8 replies to this topic

[Bill Sievers]

I've been racking my brain to remember when the actual opening year was for the old Wyatt Food Store in the Westcliff Shopping Center.  It was either in 1955 or 1956, but I can't remember for sure.  I tend to think it was the fall of 1955, but that date conflicts with other events in my life at that time.

 

Does anyone on the forum know for sure?

 

Thanks,

Bill 

[Stadtplan]

Bill, based on quick search it would appear Wyatt Food Store at Westcliff was open prior to Dec. 5, 1955. S-T ran a cool story a few weeks ago featuring several of these bygone grocery stores and this date mentioned the store you asked about.

There was another article dated Oct 10, 1954 stating the Fair Westcliff Shopping Center $1M expansion would start in 30-days. It mentioned Wyatt Food Store will be a 24,000 SQFT built in the west side of the quadrangle and Wyatts Cafeteria at 8,000 SQFT will be built in the center of the north side of the square.

[Bill Sievers]

Thanks Nitixope!  That opening date makes sense to me with regards to my life events at that time.  For some reason I thought Wyatt's opened right at the beginning of September, and that didn't fit into the time frame that I remember at that time.  Problem solved!  Thanks again!

 

Bill

[Stadtplan]

Bill, the grand opening was Tuesday Nov 15, 1955.  It's hard to believe that at this point in time, this was the largest supermarket in N. Texas at 28,300 SQFT of floor space.  

 

There's some interesting history in this link as well: https://www.findagra...493/earle-wyatt

 

[Bill Sievers]

Yeah, that was an interesting article about Mr. Wyatt.  I never knew about any of that.

 

That Wyatt's store in the Westcliff Shopping Center was right across the street (Biddison) from where I used to live in FTW.  I went over there many times when it was under construction and got to see it in its final form when it was finally up and running.  As I remember one of the advertising points was that it had the longest meats counter in north Texas.  It ran nearly the entire width of the store!

 

That entire Westcliff Shopping Center had almost every store you could want back then.  Today, it's almost a ghost town with just a few stores.  A far cry of its heyday when there were 19+ stores in that center.

 

Bill

[Stadtplan]

Bill, according to the article, you are correct.  The meat case was a full 126-feet in length and was at the time considered the longest continuous line of meat case in the state.  

 

This is quite interesting, however, pretty obscure as far as bragging rights go.  It leaves many questions: what was the second longest line of meat cases that this line of meat cases dethroned?  Was there some statewide authority that could verify that no other stores anywhere in Texas had a longer line of meat cases?

 

 

 

 

 

This caught my attention in the obit: "In 1955, Wyatt Cafeterias, Inc. was operating independently of the food stores and in 1958, Wyatt sold the food stores to the Kroger Co. and devoted his energies to the cafeteria business."

He was around 62 years old at the time of this acquisition.

[Bill Sievers]

Ok.  I think the long meat case was unique, as most of the grocery stores I remember at that time, had just small case(s) and not just just one long continuous case.

 

The Westcliff center already had a cafeteria, so that' why a Wyatt's cafeteria didn't open there (at least I don't think it was a Wyatt's).  I believe it went through two cafeteria ownerships, Finley's and then the Chanticleer.

[Stadtplan]

I thought the Westcliff Theater was razed and rebuilt as Wyatt's Cafeteria at the center of the north side of the square?

 

What's crazy, is I read that the Westcliff Theater was built in 1951 for $150,000 and was razed only two or three years later?  I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around that decision.  Does anyone have more details on why?

 

Nice to know the theater was equipped with a "Cry Room....with Bottle Warmer"

[Bill Sievers]

When I arrived in FTW around the 1st of June in 1955, the Westcliff theatre was in the process of being torn down (along with a few offices adjoining it in the same building).  The offices seem to stay for about another year or two, then they were demolished too.  One of the places in that remaining building was Bob Bolen's father's watch store, which later moved into Bob's toy store (Toy Palace).

 

I never knew why the theatre was torn down.  Maybe it didn't do enough business as planned, and the amount of real estate it occupied was deemed essential for the expected traffic due to Wyatt's and the Fair Dept. Store, as well as the rest of the shopping center.