Before Walmart swallowed up everything in a 30-mile radius, you had the dime store.
Not that you called it that. You just said you were “going to town.”
Mom needed thread. Dad needed something he
couldn’t quite describe. You needed a couple dollars and about an hour to
wander.
Every Iowa kid knew the layout without
thinking. Toys somewhere near the front. School supplies off to the side. Candy
close enough to beg for. And if you were lucky… a lunch counter in the back.
You didn’t run in and out. You drifted.
Picked things up. Put them back. Checked your money again like it might’ve
magically increased.
These weren’t big stores. That’s why they
worked.
If your town had a Woolworth’s, you had the deluxe version.
Everything people remember about it comes
down to two things. The counter up front and the counter in the back.
The bins and racks were up front. Cheap
toys that felt like treasure. Rubber balls, plastic dinosaurs, cap guns that
snapped loud enough to get you in trouble, and those little metal cars that
weighed more than they should’ve.
You could stand there forever trying to
decide if you wanted one good thing or three cheap ones.
The lunch counter was in the back.
You climbed up on one of those spinning
stools—chrome base, cracked vinyl seat—and suddenly you weren’t just some kid
dragged along on errands. You were ordering.
Hot dog on a soft bun.
Grilled cheese that came out a little too
crispy on one side.
A Coke poured right there behind the
counter. A Cherry Coke if you were extra good.
And the milkshakes. Thick enough that the
straw didn’t do much good. You had to wait it out or go in with a spoon.
Chocolate, vanilla, sometimes strawberry.
All roads led to ice cream head. Better
known as a brain freeze.
If your store had pie, it came out on a
plate that looked older than your grandparents. Apple, maybe cherry. Nothing
fancy. Didn’t need to be.
Nobody rushed you. You sat there, legs
dangling, spinning a little too much on the stool until someone told you to
knock it off.
By the late ’80s and into the ’90s, they
started disappearing. Counters closed first. Then the stores.
But people don’t remember the closing.
They remember where they used to sit.
Kresge’s was Woolworth’s quieter cousin.
Long aisles. Narrow walkways. Stuff packed
tighter than it needed to be. You couldn’t help bumping into stuff.
But it had the same magic combo. Cheap
stuff and food.
The lunch counter wasn’t always as big,
but when it was there, it delivered.
Hot dogs wrapped in paper. Ham sandwiches
that tasted better than they had any right to.
Milkshakes that came in those tall metal
mixing cups, if you were lucky, the kind where you got the extra bit poured
into your glass.
And pie again—always pie.
Nothing was labeled homemade, but it
tasted close enough that nobody argued.
Kresge’s felt a little more practical.
Less of an outing, more of a stop.
But kids didn’t care about that.
You still had comic books on a spinning
rack, cheap craft kits you’d never finish, and those weird little toys nobody
else sold.
Kresge turned into Kmart, and that’s when
things started changing.
More space. More stuff. Less personality.
You gained square footage and lost the feeling.
If you grew up in a smaller Iowa town, this was probably your store.
A lot of them were locally owned, which
meant every single one felt a little different. Some leaned heavily into
crafts. Fabric, thread, patterns nobody under 40 understood.
Some had better toy sections than they had
any business having. And some were just a little bit of everything.
You remember the floor.
Wood. Slightly uneven. They creaked in a
way that made it impossible to sneak up on anyone. Every step announced itself.
You remember the smell.
A mix of paper, plastic, and whatever had
been sitting on those shelves since the Carter administration.
And you remember the randomness.
You’d go in for one thing and come out
with a yo-yo, a pack of baseball cards, and something your mom said you didn’t
need but bought, anyway.
No lunch counter. No hot food. No ice
cream.
But you didn’t need it.
This was the store where you took your
time and looked around. Where you could stand in one aisle for ten minutes
debating something that cost $1.29 like it was a major life decision. And it
was if you only had two dollars.
A lot of these hung on longer than they
should’ve. Some still exist in one form or another.
Walk into one today and you’ll recognize
it immediately, even if everything’s technically newer.
McCrory’s always felt older.
Even when you were a kid, it felt like it
had been there forever and wasn’t planning to change for anyone.
Glass display cases. Long counters.
Lighting that was just a little dimmer than it should’ve been.
If they had a lunch counter, it followed
the same playbook. Hot dogs, basic sandwiches, pie behind glass, coffee for the
adults.
Nothing fancy. No attempt to be trendy.
And that’s why people remember it.
There was something about standing at
those counters, looking at things you couldn’t touch unless you asked, that
made it feel different from the open racks at other stores.
You had to point and ask, “Can I see
that?”
Once you saw it up close, you didn’t want
it. The moment had passed.
Didn’t matter. That was part of it.
By the time TG&Y rolled in, the classic dime store was fading out.
This was the transition.
Bigger building. Wider aisles. More
inventory. Less charm.
But as a kid, you didn’t care about the
charm. You cared that the toy section got bigger. More plastic. More choices.
Stuff stacked high enough that you had to look up at it.
Seasonal aisles changed everything. Summer
meant cheap pool toys and water guns. Fall meant Halloween junk you begged for.
Winter meant wrapping paper and decorations that showed up way too early.
No lunch counter here. That part was gone.
But TG&Y still had that feeling of being able to roam.
Nobody hovered over you. Or rushed you to
get in and out. You just wandered until mm said it was time to go.
The candy situation
Every one of these stores had some version
of the same setup.
Loose candy. Penny candy. Candy, your
parents pretended not to see.
You could walk out with a paper bag full
of stuff for under a dollar. Things that probably wouldn’t pass inspection
today. Flavors that made no sense, but you bought anyway.
This wasn’t gas station candy. It was dime
store candy.
Different category entirely.
What you actually did
in these stores
You circled.
You checked the toy aisle first. Then
candy. Then back to the toys to make sure you didn’t miss anything.
The comic rack was good for at least ten
minutes. You had to spin it full circle before you called it quits. Twelve
cents was a major investment when it could buy you as many pieces of candy.
You counted your money three times. You
did the math. If I get this, I can’t get that.
Eventually, your parents said, “Pick
something or we’re leaving.” And somehow that made the decision worse.
Why we remember them
They weren’t better than what came
next—K-Mart, Target, the Big W — Walmart.
The selection was smaller. The lighting
wasn’t great. Half the stuff broke within a week. But they gave you something
big stores don’t.
Time.
Time to wander… think… and feel like a
couple dollars actually meant something.
And for a lot of Iowa kids, that’s where
you learned how to choose. Not just what you liked. What you could afford to
like.
When those stores disappeared, it wasn’t
just the buildings.
It was the pace.
Errands got faster. Stores got bigger.
Choices got easier and somehow less interesting.
Nobody sits at a counter and orders a
grilled cheese in the back of a store anymore. Nobody spins on a stool while
waiting for a milkshake that takes five minutes to show up.
You just grab something and go.
And that’s why people still talk about
dime stores. Not because they were perfect. Because they slowed everything down
just enough that you remember it.
One More Thing
If you’ve ever said “I remember that place”… this blog is for you.
I dig up the stories, the lost stores, the old Iowa you don’t see anymore. No clickbait. No junk. Just real nostalgia.
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