From Garrison's Court to C & K Market

231 Highway 101, Yachats, OR 97498

Yachats gets a "Super" Market The first business on this site was Garrison's Court's eight tourist cottages. It later became Clinton's Court and advertised that it had not only "Steam Heat," but "Hotpoint Ranges."

In 1968 four of the cottages were moved by David Freeland, owner at the time of the Stop N' Shop across the highway. On this site, he opened up what the Newport News-Times wrote was not just a market, but a "super" market. The new "super" market was 5,200 square feet. The average Fred Meyer's in 2020 is 150,000 square feet.

In 1982 Robert and Beverly Clark, owners of Clark's Market in Waldport, bought the store. In 1993 they sold the stores to their children.

In 2007, the children, ready to retire from the business themselves, sold the markets to Audia Moore Properties LLC. Jerry Clark said he felt good about the sale because Jay Audia, a Bend developer, said he wanted to upgrade the stores. It wasn't long, though, before customers at the newly renamed Yachats Village Market noticed that shelves weren't being restocked.

The central Oregon housing market had collapsed, bankrupting Audia. In July 2008, Audia, 48, owing $1.5 million to the Clarks, and millions more to other creditors, fatally shot himself.

The Village Market went into foreclosure and closed. The nearest store was eight-miles away in Waldport. Many in town didn't drive, so Mary Wiltse (part owner of Mari's Books) and Lauralee Svendsgaard set up a Grocery Hotline and a Volunteer Grocery Delivery Service started.

Dark Windows, Dark DaysIt wasn't the first delivery service transporting groceries from Waldport to Yachats. Before Highway 101 was built in the 1930s, back when the beach was the highway, Lester Hall drove a Model T-truck from Waldport to Yachats on Tuesdays and Fridays. He worked for his brother, Claude Hall, owner of Waldport's Hall's IGA, the store that eventually became Clark's Market.

"I never had any problems," Lester said. "My brother decided to take the meat route -- he turned [the truck] over, out on the beach. Had the waves coming over him. And the old mailman come by, he had those big tires -- and he started to leave, but he heard somebody groan. 'Oh! There's somebody under there!' And he got that sudden wave, and he pulled that pickup off, and saved his life."

Jerry Clark was heartbroken when the stores closed, but after a lot of legal wrangling, he regained legal possession of them. Today C&K, a family-owned company based in Brookings, leases the property from Clark and runs the current "super" market.

The four former tourist cottages and carports that weren't moved in 1968 house other businesses in 2020: Yachats Visitor Center, Ocean Odyssey Vacation Rentals, Judith's Kitchen Tools, Books and More, and Planet Yachats.

Businesses That Have Been at this Location

Garrison's Court

Clinton's Court

David Freeland's Super Market

Clark's Market

Village Market

C & K Market

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