Bethel Road doesn’t boast quite as much action-per-mile as Lane Avenue, but it’s close. Both are relatively short roads which have nonetheless packed a ton of firepower into their compact arsenals. The main differences are in size, as both end/begin at Riverside Drive, yet Bethel’s other terminus is at 315 – Lane continues well past that, to High and then Summit. Also, owing to its proximity to campus, Lane Avenue counts many more iconic sights along the way, either directly upon it or within view. Still, it’s definitely possible that nowhere has more personal history for me, whether by the inch or as a sum, than Bethel Road, which is probably why it’s taken me so long to tackle this project – which I’m only slightly getting into at the moment. I used to be in favor of compiling biblical epics of info before publishing a page, but have reconsidered that strategy here lately. Now I would rather go to press with whatever skeletal material I have handy, but then frequently update it. If nothing else, I think this makes it more interesting for the reader.
Regarding this page, we’ll start from the 315 end. Nothing much happens after you get off at the Bethel Road exit, apart from crossing over 315 itself (if driving northbound at that time), so this particular journey begins after passing the Olentangy River Road intersection. The KFC on the corner (711 Bethel) and the BP station across the street (5067 Olentangy River Rd) have been here since at least the late 90s, effective symbolic guardposts opening the door to you for everything that follows.
click arrows to turn on Olentangy; otherwise keep on movin’ along Bethel…
south side of road
747 Bethel Road
Micro Center
The font for this computer store is pure 90s,
which looks amazing. In many respects I can’t
believe this place is still here.
767 Bethel Road
among the buildings in front of the strip mall. Currently a Massage Envy, was once a Blockbuster Video.
769 Bethel Road
Olentangy Plaza. In the late 90s there was an art gallery back here somewhere, that I visited once under weird circumstances: my coworker Joe at the “Bethel Road” Kroger had a friend who was trying to fix him up with some chick who worked here. He asked me to swing by here under the pretense of shopping for art, but really to scope out this woman. And report back to him with my findings, if she was any good looking or not. This may have been Copeland Fine Art, but I’m not entirely sure.
The first set of businesses, in the building nearest Olentangy River Road, have an Olentangy address. After that, as it wraps around from Micro Center in an arc to the right, these all belong to Bethel. There used to be a beloved Kmart back here but I think it sat where the Taylor House high-rise apartment is now, and therefore probably had an Olentangy address too.
833 Bethel Road
Formerly a business that is technically registered as Music-Go-Round, although you might also find it indexed under The Smarmy Jackass Zone. I recall one day my good friend Damon drifted through my workplace pretty fired up about his interactions with the help at this location. Then a couple years later I ventured through these doors and was given a healthy dose of this bitter medicine myself. I realize all the trendiest people work in second hand music equipment stores in the suburbs, but come on.
839 Bethel Road
Kai’s Crab Boil at present. In 1997 it was Holcomb’s Educational Materials.
1299 Bethel Road
In more recent times has belonged to Brush Crazy. At one point housed Video Central, a mighty convenient and oft frequented spot when living nearby.
1325 Bethel Road
Former home of the awesomely named China Gourmet Express. Now just a boring ol’ Dunkin Donuts/Baskin Robbins.
1355 Bethel Road
La Casita: was formerly Harold’s Cajun Glory Cafe. Looks basically the same from the outside.
And before that was once a Long John Silver’s! Which I think you can still detect traces of, on the outside.
1375 Bethel Road
The Forge Tavern: this is where Polo’s used to be.
1381 Bethel Road
Used to belong to this funky little Pizza Hut franchise, which might have even been delivery only, I’m not sure. Notorious in that Roy, Doug Fogle and I once caught a ride over to DiMarco’s from here, in a delivery girl’s truck, in a heavy downpour.
1401 Bethel Road
has been a Marathon for an eternity. Was once “Wayne’s Marathon” although I’m not sure if Wayne is still in the mix or not. As this pertains to personal/collective folklore, immediately after I stopped seeing Stacy, in the early 2000s, she started dating this Damon guy (not my dear old pal of the same name) who worked here. He was friends with Maria somehow and this is how they struck up an acquaintance. As far as I know they are still together, too
1515 Bethel Road
Enchanted Hands (suite #301) is but one of the residents at this address. Which I know because they recently sent me a friend request on Instagram – that’s pretty much all it takes to grab my attention. Hey, you’ve got to do what you can to rise above the muck these days! So their efforts are appreciated. Let this be a lesson to you fellow business owners out there…
north side of road
1092 Bethel Road: The Refectory
Award winning restaurant is basically a C-bus institution at this point. It opened in 1976 and has been here ever since.
