is coming to me now. I will say that it has a cleaner-ish look to it.
UPDATE 15 Jan 2011 -- OK, I spent some time with the city directories, though I only got up to 1995 before the library closed, but here's what I have for this building:
1970 -1972 -- Powers 60 Minute Cleaners
1973 -- Boland's One Hour Martinizing
1974 -1977 -- Vacant
1978 -- The clock Doctor
1979 -- Vacant
1980 - 1981 -- Brinson's Quality Cleaners
1982 - 1984 -- Vacant
1985 -- Haywood Electrical Corp
1986 -1987 -- B C Bike Inc
1988 - 1990 -- Vacant
1991 -- Jomacies Cafeteria (hard to read my handwriting, but I think that's it)
1992 - 1995 Vacant (I did not have time to check past 1995)
I believe The Clock Doctor is still around in that little strip of trailers across from the Two Notch K Mart.
UPDATE 3 February 2021: This building and the one next door were razed in December 2020:
Also updating tags and adding map icon.
13 Responses to 'Powers 60 Minute Cleaners / Boland's One Hour Martinizing / The Clock Doctor / Brinson's Quality Cleaners / Haywood Electrical Corp / B C Bike Inc / Jomacies Cafeteria / etc, 3618 Covenant Road: 2000s'
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badger
1 Dec 10 at 9:57 am
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Ted, check your old directories. It think it was part of a local chain of cleaners who's building's had the same yellow color scheme and architecture. The specialized in one hour service, but I can't remember their name, though I know it was not Sunshine.
Tom
1 Dec 10 at 5:02 pm
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Yeah, Sunshine was just down the hill.
I've got 1998 and various xeroxed pieces of other years at home, but for anything else (or search by street address) it's the library..
ted
1 Dec 10 at 6:24 pm
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Ted, I think you have this cleaner confused with the place down the road. The building you have identified as Sunshine Cleaners was instead Custom Cleaners, and the above place was Sunshine Cleaners, with the original yellow paint (as in "sunshine yellow"). I know this goes against the grandson of one of the owners of Sunshine Cleaners, but my mother attended church with the owner of Custom Cleaners, and they had two locations: the one at 3767 Covenant Road and one at 2801 Two Notch (on the corner with Curry Street), which is still there as a Custom Cleaners, but no longer owned by the original owner, because he passed away years ago. The co-owner is still alive, however he has throat cancer, and I don't particularly want to call him to ask him such a trivial question and make his chords work more than they need to.
2 Dec 10 at 1:44 am
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Ted (anyone)?, wasn't that a florist back in the day .. (early 80's)
.. there was a place called "The Carolina Jasmine" in that building
... I'm graspin' for straws, but a friend of mine roomed
w/ the owners for a time .. check your old directories !Fish
2 Dec 10 at 4:51 pm
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Not to put too fine a point on it, but I'm 100% certain that the cleaners at 3767 Covenant Road was Custom Cleaners. I called another member of my mother's church, and the lady confirmed this. She also mentioned that Mr. M. (the above mentioned co-owner) was having a hospice program set up, so as anyone who has ever had a loved one die from cancer knows, this is the "end stage." At any rate, when my family first met Mr. A. (the owner of Custom Cleaners and also the brother-in-law of Mr. M.) at Forest Drive Baptist Church circa 1965, he had the Custom Cleaners at 3767 Covenant; I think the Two Notch location was built soon after, but I wouldn't bet on the details of that one. So before 1965, it could have been another cleaners, but I'm nearly certain Mr. A. had it built to his specs for Custom Cleaners. And though the lady I talked with tonight didn't know the details of the closing, she agreed that Mr. A. retired from the dry-cleaning business in the mid-80s or thereabouts. I was living on the West Coast when that happened, so I can't say for sure what occupied the 3767 Covenant location between Custom Cleaners and the satellite dish place, but when I got back to town in the late-80s, it was the dish store.
The certainty leaves me with the above 3618 Covenant Road building. Fish could very well be correct about it being a florist at one point. Just in the guessing mode, I feel like there is a good chance that this was the Sunshine Cleaners originally, because as I remember, they were all painted sunshine yellow and looked very much like the above building in design.
Looks like a trip to the RCPL and a session with the city directories are in order. I would start with the 1970 directory, because this is when I know for a stone cold fact that 3767 Covenant was a Custom Cleaners.
BTW - I didn't mean to imply in my last comment that this was all a trivial pursuit. I check into Columbia Closings everyday and throughly enjoy commenting when I have something to add, or at least reading everyone else's comments when I don't. However, compared to dying from throat cancer, you have to admit, it's pretty trivial.
3 Dec 10 at 12:10 am
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Well, I am sorry to hear that!
I will try to check it out next time I get to the library, but that may be a few weeks.
ted
3 Dec 10 at 12:18 am
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In the 1970 phone book (the only one I have - it was in some of my mother-in-laws stuff and I wouldn't let my husband throw it away) Custom Cleaners is listed at 3767 Covenant Rd. The cleaners at 3618 Covenant is listed as Powers cleaners. They had another location on Broad River Rd.
I wonder if they took over the building after the original cleaners moved out? That building just looks too much like something else that I've seen in town.
Cary
6 Dec 10 at 2:36 pm
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Cool Cary, thanks for the confirmation of Custom Cleaners being at 3767 Covenant Road. It's pretty coincidental that you would happen to have the 1970 phone book, that being the year I suggested that Ted look into the city directories. Guess that will save him a trip for Custom Cleaners, but I'm with you, the 3618 Covenant Road building looks very familiar, perhaps something an earlier city directory could solve. At least we know it was a Powers Cleaners in 1970.
7 Dec 10 at 2:18 am
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Just another hunch on the above 3618 Covenant Road address, but I notice that David H. in the entry for the cleaners at 3767 Covenant Road mentions that the Sunshine Cleaners became a Lexington Dry Cleaning in the last decade or two. While driving by the empty building at 3618 tonight, I had a flash in my mind of seeing a Lexington Dry Cleaning sign on here at one point a few years back. The more I thought about it, the more I remember wondering why Lexington Dry Cleaning would be in Forest Acres. When I got home, I looked them up and they have stores all over the midlands.
So Ted, I'm guessing you're still not convinced about Custom Cleaners being at 3767 Covenant Road, even after Cary confirmed it with a 1970 phonebook listing. When you do make the library trip, in addition to the Powers Cleaners she mentions, try a Lexington Dry Cleaning for sometime in the '80s-2000s or so for the above 3618 Covenant Road address. I think you'll hit pay-dirt on all accounts.
11 Dec 10 at 2:15 am
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I'm convinced, I just have not had a chance to sort it out and fix it yet..
ted
11 Dec 10 at 2:19 am
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OK folks, update here (to 1995 anyway).
ted
15 Jan 11 at 1:53 pm
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I knew the Mr. M. that Michael Taylor mentioned in his Dec 3, 2010 post. Custom Cleaners also had a location on Leesburg Road in the late sixties and early seventies. I lived about a block away and hung out at the cleaners in the afternoons when I was around 13 years old. There was a girl that worked there I had a crush on. I would see Mr. M. from time to time. After I turned 16, Mr. M's Daughter started working at the Leesburg location, we got to know each other and dated for awhile. Very nice people from what I remember.
Rick
2 Aug 12 at 11:57 am
This is real fuzzy, but it might have been something like "Haywood Electric" in the early 80s. I think it was in this same general area, but no guarantees. It does look like it was a cleaner in an earlier life.