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TEST YOUR NIAGARA FALLS KNOWLEDGE

Many businesses have come and gone over the years in Niagara Falls. Since the last great heyday of the 1960s and '70s, numerous stores that helped make up the cultural landscape of Niagara Falls have closed their doors for good. How well do you recall these businesses?

Take the following quiz of 30 questions (10 each in the categories of easy, medium and difficult) to see how well you remember the way we used to be. Score 1 point for each correct answer.

EASY

1. This fixture of the old downtown of Niagara Falls became the original anchor store of the Rainbow Centre. Name it for your first point.
2. What was the name of the drive-in theater on Military Road that brought the big screen experience to Niagara Falls?
3. What bakery famous for its Italian bread and cold slices of pizza was located at 19th Street and Elmwood Avenue?
4. What department store occupied the building on Packard Road before Gold Circle?
5. A car wash on Third Street in the Town of Niagara garnered a lot of press in the late '70s because of what it was built to look like. Can you name it?
6. What was the name of the Western New York chain that was bought out by the Bon Ton at the Summit Park Mall?
7. What was the name of the meat market that stood at 18th Street and Linwood Avenue until it was tragically lost to fire?
8. Name the department store that stood at the site where the Prime Outlet Mall is now located.
9. Name the family grocery store on Linwood Avenue and Main Street that used the motto, "Where Food Shopping is King."
10. What was the name of the K-Mart subsidiary that was operated from the building on Main Street that now houses D&K?

    MEDIUM

11. What restaurant specializing in steaks was located in the Summit Park Mall across from the movie theaters?
12. What Niagara Falls bakery had a location on 20th Street in the city?
13. What Third Street nightclub featured nationally known blues musicians like B.B. King and John Lee Hooker?
14. Name the Niagara Falls Boulevard chicken wing outlet that had a sign on the front that also served as its menu. The sign read, "50 Wings -- $5.99."
15. Iney Wallens has done her Friday lunch radio broadcast from the restaurant of a Buffalo Avenue hotel -- that most recently was called the Best Western Inn on the River -- for years. What was it called for most of the '70s and '80s?
16. The China Garden Chinese Restaurant is located at the intersection of Pine Avenue and Portage Road. What coffee shop occupied the building for decades before closing up shop in the '90s?
17. What national food chain used to do business out of the building now housing Mighty Taco on Military Road?
18. What Pine Avenue bar was reopened, in the mid-'90s, by new ownership under the name, "Studrats?" Hint: The new owner must not have had enough money for a proper sign because the old name was an anagram of the new one.
19. What sinfully good ice cream chain had a franchise in the food court of the Rainbow Centre?
20. What local hamburger joint had shops on both Pine Avenue and Military Road in the 1970s?

    DIFFICULT

21. What was the name of the first head shop to "turn on" Niagara Falls? It was located on lower Main Street.
22. This drugstore on 18th Street and Cleveland Avenue had a sign out front that stated that they carried Russell Stover Candies. Can you name it?
23. Name the two locations of "David's Steak Hoagy" before they moved to their current spot.
24. In the summer of 1979 a strange airplane was frequently spotted flying over the skies of Niagara Falls. Why was this plane different from all others?
25. Name the Italian restaurant that stood on Whirlpool Street across from the bridge in the 1970s.
26. This hamburger chain was located on Main Street where the Burger King stands now. Do you know its name? Hint: If you know the name of the corporation that owns most of the Burger Kings in Western New York, then you know the answer to this question.
27. Name the Niagara Falls daredevil who briefly set up shop in the Rainbow Centre in 1985, selling autographed keepsakes of his plunge.
28. Name the Summit Park Mall women's clothing boutique that was managed in the 1980s by Niagara Falls television host Lori Caso.
29. The site of the current Fichte Eye Associates on 24th Street and Pine Avenue once had a brief and disastrous incarnation as a drive-through spaghetti house. Double garlic bread to you if you can name it.
30. The parking lot at Trusello's Bakery featured a billboard that had a cartoon rendition of one man choking another. What did the caption that accompanied the drawing read?

Answers

1. Beir's Brothers
2. Starlight Drive-In
3. Trusello's Bakery
4. Twin Fair
5. The Blue Whale Car Wash
6. AM&A's
7. Meranto's
8. King's Department Store
9. Slipko's
10. Kresge's
11. York Steak House
12. DiCamillo's
13. The Imperial Garage
14. The Chicken Coop
15. The Red Jacket Inn
16. The Wedge Coffee Shop
17. Wendy's
18. Stardust
19. Haagen-Dazs
20. Henry Hamburgers
21. The Fevertree
22. Stein Drugs
23. Pine Avenue and Portage Road across from the old high school and in Pine Plaza on Niagara Falls Boulevard
24. It had a scrolling dot-matrix advertising board mounted under its wings and ran ads for businesses
25. The Checkerboard
26. Carroll's Hamburgers
27. Steven Trotter
28. Ormond
29. The Spaghettory Poker
30. "What did you say about Trusello's bread?"

Scoring Table

27-30 points: You are a dyed-in-the-wool Niagarian. Congratulations.
20-26 points: You know your stuff.
15-19 points: You win the 10th cigarette prize -- middle of the pack.
9-14 points: You must have lost your long-term memory after drinking some bad Love Canal water.
0-8 points: You're not from 'round these here parts, now are you?