like old, only new

Since my post about the old, long gone Thornburg VA Stuckey's, something odd has emerged.

Not a new Stuckey's, but a combination Miller's Mart/Dairy Queen that gives this ol' wayfarer déja vu all over again.

Like it's Stuckey's for a new millenium.


Or for an old era, watched over by a figure from a Captain Morgan's ad.


Old mainstays like bottle rockets, pop-its & other fireworks can still be found.


And questionable figurines of times past have been transmuted into howling wolves, dark castles and questing elves.

Now if I can only find the jokey trucker hats.

And someone to wear them.

wayback with Stuckey's

To file under Stuckey's . . .

As things online have a pretty fast turnover, it's thanks to the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine that old websites can still be visited.

The Stuck On Stuckey's site being a case in point . . .

There's a whole list of links to different editions, but this one will get you there.

As Petersburg gets mentioned here now and again, here's a postcard image of an old Stuckey's on US 301. From this list of Stuckey's images.

sick in a good way . . .

[reposted from unterkayness, epic backstory to be found there]

On her way to work, school and Lane Bryant, Anita Rose has been keeping tabs on dead & dying retail in the Hampton Roads area and thereabouts. The now long gone Coliseum Mall and Mercury Plaza. The pretty much totally repurposed Newmarket North/Newmarket Fair mall. The extant time machine to '89 that is Southpark Mall.

Beyond southeastern Virginia, the Sickmalls blog has links to other retail blogs and sites dedicated to once ubiquitous chains like Caldor and Ames. And Anita also has a hand in Deadmalls.com.

But shunting over to the big grid experience, you'll miss some cool details and such.

So go see for yourself why That Mall's Sick And That Store's Dead! wins with special recommendation the E for Excellent blog award.

currently known as Stuckey's

My brother is a semi-regular at the Midway Cafe on US 460. And he's been saying the owners of the Midway were putting up a Stuckey's next door.

Now anytime he mentioned this new Stuckey's I'd think (but politely not say): "Oh, come on--a new Stuckey's? No way . . ."

Well: way.

Check this out at Anita's Sickmalls blog.

Cool, huh?

formerly known as Stuckey's, pt. 2

As you can tell from the pictures, both the business and the building are now long gone.

But some years back there was a Stuckey's in Thornburg just off I-95.


My wife & I would often stop by either heading to or from southeastern Virginia.


The Shell sign doesn't quite cover the white paint that mostly covers the Stuckey's logo beneath it all.


Can't say if this fireworks sign came along after the Stuckey's was no more. I do recall some elaborate fireworks packages, one with a rebel theme.


But my wife liked to get a box of pralines for her dad.


I liked the milk shakes. And browsing the novelty baseball caps that bore expressions like: Beauty is just a light switch away.

It was a bit like stepping into a 90s Country Pop song. A song that played a million times but you never hear on the radio anymore.


Nearby is what seems to be a former Texaco station that I don't rightly recall. An older song maybe.


Previous links:
Formerly known as Stuckey's, pt. 1 (Toano VA, 2007).

Pictures of Stuckey's (Toano VA, 1999).

formerly known as Stuckey's, pt. 1

This former Stuckey's was the one I went by about 8 years ago.

After driving around Jamestown, I went in search of this Stuckey's and found it near I-64 in Toano VA (thanks to a fellow working at Musicland).


While the store had indeed seen better days, it was good at least to find the building still standing (more about that in pt. 2).


There's maybe one actual Stuckey's in Virginia now, on the Eastern Shore in Mappsville. Otherwise, it's just a few mini-marts that happen to stock Stuckey's items.


And thankfully, the unofficial fansite Stuck On Stuckey's is still online now archived , though it seems to be in transition.

[UPDATE Nov. 2008: SOS (and many other AOL-based sites) have gone offline. The dead link has been replaced with a link to a recent version archived at the Wayback Machine.]

pictures of Stuckey's

It was late September 1999. My usual route south to my mom's was washed out courtesy Hurricane Floyd. So I took I-64 east toward Williamsburg VA to a back route I knew to the Jamestown Ferry.

Along the way, there was a Stuckey's.

Angels sang. Pralines were purchased. That's more or less how it was in those days . . .



No interior pics, but I seem to recall wood beam rafters and wood paneling. (Might've been praline-induced reveries . . .)

I've just sent these pics along to Stuck on Stuckey's, a cornucopia of info on the once great roadside chain.

[UPDATE Nov. 2008: SOS has since gone offline. But like many other old sites, it has an archived version now available on the Wayback Machine. The dead link's been fixed.]

Haven't been back since--no idea if the building stands now or what. I only know it's not listed at the Stuckey's official site.