Sidewalk advertising: Main Street Restaurant co-owner Dan Kennedy sets up a sign in front of the restaurant for the dinner crowd Thursday afternoon in Rosedale. Tribune-Star/Joseph C. Garza
ROSEDALE — In the years before most families had at least two cars, the village of Rosedale in southern Parke County was a booming little town.
Tucked away miles from any major roadways, Rosedale was for generations a nearly self-contained community, complete with its own schools, grocery stores and even three car dealerships.
In recent years, however, Rosedale became a shadow of its former self.
The Red & White grocery store, once Wilbur Hickman’s Rosedale IGA, closed a couple of years ago, leaving residents without a local source of groceries and a big vacant building in the heart of town. Soon, however, J.T.’s Marathon — a garage and filling station on the opposite corner — stepped up and started selling bread, milk and a few meat items to meet the local demand.
“It’s just the bare necessities,” said J.T. Obenchain, owner of the long-time Rosedale landmark, which is located at the town’s busiest intersection on the corner of Main Street and Rosedale Road.
About three hundred yards to the east, near Rosedale Elementary School, Dollar General recently opened one of its newest stores.
The business seems almost like a small “super store,” selling clothing, groceries, toys, household items and much more.
“It’s wonderful,” said Denise Baker, who was shopping at the Dollar General last week with her daughter, Rachael Rhoades, 10, a student at Rosedale Elementary. It was pajama day in Rachael’s class, which explained why she was shopping with her mom wearing a bathrobe and PJs covered with pictures of monkeys.
“She runs into her friends when we come here,” Baker said of her young daughter. “We like it. It’s great not to have to drive all the way to Clinton to shop.”
Losing a place to run into neighbors and chat was one of the negative effects of losing the old Red & White, noted John McMullen, a nearly life-time resident of Rosedale. McMullen remembers when a corner hardware store sold still-rare television sets and locals could come inside and watch their favorite daytime programs in the 1950s.
“That [grocery store] was a place where people saw each other,” recalled McMullen, president of the Rosedale Town Board. The new Dollar General is a big help to local residents, especially older people who cannot travel as easily to do their shopping, he noted.
Around the corner from the Dollar General lies the Main Street Restaurant, another brand new business serving up new life into the small Parke County town.
“The food is really good here,” said Randy McPike, pastor of the Rosedale Baptist Church, who was eating country fried steak at the small eatery Thursday. McPike, who grew up in Rosedale and graduated from the former Rosedale High School in 1970, remembers when the town had several restaurants and three places where you could buy a pickup truck: a Ford, Chevy and International dealerships.
“It was a booming place,” McPike said. At one time, there were four places to purchase gasoline in the town, another resident said.
Melissa and Dan Kennedy live in Terre Haute but chose Rosedale as the place for their new restaurant, which opened Sept. 16. Melissa’s son, Jesse Tevlin, is a chef trained in Chicago and the Main Street Restaurant gives him an opportunity to put his considerable talents to use.
“He’s a true chef. He’s very talented,” Melissa said. “He makes all of his own sauces. I think anyone who comes is in for a treat.”
“You can take a spoon and cut the steak,” added Dan Kennedy. While steak is one item on the menu, thick, breaded tenderloins may be the most popular single item on the menu, he said.
“I don’t eat greens,” Dan Kennedy added. “But I will if he makes them.”
Rosedale lies inside Parke County but is a few miles from the nearest covered bridges, the Thorpe Ford Bridge and the Roseville Bridge in nearby Coxville. The Rosedale Civic Center is utilized by vendors during the annual Parke County Covered Bridge Festival, and it is also used for events such as 4-H meetings, weddings and town meetings. The town also sports an annual Strawberry Festival in June. But Rosedale is not like other small towns in the county, such as Bridgeton and Mansfield, which attract massive crowds during the annual bridge festival.
And that’s how many residents want the town to stay. In fact, one person interviewed for this article worried openly that a newspaper article about the charms of Rosedale might draw too many people to the quiet village.
But everybody seems happy about the new signs of life appearing in the small Parke County town just north of the Vigo County line.
“The people here are excellent,” said Melissa Kennedy of the customers who come to her new restaurant, which features a painting of a covered bridge on the floor. “We love the old building. We love history.” Evening business is growing, so the restaurant owners are considering being open for dinner Tuesday through Sunday as opposed to the current Friday through Sunday dinner schedule, she said.
Currently, breakfast and lunch are served six days a week.
The Dollar General also seems to be enjoying healthy business since opening earlier this year. There are always cars in the parking lot, noted McMullen. “People shop there from around the area,” he said.
And J.T.’s Marathon, a feature of downtown Rosedale for decades, has also seen a recent increase in business.
“Last year we had our best year ever,” said Obenchain, who moved to Rosedale from Terre Haute when he got married and has worked at the Rosedale Marathon for about 25 years. “I love [Rosedale]. I know everybody,” he said.
And does Obenchain ever miss the his hometown of Terre Haute, just a few miles to the south?
“There’s too many railroad tracks and traffic lights” in Terre Haute, he said laughing. “I love living here.”
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