Ah, the good old days. Each generation cherishes a different ideal of what makes a time and place special and worthy of nostalgia. And while our fondest memories often focus on the people we hold dear, the places where we experienced our best moments – that first kiss, favorite birthday party, the greatest vacation – hold a special place in our hearts as well. When we recall our favorite days, we also recall where we spent them. Here are a few memorable Fayetteville landmarks, which no longer exist or exist in a changed form, that have played a part in the best days in the lives of so many of our neighbors.

The Capitol

“The Capitol is an icon, the last of the old-fashioned department stores where everyone knew you by name,” says local historian Bruce Daws. In the heyday of Hay Street, before the advent of malls, downtown was the place to shop. And from 1912 to 1990, shopping at the Capitol was a treat.

“It was the Lord & Taylor or Saks Fifth Avenue of Fayetteville,” said Joel Schur, who became general manager in 1960, after marrying Marcia Stein, daughter of the store’s founder, Bernard Stein. The store offered a little bit of everything, from fine furs and jewelry to sportswear, cosmetics, bridal wear, hats, shoes and antiques from around the world. Marcia Stein Schur and other sales folks knew not only their customers’ names but their preferences and sizes, too. During the holidays, a patron might come into the store to find a gift already chosen and wrapped.

“If a man, around Christmas time, didn’t have a package from the Capitol, he was in trouble,” Schur said. “Our salespeople knew what to pick for whom.”

A trip to the Capitol was never complete without lunch at the Birdcage, the tea room on the third floor. Diners might enjoy chicken chow mein, potpie or a sandwich, followed by a slice of chocolate fudge pie. On the tea room’s final day, everyone was given a sliver of the beloved dessert.

“It was a pillar of the community,” Schur said, “but the malls had taken over. It was best to take a bow out, and we did. We thought it was best.”

Here or history? The Capitol may have closed in 1990, but it has since been reinvented as Dock’s at the Capitol, where you can even get a glimpse of the old sign.

Breece’s Landing

Those who remember Oscar P. Breece say he was the consummate community host. If a celebrity or dignitary visited Fayetteville, chances were Breece would show them a good time, give them a good meal and ferry them up and down the Cape Fear River on his 100-foot yacht, the Florida. “He was the official entertainer of Cumberland County,” said Corey R. Breece Sr., Oscar’s grandson.

Oscar Breece was one of the original owners of Rogers & Breece Funeral Home, a business that his grandsons, Corey and Robert Breece Jr., carry on today. Perhaps it was his line of work that gave Oscar Breece his zest for life? In the early 1940s, Oscar opened Breece’s Landing, which quickly became the social hub of Fayetteville. In a wooden banquet hall overlooking the river, big-band musicians entertained the crowds who came to listen to the music and dance.

On the river below, the Florida was moored to an old World War II submarine chaser, which served as a dock and a popular fishing spot. The sub chaser sank years ago, but its carcass still lies there on the banks of the river.

Here or history? The memories aren’t far out of reach – just take a ride to the river. The Oscar P. Breece Bridge that carries Person Street over the Cape Fear gives a birds-eye view of that old chaser.

The old movie houses

The Cameo Art House Theatre on Hay Street opened in October 2000, but the building already had a rich history in motion pictures. Beginning in 1914, it housed the New Dixie, the successor to the original Dixie, which stood across Hay Street and in the early 1900s offered early cinema fans silent movies. The New Dixie’s success encouraged other businessmen to open other theaters downtown, and in the middle decades of the 20th century, the cinematic choices on Hay Street were plentiful.

Both the Colony and the Miracle theaters occupied space in the 300 block of Hay Street, where new shops and condominiums are being built now. The Carolina Theatre stood in the footprint of the police department, and the Broadway was situated where the Public Works Commission building now stands. Up Haymount Hill, where the Cape Fear Regional Theatre is today, the Hamont Theatre showed popular westerns on Saturday mornings for neighborhood children.

Before the Civil Rights movement ended segregation, many businesses, including theaters, were off limits to blacks. In the early 1900s, the Eureka Theatre on Person Street catered to the city’s African-American residents. The Plaza Theatre on Hillsboro Street served black customers as well.

