Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. Beautiful view of the old rink that was an entertainment center. You can see the mini golf course outside. Beautiful designed course. Would have had hosted a professional mini-golf tournament there. Source: Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. A roller hockey game in action at the time. Sorry for he grainy photograph. Practically all photographs from Facebook are grainy. Source: Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. Announcing the new owners and new name. Originally was to have hyphen name- Celina Roller Rink/Grand Slam Family Fun Center but looked like they stick with just the new name, Grand Slam Family Fun Center by dropping the original name. Source: The Daily Standard, Friday February 19, 1993 through Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page. Copyrighted and digitally remastered by Dead-Rinks (background messy, and last line was cut off by them, not me so I had to finish the final line by adding "than most area skating rinks").
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. Children having fun at the rink during MLK Jr. Day. Source: The Daily Standard, Tuesday January 1990s? Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page. (Name redacted to protect the idenity of the child).
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. Children having fun at the rink during MLK Jr. Day. Source: The Daily Standard, Tuesday 04 May 1993, through Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. Children having fun at the rink to win prizes as they were there for a great smoke out. Source: Chronicle Week, 13 to 19 December 1995, through Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. Children having fun at the rink during MLK Jr. Day. Source: The Daily Standard, (date unknown) through Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. The Great Smoke out at the rink and they were presented an award for curbing smoking and more clean place. 1990s had many laws passed in most states to ban smoking in places and indoors. Source: The Daily Standard, Saturday 10 February 1996 through Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. 1990s was a good decade for roller hockey at the time because of inline skates and this was happening with this rink. Source: The Daily Standard, September 1999 through Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. LazerBall arrives at the rink. Apparently for an indoor activity overtaking the rink. I assume they were trying to increase more interests and activities at the aging rink. Source: The Evening Leader, Saturday 11 August 2001 through Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center Facebook group page. (Note, this was exactly a month prior to the 9/11 we all knew).
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. Bushes and trees overgrown and grounds unkept. It was decaying after it was so nice! I noticed no fence! They were already closed and out of business. Source: Google Map.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. More of the same. Decaying, growing trees and bushes. It looked real nice when they first opened. Then it did not look good. (Compare to the first photo on top). Source: Google Map.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. There was a suspicious fire that the fire fighters discovered early and caught it early. Good timing for two of them to be so close to the former rink. In fact, one was right cross the street at the gas station pumping gas and he heard another guy saw smoke and fire and screamed so he abandoned his car at the pumps and ran over and check it out fast and put out the fire. The other arrived by himself then the rest were from the fire department and discovered 4 locations on fire. 3 were on the wooden roller rink floor! This fire was suspicious because I learned from doing rinks profile and I can see a pattern, punks like to set fire ON the roller rink floor. (A rink in Chicago in Spring 2021 faced the same fate but that fire was truly out of control and too late). This one was quickly to dose out. No one was inside when the fire happened. They investigated but I do not see any results yet. Source: The Daily Standard, Tuesday January 19, 2010.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH. After that fire, and the decaying, they finally demolished. Beautiful grass growing and kept one tree seen on the left. Yes, you are seeing that blue bucket there. I think to mark where the sewer is or something. Source: Google, 2014.
Celina Roller Rink 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center 911 East Wayne St, Celina, OH
Celina Roller Rink and later was replaced with Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center which was held at 911 East Wayne Street, Celina, Ohio. Erwin and Charlotte Beyer operated Celina Roller Rink at that location from 1950 to 1993. Then Gloria and Bill Rodgers purchased on 05 January 1993 and renovated and reopened in February 1993 as Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center to include baseball among other recreational fun activities there including roller skating as it was and miniature golf course that was pretty much wrapped around with an exception of front door the entire building.
The building itself was an old style Segmental Arch with extension of tilted Flat making it look more like a flattened Ω. That is the symbol of of Omega, the last latter in the Latin/Greek Alphabet and the symbolic meaning, "End" or "The End" as I am referring to the Holy Bible Jesus spoke (Revelation 21:6 -- And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. (King James Bible)
Ok, architecturally, it was quite interesting design at the time and the height when most rinks used Segmental Arch or even Quonset Huts at the time.
The second run-- the Grand Slam ran shorter time than the original. It went under. The bank foreclosed the rink perhaps for non-payment. It is not easy. What I found out that the City of Celina utility records indicate electrical service was disconnected Nov. 24, 2008. This proved officially ended that run for the rink.
The Interior.
Apparently they had most of the floor as roller rink when it was Celina Roller Rink but when the Rodgers bought it, they wanted to add baseball cages and they took part of the rink just for the cages and still have a rink. They said they kept the size as big as they can and still bigger than any other area rinks. It was non-painted Urethane coated Maple floor. I do not know what it was like when it was Celina Roller Rink but I follow my gut feeling that they had exposed ceiling to see the Segmental Arch and Steel trusses. But the Rogers, the owners of Grand Slam USA had lowered the ceiling and perhaps a floor to become an attic. It was quite low ceiling.
