Lakewood Lore

Store's closing leaves hole in this town

Lakewood lost a landmark this month when Kelly Donuts closed its shop on July 5, one day after the 50th anniversary of its founding in 1948.

The familiar store at 13621 Detroit Ave. on the corner of Wyandotte, source of delicious “donuts” and hot take-out cups of coffee, has succumbed to changing times.

“Too much competition from franchise doughnut businesses, supermarket in-store bakeries, coffee houses and bagel places with their advantages of mass buying,” is the way Joan Kelly put it.

Joan, who started with helping out at the independent family enterprise when she was 10, and her younger sister, Carol, and brother, Michael, were mainstays in the business.

Their father, founder John Kelly, turned 80 this spring and had relied on his children to run the operation for a number of years.

The sisters waited on customers and their brother made wholesale deliveries. Kelly’s supplied restaurants, hospitals, schools, churches and delicatessens. In the past, it served Ford factories, Cleveland Convention Center shows and even Higbee’s downtown Silver Grill.

There also were three other longtime employees who were an important part of the business – Juanita Neeley, with 25 years on the job; John Yates, with 20 years; and Kathleen Gore, with 10 years.

John Kelly is a native of Waterbury, Conn., who began making his donuts in Lakewood in a shop on Madison and Lincoln in 1948. He moved to the Detroit-Wyandotte location seven years later.

In the beginning, when donuts were a mere 25 cents a dozen, he went door to door in Lakewood to cultivate customers. Then, he delivered to their homes in his Crosley automobile, a midget-sized make made from 1939-52.

Before becoming a Lakewoodite, John attended Springfield College in Springfield, Mass., where, in 1942, he received a bachelor’s degree in social studies, and the same years married Nellie Godek of that city.

Nellie assisted her husband in the donut venture here until her death in 1989.

The couple had five children. Besides those who worked at the shop, there are two daughters – Jacqueline, a pediatrician in Annapolis, Md., and Patricia, a homemaker in Santa Rosa, Calif.

Joan Kelly estimates that the shop produced 25 million dozens of donuts during its half-century tenure in Lakewood. Throughout the years, Kelly’s output continued uninterrupted, even when a fire in the middle of the block in the early ‘60s caused considerable smoke damage to the store.

“Although we sold 19 different varieties, our best sellers were always the plain old-fashioned frycakes,” remarked Joan, whose own favorites are the cinnamon ones.

Hot coffee also was an integral part of the operation – 40-50 cups a day – she pointed out.

“Some customers thought we added something special to the coffee because it tasted so good. But it really was only Maxwell House,” Joan revealed.

Of her 44 years abroad, Joan said she enjoyed most the meeting and socializing with customers.

“Because of our long hours – seven days a week from five in the morning to 11 at night – our place was like a social center for the block,” she explained.

Kelly’s always spelled its product “donut” instead of the traditional “doughnut.”

“We used to think we were pretty avant-grade because of this,” Joan said. “However, today, of the approximately 70 donut shops in the Cleveland area, only four of them still use the longer spelling.”

Now, not able to sell the business per se, the shop is disposing of all its equipment and everything else in the store piecemeal, according to Joan.

“We want to thank all our loyal customers for their patronage over the years,” she wished it be made known. “They came from all over metropolitan Cleveland and, since learning of our closing, have shown a great outpouring of affection with cards and flowers. Many have said there was nothing like a Kelly donut.”

“It was a grand experience, and I will miss them and the job terribly,” she said, adding that she thought she spoke, too, for everyone else who worked there.

“What now?” we asked her.

“Well, I’ve forever looked at life through rose-colored glasses, and feel that, when one door closes, another opens,” she sighed.

This article by Dan Chabek appeared in the Lakewood Sun Post July 23, 1998. Reprinted with permission.

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