Only the ghosts of Fayetteville’s first movie theaters remain today, though. In the 1970s, as shopping shifted to the Skibo Road area and downtown sank into seediness, the old theaters met their demise. When adult entertainment took hold of Hay Street, the old theaters went from showcasing popular films of the day to playing X-rated productions and low-budget kung fu flicks. They eventually closed, along with downtown’s notorious strip clubs and bars.

Little remains of Fayetteville’s old drive-in theaters either, though, in a couple of places, their skeletons remain. At 4025 Bragg Blvd., where Kelly’s Auto Sales operates, the rusting hulk of an old drive-in screen towers among the trees. In the boulevard’s heyday, at least three drive-ins – the Boulevard, the Fox Twin and the Midway – entertained movie-goers. The Sky Vue Drive-In out on Gillespie Street could accommodate more than 400 cars before it shut down in the late 1950s and Steve’s Tower in the Sky moved into its space.

Here or history? The Cameo thrives in the spot where movies once lived, but only nostalgia remains for Fayetteville’s drive-in theaters. Film buffs may have to be satisfied with movies on the lawn in Massey Hill and Fort Bragg.

Steve’s Tower in the Sky

Steve Horne is 77, and it’s been more than 40 years since he closed Steve’s Tower in the Sky, but folks still stop him to reminisce about the good times. “I can go to the barber shop sometimes, and someone will come up to me and say, ‘I met my wife at your place.’ Thirty or 40 people have come to me to say that – and they’re still married.”

Horne opened his business on Gillespie Street in 1957. About 18 months later, when the Sky Vue went out of business, he leased it, expanded its snack bar into a restaurant that would seat 70 and built a glass tower on top to house a DJ who would take requests and broadcast Top 40 hits on WFNC. It was just a building in a field, Horne said, but it soon became one of the most popular spots in town.

Folks could sit inside, but most opted to stay in their cars, scanning the scene, listening to music, waiting on orders of fried chicken or barbecue that carhops brought right to the window. Steve’s Tower in the Sky was a favored cruising spot, where young people drove slow circles around the restaurant – to see and be seen. By filling out little cards, patrons could request that the DJ play a special song for their sweethearts, too.

There were times when as many as 200 cars filled the parking lot, Horne said. And some of Fayetteville’s best-known radio personalities, including Jeff Thompson, spun tunes in the tower. Around 1968, though, plans to build a new highway shut down Steve’s Tower in the Sky. Now, nostalgia is all that remains.

Here or history? All that’s left are the memories – Steve’s Tower in the Sky is now the Martin Luther King Jr. Freeway or what some folks still call the CBD Loop.

Era of the soda shop

As a kid, Lewis M. Crawley Jr., used to do a little bit of everything at the Carolina Soda Shop, the business his father, Lewis M. “Bill” Crawley Sr., opened on Hay Street in 1933. He took orders, washed the dishes, waited tables and worked the soda fountain. In the 1940s and ‘50s, Hay Street bustled, and children from the nearby city schools would come in for a Coca-Cola, an ice-cream soda or one of the shop’s famous hot dogs.

The shop, which stood at the corner of Hay and Pittman streets, where the Fayetteville Police Department now stands, catered to all ages. It had a few notable visitors, too. Crawley said his dad used to sell magazines, and one day Gen. George Patton, who was staying at the Prince Charles Hotel across the street, stopped in to buy western magazines. Gov. Terry Sanford came to eat at the shop, as did those famous stooges, Larry, Moe and Curly.

The Carolina was not the only soda shop on Hay Street back then. It was the era of the soda shop. There was also Brady’s, which operated from the building where Rude Awakening coffee house is now. There was the soda fountain inside Horne’s Drug Store. And then there was the Point News, in the triangular building where Hay and Old streets meet, where William and Helen Ward sold old-fashioned banana splits and fresh-squeezed orangeade. Bruce Daws, the local historian, said there was a time when Point News was a haven for schoolchildren. The Wards employed many of them to do nothing but cut truckloads of potatoes into French fries.

Pete Piner, who grew up in the Massey Hill neighborhood and retired as chief from the Fayetteville Fire Department in 2001, said the Point News made “the best hamburger in the world.” The Wards also sold a good selection of cigars, newspapers and magazines.

