McDonald's Takebashi Palaceside Building closed at 6 p.m. on September 30. Opened December 24, 1999, it ended 14 years of history. At 6:43 p.m. the familiar red-and-white sign came down = photo top =; many on their way home stopped to watch and photograph = photo bottom =.
It was Palaceside Building's first fast-food tenant — ahead of its time nationally. Closure came amid a chain-wide location review — a shame.
What kind of year was 1999? A hobby pick of headlines: Nostradamus doom for "July" stirred end-times talk amid disasters and tragedies.
Jan Colombia earthquake, 1,000+ dead ▽ Giant Baba died of liver failure
Feb Clinton impeachment acquittal
Mar Stanley Kubrick died ▽ Amuro Namie's mother murdered
Apr Kōchi mother-child murder ▽ NATO误爆 Yugoslavia 70 dead ▽ Columbine shooting 15 dead (20th)
Jul ANA hijacking, captain killed ▽ Atlanta office shooting 9 dead
Aug Kanagawa cloudburst camp deaths 13 ▽ Turkey earthquake 10,000+ dead
Sep Ikebukuro slasher 2 dead ▽ Typhoon 18 Kumamoto 12 dead ▽ Shimonoseki station car attack 3 dead ▽ JCO Tokaimura criticality 49 exposed
Oct Macau returned to China ▽ Taiwan earthquake 2,000+ dead
Nov Omoide Yokocho fire, 28 shops burned
Dec Ichiro married former TBS announcer Fukushima Yumiko
After such a year, that happy news felt like a rescue.
Fourteen years on. I had grown distant worrying about fat, but used it often at opening. Thank you, McDonald's.