HILLS & DALES CENTER
South Dixie Highway / US 25 and West Dorothy Lane
Kettering, Ohio
The first open-air shopping mall in Southwestern Ohio was Cincinnati's SWIFTON CENTER, which was completed in October 1956. The second "courtyard mall" in the region was built on 21.6 acres. The site was located 3.3 miles south of Dayton's Central Business District, in the newly-incorporated suburb of Kettering.
Plans for HILLS & DALES CENTER were announced in April 1956. An entity known as Hills & Dales Center, Incorporated started developing the property. Columbus' Columbia Building Company bought their interests and initiated construction on April 2, 1959.
A 2-level, community-class retail complex was officially dedicated on June 9, 1960. It encompassed approximately 260,000 leasable square feet. In its original state, the mall was anchored by a (30,000 square foot) G.C. Murphy 5 & 10, (18,500 square foot) Kroger supermarket and (19,000 square foot) Liberal supermarket.
Original inline stores included Gray Drug, Singer Sewing Center, Cheerheart Cleaners, Music Land and a Top Value Stamps Redemption Center. On the Lower Level of the complex were Sam Snead's School of Golf, a branch of the Dayton Public Library and (eventually) offices for the National Cash Register Corporation.
A 1-level (55,000 square foot) Miller's discount mart was added. This store welcomed first shoppers on February 22, 1962. Another store block encasing 12,000 square feet was completed in 1965. This housed new Dunhill's men's and Singer Sewing Center stores and was the final leasable space added to HILLS & DALES CENTER.
Shopping hubs in the vicinity of HILLS & DALES CENTER included TOWN & COUNTRY CENTER (1951) {2 miles southeast, in Kettering}, VAN BUREN CENTER (1959) {3 miles northeast, in Kettering}, RIKE'S KETTERING CENTER (1962) {3.8 miles east, also in Kettering} and DAYTON MALL (1970) {4.9 miles southeast, in Montgomery County}.
By the early 1970s, a large nightclub had been set up in the Lower Level of HILLS & DALES CENTER. It operated under various names, such as The Venus Club, Sonny's Disco and The Music Man. On the mall's Upper Level , the Miller's store was rebranded as a Goldman's discount mart in June 1974.
Kroger was replaced by Dorothy Lane Markets in November 1976. This grocery was followed by The Sweetwater disco bar in July 1979, which morphed into the 1470 West bar in the mid-1980s. The Liberal grocery on the mall's north end morphed into a Stump's supermarket in 1981, a Stump's U-Save Food Market in 1983, MorForLess and -then- FooDeals, in March 1995.
The gradual decline of HILLS & DALES CENTER had started in the early 1970s. By the mid-1990s, the center was virtually vacant and had deteriorated into a dilapidated eyesore. The old Miller's-Goldman's space housed an A & B Wholesale Warehouse and then Yester-Year Mart.
The City of Kettering was becoming more and more apprehensive about the derelict shopping center within its corporate limits. The Columbus-based MTB Corporation bought the ailing retail hub in August 1996. A reinvention was proposed and tenants were given eviction notices; effective March 1, 1997. The official name of the complex was changed to KETTERING CENTER in August 1997...but the prospective renovation fell through.
After sitting vacant and decaying for 2 years, the shopping center was bought by the City of Kettering, who initiated its demolition and redevelopment in December 1999. The cleared land parcel was subdivided and a roadway built through it. A new office park, known as Governor's Place, was built between February 2001 and June 2003.
Governor's Place consisted of ten freestanding buildings. A bank and filling station had been left standing from HILLS & DALES CENTER. These were joined by stores and services such as Heapy Engineering, A.G. Edwards, Baja Fresh Mexican Grill, Applebee's Neighborhood Grill, Cici's Pizza, Quizno's Subs, the Greater Dayton Cancer Center and PNC Mortgage.
Sources:
The Dayton Daily News
The Journal Herald (Dayton, Ohio)
http://www.daytonhistorybooks.com
http://www.kettering.org
Recollection of the author
"Sprawl and Public Space: Redressing The Mall" / From The National Endowment for the Arts / By David J. Smiley, Mark Robbins
"Two Malls Kettering Ohio" / By Marilou W. Smith and Andrew Aidt / City of Kettering
Montgomery County, Ohio tax assessors website
