Milestones on Mainstreet: There was a Time…

There was a time, in Sparta, when everything you needed was in your own backyard. You may have left school on a Friday afternoon and stopped at Phoebe’s store for a piece of gum or some penny candy. After leaving Phoebe’s, you may have had a book or two to return at the Carnegie Library on N. Union. You may have even stopped at the bridge over Nash Creek to toss a few stones into the water. During the 1960’s you may have had a Brownie or Girl Scout meeting at the Civic Center after school, or stopped for ice cream at the House of Flavors next door to the Civic Center. Some of you may have had parents working at one the many businesses on Main Street. If you lived outside of the village and boarded the school bus, you may have passed one of the many beautiful apple orchards or dairy farms on your way home. If Friday night football was scheduled to be played at Balyeat Field you may have attended with your friends to support your Sparta Spartans. If the year was 1953, you would enjoy watching a championship team. After the game it was a short walk across Roger’s Park to the Hob Nob drive-in where you may have enjoyed an ice cold root beer and a burger, probably wrapped in paper from Handy Wacks.

Saturday evenings may have been spent on Division Street, also known as Main Street, the heart of downtown. Families would have been doing their weekly grocery shopping, possibly at Reeds or Finch’s. You may have stopped at the Federated Store, later to become Walstrom’s, for a new dress or fabric to make one. Next door, at the Ben Franklin you were sure to find that new toy or game you had been saving for. You may have enjoyed a concert at the band shell across the street that once stood where Choice One is today. If you were lucky, you enjoyed a soda, milk shake or the famous green river at the soda fountain at Wolf’s Drugstore. Dad may have needed a new shirt, or tie from Gass Menswear or a quick stop at Roger’s or Johnson’s Hardware where he could buy a supply of screws or nails directly from the bins that lined the isles. There may have been a Bing Crosby or, later, a Rock Hudson movie playing at the Sparta Theatre. Next door was the Sparta Cleaners, where mom may have picked up her dry cleaning. After an evening of shopping and family fun on Main Street, you piled into the car or pick-up and headed home, but not until you stopped at Leon Parker’s or Bill Noller’s to fill ‘er up and check the oil.

In Sparta, on Sunday, you may have attended Sunday school at Sparta Baptist, Sparta Methodist, or if it were before 1947, you may have attended Mass at the old Town Hall as a parishioner of Holy Family Parish. If you lived in the country, specifically on “The Ridge”, you may have attended Mamerlund Lutheran, Trinity Lutheran, or Ballards Church of Christ. After church, during the summer months, you may have packed a picnic lunch and with the family loaded into the car, you made the trip to Camp Lake, Long Lake, or Olin Lake for a picnic and a swim.

Some things never change. Everything you need is still in your own backyard. Enjoy Main Street this shopping season. It’s been there all along. Happy Holidays!

In Loving Memory Of

Leonard “Bose” David Feerick Jr.

2-8-25 – 9-13-11.

Member of the Sparta Township Historical Commission

Jayne Heath Paasch and JoAnne VanderWerff

Sparta Township Historical Commission.