It had traditional Starburst lights with Diamond Ball.
The Exterior.
This unique building with Segmental Arch and part of it was the slight slant Salt Box which made the place look almost Omega Roof shape design. When it was Grand Slam, the walls were all White on the outside. Including that was the C-shaped layout of 18 hole miniature golf course.
Apparently by the look of that building, I would have to say it was built in 1950.
The Stats:
Rink Size: 70 Feet x 100 Feet Floor: N/A. Floor Layout: N/A.
Building Size: N/A. Built/Renovations: Likely 1950/ 2003 (adding batting cages), 2001 (adding Lazer Ball) Demolished: Damaged by fire Tuesday, January 19, 2010 but demolished in around 2010/11.
Type of Building: Free-Span Steel Trusses Steel - Walled Warehouse - like Building.
Roof: Gable.
Acres: N/A.
Operated: (Overall)-- 1950 to 2008
Celina Roller Rink: 1950 to Tuesday, 5 January, 1993
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center: Tuesday, 5 January, 1993 to c. November 2008.
Reason for Closure:
Celina Roller Rink: N/A.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center: bank foreclosure. Likely for non-payment of mortgage.
Wanted: Information regarding exact dates of open/closed, why closed, size of rink, rink materials. Also photos/articles. Anyone knows or have photos, please let me know by emailing at [email protected]. Thank you. You can also use this form.
Sources:
Facebook - Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center
Better Business Bureau - Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center - showing it went out of business.
The Daily Standard - Suspicious fire occurred Tuesday, January 19, 2010.
Many newspaper clippings are credited or sourced as seen above.
Date of issue: 21 September 2021.
For office use only: 14
© Copyrighted by Dead-Rinks. All Rights Reserved. Jn 3:3 and 16.
The building itself was an old style Segmental Arch with extension of tilted Flat making it look more like a flattened Ω. That is the symbol of of Omega, the last latter in the Latin/Greek Alphabet and the symbolic meaning, "End" or "The End" as I am referring to the Holy Bible Jesus spoke (Revelation 21:6 -- And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. (King James Bible)
Ok, architecturally, it was quite interesting design at the time and the height when most rinks used Segmental Arch or even Quonset Huts at the time.
The second run-- the Grand Slam ran shorter time than the original. It went under. The bank foreclosed the rink perhaps for non-payment. It is not easy. What I found out that the City of Celina utility records indicate electrical service was disconnected Nov. 24, 2008. This proved officially ended that run for the rink.
The Interior.
Apparently they had most of the floor as roller rink when it was Celina Roller Rink but when the Rodgers bought it, they wanted to add baseball cages and they took part of the rink just for the cages and still have a rink. They said they kept the size as big as they can and still bigger than any other area rinks. It was non-painted Urethane coated Maple floor. I do not know what it was like when it was Celina Roller Rink but I follow my gut feeling that they had exposed ceiling to see the Segmental Arch and Steel trusses. But the Rogers, the owners of Grand Slam USA had lowered the ceiling and perhaps a floor to become an attic. It was quite low ceiling.
It had traditional Starburst lights with Diamond Ball.
The Exterior.
This unique building with Segmental Arch and part of it was the slight slant Salt Box which made the place look almost Omega Roof shape design. When it was Grand Slam, the walls were all White on the outside. Including that was the C-shaped layout of 18 hole miniature golf course.
Apparently by the look of that building, I would have to say it was built in 1950.
The Stats:
Rink Size: 70 Feet x 100 Feet Floor: N/A. Floor Layout: N/A.
Building Size: N/A. Built/Renovations: Likely 1950/ 2003 (adding batting cages), 2001 (adding Lazer Ball) Demolished: Damaged by fire Tuesday, January 19, 2010 but demolished in around 2010/11.
Type of Building: Free-Span Steel Trusses Steel - Walled Warehouse - like Building.
Roof: Gable.
Acres: N/A.
Operated: (Overall)-- 1950 to 2008
Celina Roller Rink: 1950 to Tuesday, 5 January, 1993
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center: Tuesday, 5 January, 1993 to c. November 2008.
Reason for Closure:
Celina Roller Rink: N/A.
Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center: bank foreclosure. Likely for non-payment of mortgage.
Wanted: Information regarding exact dates of open/closed, why closed, size of rink, rink materials. Also photos/articles. Anyone knows or have photos, please let me know by emailing at [email protected]. Thank you. You can also use this form.
Sources:
Facebook - Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center
Better Business Bureau - Grand Slam USA Family Fun Center - showing it went out of business.
The Daily Standard - Suspicious fire occurred Tuesday, January 19, 2010.
Many newspaper clippings are credited or sourced as seen above.
Date of issue: 21 September 2021.
For office use only: 14
© Copyrighted by Dead-Rinks. All Rights Reserved. Jn 3:3 and 16.