Henry D. Seele and the Ice and Fish News

In the 1880 U.S. Census, Henry D. Seele listed his occupation as editor of Ice and Fish News.

At this time, Mr. Seele and his wife, the former Ora Dick, lived at the West House in downtown Sandusky. The Ice and Fish News was a monthly trade newspaper, eight pages in length, established in 1872. Advances in technology led to the demise of the natural ice industry, but in the 1870s and 1880s, the Ice and Fish News informed people all over the eastern U.S. about business in the Great Lakes region. An entry in the C.A. Cooke and Co. Newspaper Directory stated that this publication was “the only paper by which advertisers can reach ice dealers, brewers, commission merchants, fish packers and dealers, oyster packers and restaurants.” This listing appeared in Rowell’s American Newspaper Directory about 1880.

In 1882 Mr. Seele was one of the proprietors of the Buckeye Business and Telegraph College, along with J.J. Dauch and H.O. Stafford. This college later became known as the Sandusky Business College. He also was the senior partner in a wholesale lake ice business at this time; the Ice and Fish News was probably beneficial for the promotion of his ice business. 

In 1884 Henry D. Seele and his family moved to Indiana, where he worked in horticulture. He died in Elkhart, Indiana in the fall of 1934. At the time of his death, he was the second oldest member of Sandusky’s Perseverance Lodge, Free and Accepted Masons. 

When Dick’s Grocery and Carry-Out Was at the Corner of Tiffin Avenue and Mills Street

For many years, the building at the corner of Tiffin Avenue and Mills Street was home to Dick’s Grocery, later Dick’s Grocery and Carry-Out. The building was constructed in the first quarter of the twentieth century. In 1925 Frank J. Dick operated a confectionery at this location; by the 1930s and 1940s, it was a deli. For a time in the early 1950s, Almo Maumus ran a grocery store at this location. The first listing in Sandusky City Directories for Dick’s Grocery appeared in 1954; Richard Lorenz was the proprietor.

The building is a flat iron building, because of its unique shape that is similar to a flat clothes iron. You can see the layout of this building in a portion of a page from a Sanborn Insurance Map below. The structure is much narrower at the front part of the building, and is wider in the rear part of the building.

Though the address on the Sanborn Map is listed as 1022 Tiffin Avenue, the address is now 1028 Tiffin Avenue.

Decorative brick trim can still be seen along the top of the building.

An article appeared in the Christmas Eve issue of the Sandusky Register in 1964: “True Christmas Meaning Not Lost on West End Foursome.” Four youngsters who lived on the west end of Sandusky went Christmas caroling. They collected money as the caroled from door to door, and raised a total of $2.57. The children donated the money to the Muscular Dystrophy Fund container at Dick’s Grocery and Carry-Out. Sandusky Register staff writer Dell McCloy wrote the article, and three of the four children had their picture taken by Register photographer Ken Eckler. By the mid 1970s, Dick’s moved to its new location at 1318 Tiffin Avenue, and was listed as Dick’s Drive-Thru Carry Out. For several years, an income tax company was located in the former Dick’s Grocery and Carry-Out.