There once was a time when towns like Amity and McMinnville had a real main street and people shopped "downtown"

Forget the "dragging the gut" festival part of this article. As the only middle aged dude in America without the muscle car that he never had as a kid, I am somewhat nonplussed about the whole event. I suppose I could take the daughter and ride the Triumph. Somehow it seems like it is just another thing that the tight arsed adults stole from the kids and now want to relive at retirement age.
However, click on the link and look a the photograph.
Once McMinnville had a real downtown. I remember shopping for Christmas presents when you could walk from one "real" store to another.
JC Penney's, Rutherford's, The Dime Store, I remember a briefly lived toy store which had a whole wall devoted to Marx Johnny West dolls, Taylor Hardware, Coast to Coast, A Shoe store, Sewing Store, Oregon Stationary, Thrifty Drugs, you get the idea.
Then came Payless Drug store and the shopping mall on the outskirts of town. Things got tough downtown as people tried out the new big stores on the outskirts of town. And then, just about the time I remember my Mother and Grandmother decided to go back to the downtown as the new stores were not that much better, there came the downtown beautification project. The first "bulbouts" and pedestrian friendly screwed up curbs at the crosswalks and the downtown died.
The infamous "dragging the gut," tradition of kids cruising on Friday and Saturday nights only caused problems when there were real businesses downtown that suffered from traffic congestion. I suppose i the reason it came to a head in the mid 1980's is because the last long time business were finally failing. That and the mid 1980's is when the 1960's generation started running things and they are the least self aware and closed minded of any generation. It is pretty funny that the generation that gave us free love and "peace protests" is also the generation that stopped freedom of assembly in downtown McMinnville....
But, I could digress on that subject and get off into the TSA and NSA and conspiracy theories and the end of the world and go on all day...
Back to Third Street.
"Dragging the Gut," which sounds pretty funny when the dorky people that never did it back in the day, now promote it, is a good idea now because.
There are no "bread and butter" businesses in downtown McMinnville. Third Street is full of knick-knack wine country shops, coffee shops, a McMinnimums (or however you spell it) there is still a bookstore, Ice Cream shop.
Most of businesses are desperate for the disposable income of middle aged people and so welcome all the middle aged folks who have finally restored the car of their dreams and want to drive at a crawl, not because they want to whistle at pretty young girls, but because they are afraid to scratch the 15 coats of hand rubbed lacquer...
And there are no kids with loud music taking risks and showing off and getting into trouble.
Perhaps we can bring it all to Amity.
Only with wine, and bicycles, and the occasional drunk guy on the BMX because he lost his license and is spending his days picking up pop cans between Amity and Ballston.
And now I shall return to baling straw and being a grump.
So the link didn't work and now I can't find what I linked to.
Here is a link that has the photo I wanted.
Here is a story in the Wine Country Newspaper