Food Fair, Roosevelt Blvd, Philadelphia - anyone recognize?

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dcgrocery
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Food Fair, Roosevelt Blvd, Philadelphia - anyone recognize?

Post by dcgrocery »

Does anyone recognize this location and what has it been replaced by? I scanned these images from old slides. The street sign says Roosevelt Blvd and I know this was somewhere near Nazareth Hospital. This is probably from the late 50's. I don't recognize this style Food Fair building without the tower. Was this common?

http://s11.photobucket.com/albums/a175/ ... dFair1.jpg

http://s11.photobucket.com/albums/a175/ ... dFair2.jpg
Steve Landry
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Post by Steve Landry »

Not a common design but I am familiar with this format as well as another format at the time that had the "Penn Fruit" "Marina" huge arch in front.

From the photo the square footage looks huge for the time (50,000 sqft?). Food Fair often hired famous architects to design experimental or "new" formats for their stores. These stores were usually very large, multi-departmental (inclusive of established departments and experimental departments) and incredible volume. I am pretty sure that this was the era that Food Fair had the highest volume stores in the country (chain stores).

I have seen this "skyline" Food Fair signage and total glass frontage before. I also have seen this design in a Food Fair/ J.M. Fields COMBO that was gigantic.
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Post by Groceteria »

Steve Landry wrote:From the photo the square footage looks huge for the time (50,000 sqft?).
Doesn't look quite that big to me. I'm guessing maybe 25K, tops. Note that the wing is actually a dry cleaner's store and not part of the Food Fair.

It's a quite beautiful store, though. Nice photo too.
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Food Fair in Phila

Post by bring-back-pylons »

I am not familiar with that location, but there is that exact prototype store in Elizabeth NJ on Route 1 north. It is now a Daffy Dan's clothing store and has had one addition to the building, but the glass front, the blue color is still the same. I did find the Elizabeth location on The Food Fair location list on this web site. Inside you can still tell where the meat department was located by the large low overhang and the window locations to the back room. Cool looking store.
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Post by Steve Landry »

With your visual expertise in photographic perspective acknowledged, I defer to your assessment David :)

Thanks
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Post by todd »

Must say.... very nice. Love the vertical blinds and all that glass. Looks like some of the things we have in Romania now... very post-modern ....one of our large grocers looks like a 60's airport terminal! I need to snap some shots.
goligga

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Post by goligga »

I recognized that design right away. At one time we had Food Fair stores in NE PA. One former Food Fair in Kingston Pa is now a Food Town.It still has that design but they filled in alot of the windows with wall.
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Post by neil mcauliffe »

Sorry I did not notice this earlier. It is the store at the Pennypack Circle and Roosevelt Boulevard. It opened around 1958. It was converted to Pantry Pride around 1967. It was totally rebuilt (not remodeled I mean gutted and redesigned) in the mid-1970's. They changed the name to Penn Fruit which they had by then acquired. After the Food Fair bankruptcy it was purchased by Acme. They have also extensively rebuilt it during their ownership. Still in operation as an Acme. It is part of a strip shopping center that I think was developed by Food Fair Properties.
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Post by Groceteria »

Looks rather uninspiring now:

http://tinyurl.com/2m85bz
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Post by Steve Landry »

It looks larger now. Do you think it was expanded?
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Post by Groceteria »

Steve Landry wrote:It looks larger now. Do you think it was expanded?
Looks like it. I'd be surprised if there were any visible trace of the original left.
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Post by HulkieD »

Groceteria wrote:
Steve Landry wrote:It looks larger now. Do you think it was expanded?
Looks like it. I'd be surprised if there were any visible trace of the original left.
That building's actually a new construction - circa 2002/2003 if my memory serves. The older building (and quite a few surrounding stores) was torn down to make room for the much larger new one. I know before the old one was torn down it looked nothing like the Food Fair pictured - it had Acme's 1980's era exterior design and a 1988/1989 interior.

Apologies for the late reply!
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Re: Food Fair in Philadelphia - anyone recognize?

Post by neil mcauliffe »

58th and Lindberg was an Acme. My information is from 1968 and it is listed as Acme store #1641.
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