Summit Street is a strange road, any way you slice it. Mostly a one way, southbound conduit for US Route 23, it’s also mostly residential. But every block or so, it seems, there’s at least one iconic business which has featured predominantly into the landscape for decades, if not our entire lives. It being Route 23, local boy Dwight Yoakam has even technically written a song in part about this. Also believe it or not, legendary rocker Joe Walsh lived on Summit Street as a young boy, and was in this house when he first learned guitar – I haven’t been able to figure out the exact address yet, but remain hopeful that fact is buried in some archives somewhere. On a related note, local band The Godz had a place on Summit, too, when they first started getting serious about their act.
But let’s move on to (mostly) the present tense. Considering that Hudson Road is where Summit begins the one way split (turning into much more of a sleepy, residential street north of here), it makes sense to begin our journey here, and head steadily south:
2515: Baba’s. Only added dinner hours June 2018.
2507: Rumba Cafe. Hoodoo Soul Band has been playing Sunday nights here since 2008, after switching over from Oldfield’s On High.
2500: the 3rd different home for Used Kids Records. This one is different in that there’s a performance area in one corner, a nifty little section where the brick lined wall is covered by reams of posters, with a sign bearing the familiar black and white Used Kids logo mounted right in the middle. I would be surprised if you found much Dwight Yoakam here, however.
2491: Wild Goose Creative
This is a really interesting space which holds everything from marathon epic novel readings, to screenings of indie films.
2216: Cafe Bourbon Street
The owner had to be talked into hosting live bands circa 1997, though they soon became a staple of this establishment. Their first live show was therefore also Superstar Rookie’s first live show. The exterior still looks basically the same, with that dark blue awning, the name spelled out in white.
Chef Ninja X ran the Taco Ninja business inside here, up through at least 2006. Was also drummer in something called Classical Ass. Cafe Ninja had homemade falafel. Other signature dishes are Big Bad Buddha’s Black Bean Hummus, Nunchuck Chimichanga, unfried pinto beans, shredded chicken. He liked to say, “your hunger has been assassinated by the Taco Ninja!” when serving you.
A line of mirrors, halfway up the north wall, has always lined the stage. They would string Christmas lights up and leave them well past the season, perhaps even year round. There for a while – I’m not sure if they still do this – musicians would get free Black Label beer on the nights they played.
2210 Summit Street
Is presently The Summit Music Hall, and there’s also a Crunchwerks eatery inside. The exterior is a sharp looking black with bright red trim, though I haven’t been inside. For the longest time, however, this was Summit Station, a prominent lesbian bar.
(click arrow to navigate)
-South Of Lane–
The building above was once split into 4 housing units, with apartments numbered 1/2 on the 2nd and 3rd floors. I know this because we moved into 1990 1/2 Summit Street in January 1997. And this disgraced former residence was quickly abolished as soon as we moved out. Dan Focht of Salthorse fame lived here right before us. This picture is from much more modern times, however.
At the time we moved in, Stephanie Silver was occupying 1990 and Sherry Shaffer 1988 (some nice alliteration there, eh?) We never really got to know these guys living in 1988 1/2. Sherry wound up putting her rent into escrow over some disputes with our landlord, Wayne Ault, moved out, and then later on ended up working with me at the Damon’s on Olentangy. Stephanie moved out in the summer of ’97 and was replaced by this teenage kid we ended up befriending, Will, along with his mom and ever so briefly a sister.
Will was always a good sport and took what nowadays might be considered “hazing rituals” or even “bullying” in stride – part of the rite of passage, hanging out with some slightly older dudes. The pinnacle of which, I somehow forgot to even mention in Riots Of Passage, might have concerned this unused roadside flare I found one day, while riding around on my bike. Stuffing it into my backpack, I brought the thing home. And then we eventually talked Will into lighting it, running out into the middle of Summit, and placing it into the center lane directly in front of our house. As we then all stood on the front porch laughing our heads off, endlessly watching the cars swerve around it.
We got away with so much at this house. Although it does seems really strange now – as it rightly should have at the time, i.e. before we did such a thing – to think that one night Alan, Snoop and I broke out my clubs and blasted golf balls from the front yard, to see who could hit them the furthest down 19th/Woodruff. Maybe I shouldn’t be mentioning this. But this is a prime example of how you just can’t win sometimes about your past: mention it and you are glorifying such behavior; omit this and it means you’re whitewashing the incident, attempting to bury it. But it happened, yes, interpret this how you will. Kiddies, just maybe don’t try this at your home – or anybody else’s.
Sean Gardner, along with some of his friends, moved into the house next door to us in I think late ’97. It looks like this address must have been 1992.
1978: Ruby Tuesday, longstanding live music venue and dive bar of considerable renown. Although it appears they have slightly renamed themselves only recently into Ruby’s On Summit!
1866: A gas station has sat here, at the corner of 17th, since at least the late 80s. Was once a BP, is now a Shell, but more importantly to nearby residents, in whatever incarnation, it’s been open 24 hours for their cigarette and beer and late night junk food runs. Well, except this brief stretch where we’d find the door locked at weird hours, and it turned out the lone employee was shooting up heroin in the cooler. He didn’t last too long, however.
The Subway shop inside is even more of an institution and used to keep the latest hours on campus (3am Fridays and Saturdays, possibly Thursdays even), though I see they’ve now scaled back to a much more standard midnight.
14th and Summit-ish: Melissa & Ann were living in an apartment near here, summer 2000
It’s kind of interesting to see what is going on with various residential properties, too, during any given era. Like as of a Nov ’06 classified ad, 2157 Summit #1 is listed as a one bedroom with “newer” beige carpet, A/C, off street parking, water paid. $400/month. 1680 Summit #1C and 3C (2 bedroom flat/townhouses) and 2117-2119 #1 (efficiency/studio) meanwhile are among the over 1000 apartments Buckeye Real Estate has for rent. 1661 is listed as a spacious one bedroom going for $375/month. 1503 a one bedroom with office/study, A/C, security system, dishwasher (mmm!) for a scant $450.
1041 Summit Street
Has been Auto Transport Service Inc. since at least January ’01. So kind of an impressive run, actually. Damage free towing, 24 hours a day.
Also Reliable Advertising & Distributing Co. as of Jan ‘01