1138 Bethel Road
Is currently Gogi Korean BBQ
used to be Bumpers, a curiously lively bar considering it didn’t look like much on the outside. And was apparently something calling Accurate Video Solutions in between these two eras?
1270 Bethel Road
The apartment where it all started! This was home base for the first new group of friends I made, upon moving to Columbus in January ’97. Sometimes it seems so improbable that I would ever meet these people, sometimes inevitable. Lisa, Maria, Doug, Mike and Junior were the five roommates at the time I arrived on this scene. In various combinations they were here for a handful of years, at least, with plenty of others coming and going. Some of them moved up the road to another apartment in ’98.
Above is what it looked like in the mid-late 90s. The exterior is pretty much the same. It does appear that they ripped out this tree at some point and planted a pine instead – this tree (or possibly one beside it) is notable in that this random drunk chick fell out of it one night whilst attempting to spy on some dude in the next apartment over. Then strolled into the one where we were partying instead, joined us for a spell, threw up in the bathroom and left.
The living room is behind the ground floor window here. And that would have been Maria’s bedroom up above, beyond the second floor window. Lisa had the other official bedroom, on the back end of the place. Doug and Mike were on the two couches, at the time I made their acquaintance, and Junior was living in the basement. One cool feature is this bay window in the kitchen side wall, too, though you can’t see it here. Parties were legion at this place and occasionally even spilled out into the parking lot.
1380 Bethel Road
Former home of 55 Grille. Is now a Sheetz station.
1434 Bethel Road
Formerly a SuperAmerica, now a Speedway. But yes apparently always a gas station, for as far back as I can track these things.
1450 Bethel Road
As of 1997 a Skyline Chili was here. But nothing is specifically using this address at present – its most recent tenant was a Kebab Hummus Grill that went out of business in ’23.
1460 Bethel Road
Currently Pronoia Beauty, a spa. Back in 1997, though, it would have been Central City Comics.
1462 Bethel Road
Cha Sha & Coffee. Looks like a cool place, though I’ve yet to try their surely delicious offerings. They offer chai flights, and have this cool art piece along one wall, of a shaky, henna’d hand accepting coffee from another holding the kettle. Either of which is enough to make me curious to learn more about their offerings.
Coaches Bar & Grill
(1480 and 1482 Bethel Road) Still going strong after all this time! One of the last bars on this road with the same name it had in the 1990s (and possibly earlier). Not the most remarkable place, perhaps, but a great location and the owners must apparently have their act together. At one time, I’m not sure if he still does, but a fellow named Dave Matthews owned the place. Back in the day, they had “Melrose Mondays” here, whereby the latest Melrose Place episodes were aired with the sound on. Much to the consternation of anyone who maybe hoped to listen to the jukebox instead – like for example, us, as I do remember our small group leaving during one of these incidents.
1500 Bethel Road
Al’s Delicious Popcorn has also been here since at least the mid 90s – which I consider an even more remarkable achievement than Coaches’ continued existence.
1512 Bethel Road
In ye ancient times, was once a Radio Shack. Nobody is using this specific plot on the map at present, however.
1514 Bethel Road
On Tap Pub has maintained a presence here since 2001, another impressive run. Owner Kenny Abraham must be doing something right. All in all, this is an impressive showing of consistency for the back wall of the Center.
Prior to this, Manhattan Bagel Co. called his spot home.
1516 Bethel Road
Golden Delight Bakery has held down this address, once again, from at least from ’97 onward. I have to admit I didn’t realize many of these businesses were back here for even half that long – the lesson here being, for all of us, that we really should get out and explore more, and not just stick to the scripted, heavily touted “popular kids” that get all the press.
1530 Bethel Road
Shooters Cafe was once a highly popular dance club at this spot. My collective colleagues and I came here a ton from ’98 to roughly ’02, I would say. Both as a nightlife option but also for happy hour, as they had pretty decent food at reasonable prices.
Nothing is here right now, but looking it up proves another good example of how your memories begin messing with you over time. I would have sworn this address was more centrally located in this back strip of businesses, and possibly even slightly over to the right. However it’s actually much closer to the far left side, if facing it from Bethel. But then I recall that you pretty much always had to park in that lot beside this strip, over to the left, that these were typically the nearest open spots – and this begins to make more sense to me, the tiny detail that helps arrange everything as it should.
1536 Bethel Road: Bethel Center
This is the address given to the “center” as an abstract, collective entity. Some occupants have Bethel Road addresses, some Bethel Center Mall. Three are three separate clusters of businesses (and one small standalone building, in the front middle), and they all belong to Bethel except for the strip on the left, facing sideways. Those belong to Bethel Center Mall instead. So I will have to tackle those in some other fashion.