Bill Crawley ran the Carolina Soda Shop for 45 years, until 1978, when he retired. Brady’s, which the Wards also operated, closed in 1980. Helen Ward served the final burger and orangeade at Point News in 2003.

Here or history? The soda shop era may be over, but Horne’s Drug Store has since been reborn as a popular breakfast and lunch spot, with some of the old décor remaining firmly intact. And for chocolate lovers, it was welcome news when the old Point News became the latest home for the Chocolate Lady.

The USO

In 1941, nearly 60,000 Army troops were training for war at Fort Bragg. To help the community entertain this massive number of young soldiers, the USO, or United Service Organization, opened its first government-built club at 333 Ray Ave., in downtown Fayetteville. The Fayetteville USO had outgrown its temporary quarters inside the old Rosemont Hotel at the corner of Hay and Winslow streets. The new club was touted as the largest USO club in the world, and the community embraced it.

According to “Fayetteville, North Carolina: The Way it Was” by Weeks Parker Jr., the new USO boasted a restaurant and an auditorium that was used for basketball and other games, as well as dancing, movies and skating. In the 1950s, Parker and his orchestra entertained at the USO on Saturday nights. Civic groups used the club’s banquet rooms for meetings, classes and a variety of community events.

The Ray Avenue USO remained open through World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. It was shuttered in 1986. In May 2003, it burned down. The building has since been razed, but in a way the site returned to its entertainment roots when it was transformed into Festival Park.

Here or history? The USO is back thanks to a center that opened last year on Fort Bragg. It’s a place for a new generation to make its own lasting memories.

Drive on in

When Bob Streib ran Streib’s Drive-in on Fort Bragg Road, his wife, Nancy, was known fondly as Mama Streib. Folks still call her that, even after all these years. The Streibs operated the restaurant from 1957 through 1977, in the heyday of drive-ins. It was a family affair.

“I was a waitress, a cook, whatever,” said Nancy Streib.

Streib’s was a frequent gathering place for students from nearby Fayetteville High School, what is now Terry Sanford High School. The menu offered the old drive-in standards: hamburgers, hot dogs and milkshakes made from real ice cream. Streib’s also offered Fayetteville’s first bucket of fried chicken and a mean sandwich.

“People went crazy over his pastrami and his steak sandwiches,” said Suzie Heflin, the Streib’s daughter, who also worked at the restaurant as a girl, waiting tables, breading chicken, washing up.

Bob Streib loved the teenagers who frequented his drive-in. He gave many of them a good job and a helping hand when they needed it, Nancy Streib said. The high school kids would sneak off campus for lunch and come to Streib’s, and their principal would come looking for them. “They’d hide in the cooler,” Nancy Streib said, “or they’d get in Bob’s car and take off.”

Glenn Jernigan remembers it well. “Streib’s was, without question, the favorite place of Fayetteville High School students,” Jernigan said. “It was a family atmosphere, a place where you were well-received as young people. (Mr. Streib) had a heart bigger than he was, and he was always receptive to the young people. He liked to chide you or tease you, but it was a good environment.”

Not far from Streib’s, over on Bragg Boulevard, Gus and Steve Pappas owned another of Fayetteville’s famed eating establishments. Named Pappas Drive-in after the two Greek brothers, Pappas was an institution in Fayetteville from 1962 to 2002. The brothers served traditional drive-in fare, including tasty onion rings and pizza, along with something called broasted chicken. Yes, that’s broasted, not roasted.

The broasted chicken was battered and fried in a special pressure cooker of sorts, said Gus Pappas’ daughter, Angie Murray. They had real milkshakes, too, and carhops would carry the orders to your car and place a special tray on your window. Murray said customers came from Lumberton and Stedman and even High Point to eat at Pappas. Customers were like family, she said, and in some cases, the brothers allowed customers to run up a tab, granting credit on a handshake. Loyal customers would bring the Pappas brothers vegetables from their gardens or freshly-caught fish or deer meat.

“My dad would always give them something in return,” Murray said. “It was always an understanding there.”

Here or history? Sad to say, but the drive-in era may be gone for good. Even after it was closed, the Pappas building stood on Bragg Boulevard until it was demolished a few years back. Lucky for landmark lovers, the parabola-shaped building next door, sometimes called the flying saucer, is still alive and well.