Flooding
finally forces Hollowood to move its music store
and its giant Stratocaster out of McKees Rocks
Retailer
heads to high ground
Friday,
February 18, 2005
By Jerome L. Sherman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Yesterday, the guitar left the Rocks.
Workers from Shamrock Signs removed the 20-foot, cream-colored
Fender Stratocaster guitar from the red brick facade
of Hollowood Music and Sound in McKees Rocks in the
early morning and placed it on a flatbed truck bound
for the store's new location.
After losing a half-million dollars in merchandise when
Chartiers Creek overran its banks and flooded the store
on Sept. 17, the Hollowood brothers -- Jim, Gary and Don
-- decided to move to The Pointe in North Fayette in late
March, taking away the largest and one of the few remaining
major retail businesses in McKees Rocks.
For more than a decade, the guitar's neon lights brightened
a Chartiers Avenue left blighted by empty storefronts,
decaying buildings and a half-century of industrial
decline. "Big Jim" Hollowood, who founded the store
in his basement almost 40 years ago, purchased the sign
after a fire destroyed the business in 1993, hoping
to make a big comeback.
By then, McKees Rocks had already lost thousands of
jobs after the closure of Pittsburgh & Lake Erie
Railroad's car shop and the Federal Enameling &
Stamping Co. plant. Its population declined by nearly
two-thirds, from 18,000 in 1930 to 6,600 in the last
census.
But Hollowood's staff established the borough as a regional
center for musicians, selling a wide range of new and
used guitars, basses, amplifiers, keyboards, PA systems
and all the accompanying equipment. The massive Stratocaster
helped attract roadies for touring bands in need of
supplies, just as McDonald's golden arches attract hungry
motorists.
Chartiers Avenue still has a number of businesses, including
several used furniture stores, a florist, an archery
shop and a tattoo parlor. A nearby shopping plaza is
home to Jim Crivelli Chevrolet and several chain stores.
And Focus on Renewal Inc., a community organization,
will open a cultural center later this year, and the
directors of the borough's recently created development
corporation are negotiating with several developers.
But the Hollowood family's decision to move is a disappointment
for those planning revitalization strategies.
"We
don't want to lose them. They bring a lot of people
into town," Mayor Jack Muhr said. "It's a major blow
to the borough."
Richard Vith, 36, who opened Razor Rick's Tattoo less
than a year ago, said many of his customers carry guitar
cases, and he worries about his business' future after
Hollowood leaves.
"They've
been an icon here," the lifelong McKees Rocks resident
said. "It makes you wonder what your own chances for
survival are."
Jim Hollowood started giving guitar lessons and selling
instruments out of the basement of his two-story home
on Bench Drive at a time when rock 'n' roll was taking
over popular music. Teenage garage bands were starting
to pop up across the country, and they needed equipment.
Hollowood was one of the first retailers to rent out
PA systems to fledgling artists, his sons said. He would
sometimes tell a band to take a system and leave it
sitting in front of the garage when they finished a
gig.
The family opened their first Chartiers Avenue location
in the early 1970s and it quickly grew, adding the Johnny
B. Goods used instrument store and a sound system rental
and installation business.
They also built a loyal customer base. Bill Jablonsky,
a guitar salesman, said that during his 13 years at
the store he has sold three or more guitars to as many
as 100 regular customers.
In 1993, a fire gutted the three-story, 19,200-square
foot building at 601 Chartiers Ave. The family decided
to rebuild on the same spot, using insurance money.
"We
were all born and raised in the Rocks, and our father
wanted us to keep the business here," Jim Hollowood
Jr. said of Big Jim, who died in 1999.
But three years later, the flood of 1996 soaked their
basement with 8 feet of water, destroying hundreds of
thousands of dollars of equipment. And then the remnants
of Hurricane Ivan brought the waters back on Sept. 17.
That night, after hours of hauling soaked sound systems
from their basement, Don, Jim and Gary took a break
in their upstairs offices.
"We've
had enough," Jim Hollowood remembered telling his brothers.
"It's time to move."
Mayor Muhr and members of the borough council met with
the Hollowoods several times after the flood and tried
to persuade them to stay. The brothers asked the borough
to dredge Chartiers Creek, but Muhr said the U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers has told him there is no money for
such a huge undertaking.
"You're
talking millions and millions of dollars," he said.
Muhr also suggested that they purchase a new building
in McKees Rocks, but the Hollowoods were not willing
to invest in extensive renovations unless they could
attract new customers. They will, however, keep their
rental and sound system installation business in McKees
Rocks.
The Pointe, where the store will share a shopping plaza
with dozens of chain businesses, will let Hollowood
reach beyond its regular customers.
"That's
how America shops," said Don Hollowood. "They go to
the mega-malls."
Staff and customers at the store Wednesday night seemed
to agree.
"It's
going to be different," said Anthony Duran, a skinny
18-year-old guitarist from Kennedy whose father introduced
him to the store two years ago. "But out there you'll
have so many people."
"I'm
ecstatic," said a black-clad Jablonsky as he leaned
up against the glass display case that runs the length
of Hollowood's first-floor showroom. "I don't like being
woken up at 3 a.m. to carry gear out of the basement
because of flooding."
Earlier that evening, about a half-dozen members of
the McKees Rocks Chamber of Commerce met at the nearby
Hamilton Building on May Avenue, expressing a guarded
optimism about the borough's future.
"It's
a temporary setback," Taris Vrcek, executive director
of the McKees Rocks Community Development Corp., said
of Hollowood's departure.
Sister Barbara Czyrnik, associate director of Focus
on Renewal, couldn't hide her disappointment when she
heard about the 20-foot guitar.
"So
they're taking it with them?" Czyrnik said. "That's
a loss."
(Jerome
L. Sherman can be reached at jsherman@post-gazette.com
or 412-263-1183.) |