1540 Bethel Road
Currently belongs to Don Tequila Mexican Grill and Cantina. I almost forget there used to be a Cooker Bar & Grille here, despite eating at this location a handful of times. It was okay enough to visit every now and then. This location was even the first one opened in Columbus, back in 1985.
But what really sticks out in your mind, ultimately, about any place? Incidents like the time Paul and I were here for lunch and I ordered a draft beer, which was served with a huge chunk of food stuck to the inside of the glass, on the side. You couldn’t miss it. Sadly enough, that’s the first thing that always pops into my mind whenever I think about this restaurant. Not to make excuses for these guys (I would later work at a different location and have reasons to doubt ownership’s competence) but this is what you’re up against, if trying to make it in the cutthroat restaurant biz. You can’t possibly have eyes on every employee all the time. You just have to trust you’re hiring people who know better than to serve chunks of food inside their beer glasses.
Reed to Dierker:
At this juncture we’ll move on to my next wacky experiment for this site. I’ve actually been plotting and planning and attempting to wrap my head around this concept for years, but nothing as of yet quite matches these grand visions. The main issue here is that the direction in which we consume content from a website does not match the directions we are moving in the real world counterparts. And there’s almost no way to orient them to make it so – well, I’m sure there are probably brilliant designers out there capable of doing something like this, but if so, I have to admit I’ve never seen it.
Basically I’d like these addresses to come at you like you are driving past the sites in question. With videos of both sides of the road visible at the same time. For this to work, I think you’d need vertically scrolling videos, side by side, with texts that pop up on the sides of those, to match what you’re seeing. So, yeah, this is something I will continue to muddle my way through and attempt to solve. For now, though, the best I can come up with is playing these two videos, at the same time. I’ve set them up to allow a second or two of lag time, for you to click the top video, then the bottom one after that (keep in mind this will apparently only work on a computer brower; if using your trusty ol’ iPhone, I believe it will only play one at a time – yet another reason why I recommend the full screen LLTC experience instead):
I think this is pretty cool and all, given my limited tech or coding skills or whatever, that it even halfway sort of almost resembles what I somewhat have in mind. But even so, without even getting into quality concerns, you can see what kind of problems this entire concept is up against: this arrangement is far from perfect, and yet there’s no way you could position these any better, at least none I can think of, that would match our experience in the real world. I guess maybe if I flipped the bottom video around upside down, then set up endless horizontal scrolling for the text in between the two? But then the bottom video would essentially be useless if actually attempting to read something. This is why I think a pair of vertically scrolling videos, then a column of text dedicated to each, might be the way to go – assuming you could get the text to roll upwards while you watched the videos. Anyway, if there are any website building wizards out there who read this and might care to suggest a solution, that would be awesome. So far, however, anyone I’ve mentioned this to plainly thinks I’m crazy.
And now we have reached my former workplace of approximately 5 1/2 years, off and on, the Bethel Road Kroger. Once again, the “Bethel Road” Kroger technically has a Crown Plaza address, so I’ll refrain from going into much detail here. But this is where it would sit on our journey. Up above is what it looks like in more modern times. The fuel center in front did not originally exist. For much, much more about this place you can visit my Bethel Road Kroger page.
Moving along, here’s the view of Bethel from Dierker up to Sawmill, on the north side of the road. Not a whole lot happening here beside apartments and maybe some offices, until you reach the Carriage Place Plaza:
And now we move on to the Carriage Place shopping center. Big Bear was of course a centerpiece of this plaza for quite some time, before they went belly up.
As far as personal highlights, one day I was stuck wearing sandals to work, a prospect Kroger management wasn’t too happy about. Having walked there that morning to begin with (a fantastic tale in its own right) I was forced to take a long break and traipse up to Carriage Place to buy some shoes. On my way back, I was just cutting through the parking lot of this bank (doesn’t appear to be here any longer) and some unknown dude in the drive through line started blowing his horn at me, repeatedly, and pointing. I finally figured out what he was trying to tell me: there were a bunch of dollar bills blowing around in the parking lot. I gave him a thankful wave, scooped them up, and kept walking.
Amusingly enough, Mike Nelson would later tell me he saw me walking up Bethel Road this fine morning and wondered what on earth I was up to. Although come to think of it, I’m not entirely sure why he didn’t pull over and offer me a lift.
I don’t think this shipping container with the Getz Builders logo is a permament part of the landscape, but I wish it were. It looks really cool. Instead maybe we’ll call it “pop up art” and if you wish to view this, assuming it isn’t gone already, it’s facing the strip mall itself, parked on the front right edge near the Pickforde side street entrance.
