What are the iconic places of your youth?
 

The mall thread got me thinking about the places that are pivotal to our memories of self. What are the iconic places of your childhood or youth?

For the purposes of this thread, let's NOT count our homes or schools since we pretty much had to be there. But anything else is open game, whether it's a restaurant or a vacant field or a parking lot or a street corner or maybe even a friend's house.

Only count iconic places that impacted you at age 18 or younger. No college stuff or army stuff or anything unless you were Doogie Howser.

For me, the iconic places were:

1. The steakhouse where I worked from age 17 to 23, though we'll only count the first couple of years. I spent a whole lot of time there, and made a lot of friends across different social cliques. Good times were had after our closing shift.

Today, it's still the same restaurant, though they've changed color schemes and business model.

2. The strip-mall pizza place where my friends and I would go for dinner during epic gaming sessions. I played my first video game there - Space Invaders.

Today, it appears to be some kind of clothing store.

3. The vacant lot where my friends and I played football. I have no idea who owned the lot, but it was well maintained. No one ever chased us off while we were playing.

Today, there are two houses on the lot.

There's a small diner in Tulsa (Tally's) that my dad, my uncle, and I would go to on Saturdays before anyone else in the family would wake up. Back then, they still asked if we wanted a smoking or nonsmoking table, but the two tables would be right next to each other. ROFL

I've always been close with my grandparents, so they're house is home to a lot of my childhood memories.

I spent a lot of time out in the wood shop with my dad and alone. Lots of bonding (no pun intended) out there year-round.

Children's Palace on Noland road and Toys R Us that is just south of that.

Independence Center

Arrowhead, Fun Factory, Mr Bulky and Discovery Zone

While living in Germany, my grandparents would take us to Lloret de mar in Spain every year for Christmas. Easily my favorite childhood memory

Hah...I was gonna say discovery zone....which replaced Children's Palace in that same building

The mid 50s we lived in Colorado Springs when it was a small town. I would go fishing off of the bridge by myself starting at about 5.

There was a field (just grass not an actual designed playing field) behind some houses in our neighborhood that we would all gather to play football or other games.

There was also a decent sized pond near our neighborhood that we weren't technically supposed to be at since it was a neighborhood specific pond. I spent a lot of time there catching frogs and anything else I could find.

current river and the area around it. my grandparents used to take my brother and i all over the place down there. now, i'm taking my grandsons to the same places.

i'll also throw in elephant rocks state park. lived there for 3 years while my dad was the ranger. i was all over that place.

nice thread, rm.
sec

I'm going to call my youth any time prior to the age of majority at the time.
Grade school-- Vacant lots where kids would gather to play baseball all day long. Haven't been back to that town in over 20 years, so I would guess they aren't there anymore.
High school-- A trip to the West Bottoms to buy a pint of cherry vodka (if you were big enough to hand the $ through the window, you were big enough to buy), followed by a cruise to Peter's Drive-Inn on State Ave. to pick up girls and buy a mixer, and the out to Wyandotte County Lake with said girls to watch the submarine races.
College--The College Hill Inn in Topeka. Now a vacant lot.

My youth was largely uniconic.

I spent a mountain of hours working on the farm. There developed my need for efficiency.

My grandmas house was pretty impactful. If I had to stay in town I would go over there and we would play cards. She put up with a lot of my little kid crap and never said a word about it. She is a far stronger person than I could be.

Another fairly impactful place from my youth would be the skies above town. Grandpa built 3 airplanes and bought another and he had built an airstrip at the farm in the 50s. Being able to fly around when I was a kid was amazing. My grandpa must have hated me though. I'd always get all wound up to go and probably be a douche because I was pumped up. Then I'd go to sleep once I got there. LOL.

As far as hanging out with my buddies this place is BFE. So we pretty much hung out at each other's houses until we could drive them we just drove around.

I didn't know it moved there. I remember it being in the shopping center on the northwest side of Noland and 40 kind of by where Toys R Us is, but on the far west side next to a Service Merchandise (or was it a BEST)

I grew up a video game junkie after my first trip to Independence Center's Aladdin's Castle around the age of 8. Most, if not all of my free time as a teen was spent in arcades...

Fun Factory - Bannister
Spaceport - Blue Ridge
Cool Crest arcade

Sterling Lanes bowling alley

I spent many hours here while my mom did her bowling league. It's amazing that I can remember this place so vividly, as this occurred in my preschool days.