It’s funny how sketch pretty much everyone always looks like in these videos, just going about their normal business. It could be an 87 year old grandma getting cakes out of her backseat at her church, in the middle of a bright afternoon, but she too would look somewhat suspicious with her dealings. And of course, most of all, the unseen guy shooting these puppies – but hey, I’m used to this, and had a choice in the matter. As for anybody else trapped unawares in one of my weird projects (here and elsewhere), my eternal apologies.
2524 Bethel Road: O’Manny’s Pub
It’s down to I think this and Coaches as far as what’s lasted longer on this road – I’m not sure which came first.
2544 Bethel Road
Is now Asian International Market, a grocery store.
Former home of Trading Zone/Video Trader, however. I remember Jill and I ventured in here one day to trade in a boatload of old movies and such. We got some Mario game for the Nintendo 64 and I forget what else. Pretty sure this was also the day I picked up a VHS copy of The Empire Strikes Back with the original artwork, believing it to be a “collector’s item.” Let’s just say I’ve yet to find a taker.
2570 Bethel Road
It was only recently announced that this 35,000 square foot space is soon to become a Fun City Adventure Park, an indoor kiddie/teen playground on steroids.
Until I believe 2023, this was formerly a Cinemark Movies 12. I don’t know if this was always the case, but by the late 90s they had already turned into a second run theater, albeit with movies that weren’t too terribly old. I saw approximately half a bazillion flicks in here, it seems. Particularly after getting on this kick where, if working a split shift (either at the same job or between two different ones) in the area, with a large enough gap between, I would dip into here to catch a cheap movie rather than driving home or something. I remember catching Spy Game and The Good Girl in this manner, for example, which should give you some indication as to the time frame in question.
But I also took in plenty of movies here with others, too. I saw The Wedding Singer twice during its initial theatrical run, and the second time was here, with Jill – nowadays it’s somewhat hard to imagine what kind of flick could even drag me to the theater once, much less for a repeat outing. She and I also first caught Go at this Cinemark, which was memorable in that Jill was fidgeting with a ring on her finger to the extent it went flying off and rolling out of sight. After the movie, she and I and an usher/janitor type employee searched all over for the thing. He eventually found it clear down near one of the front rows – we were all somewhat incredulous that it had managed to roll that far, in a theater at least halfway full of people.
2630 Bethel Road
It seems Music Go Round must have relocated here at some point, from that spot farther down the road. Without most of the previous employees, we can only hope.
2640 Bethel Road
somewhat of a cursed location. It was B Street Grill for a while, where my good pal Clif Davis was working at the time (alongside such luminaries as Colin Gawel of Watershed fame). Before, it had been a Dalts, which literally closed overnight without a heads up to any of the employees, in 1996. B Street Grill lasted not even two years themselves. Then a short lived Banana Joe’s operation, one of at least three around town. After that I think some other bar I vaguely remember possibly visiting, then possibly a couple other things after that, and now a Tire Discounters.
The addresses here don’t entirely make sense, because this is a standalone building up by the road, while the next (2642) is tucked into the strip mall behind it.
2642 Bethel Road
This is now a Half Price Books. More spacious than the Lane Avenue location, yet I always seemed to find less of interest here, somehow. This location actually moved at one point from a different spot in the same strip mall – it was formerly located at 2660, so I’m not sure how or why that happened.
Circa 1997 this address belonged to Petland. I remember when I was dating this Jamie chick we came in here one time, I think just driving around and looking for something to get into. But she may have been looking for a specific new pet – I can’t recall that detail at the moment.
2650 Bethel Road
Was once a Drug Emporium location. My old pal Jamie (not the chick I used to date – rather he was a male coworker I hung out with quite a bit back during that same rough era) (I’m well aware these name droppings are highly confusing to outsiders, but am not about to explain the entire history of every acquiantance on every post; maybe a “cast of characters” roundup could be useful at some point, but, eh, let’s just say that’s not a top priority) ended up working here for a spell after, let’s just say, management at the Bethel Road Kroger became less than enamored by his antics.
Once again, nobody is using this address right now.
2700 Bethel Road
Walmart gobbled up this prime spot, essentially the anchor of this shopping plaza, when a former tenant went bust. For yes, ’twas once yet another outpost of the Big Bear empire. Big what? you might say, if not from this area and/or not of a certain age to remember it. Well, believe it or not, barely more than 20 years ago, this grocery store chain was Kroger’s greatest local competitor. At the time, I recall that Kroger management was fond of saying they knew how to compete against the Bear, and were not worried about them – they would rather have Big Bear in these spots than some other potential competitor. Then in the late 90s/early 2000s, Giant Eagle came to town, a development significant enough to break up that stalemate. By 2004, Big Bear was toast, although I think this location was shuttered slightly before that date.
