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Related: Culture Forums, Support ForumsAs a youngster or older, What stores did you do your holiday "shopping" at, that are no more? We would go to Kaufmanns
in Pittsburgh and look at all the decorated windows. We would go inside and with the eyes of a child, delight in the decorations. I don't ever remember buying anything myself, but the experience was magical.
hlthe2b
(112,346 posts)mostly early childhood stores, but I still have a green and white striped gift box from Harzfeld's that my Mom used to store some nostalgic items.
debm55
(53,665 posts)rsdsharp
(11,634 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)Santa.
RazorbackExpat
(821 posts)I would go straight to the hobby and book sections. I especially loved the Peanuts and Winnie-the-Pooh books
debm55
(53,665 posts)Lochloosa
(16,643 posts)CrispyQ
(40,525 posts)Every January I refreshed my kitchen towels cuz they put them on sale three for $3. Nice terry cloth ones, too. Super absorbent. Now you pay $3 per towel. WTF happened? They had great deals all over the store!! The one I shopped at was one of the last retailers to offer lay-away.
Lochloosa
(16,643 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)MustLoveBeagles
(14,120 posts)Mom worked there in the 80's.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Response to Lochloosa (Reply #3)
debm55 This message was self-deleted by its author.
SheltieLover
(75,518 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)50 Shades Of Blue
(11,322 posts)Woodie's downtown DC store had amazingly decorated windows for the holidays.
debm55
(53,665 posts)oberle
(247 posts)a fellow DC denizen.
50 Shades Of Blue
(11,322 posts)RandySF
(80,289 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)Diamond_Dog
(39,394 posts)But when my sister and I were kids, my parents took us to downtown Cleveland a few times, this would have been in the mid 60s. Among the several big department stores, there was one called Sterling-Lindners.
Every Christmas they had a huge real tree on display in the atrium of the store. The one in 1966 was 73 ft. Tall. Gazing up at that tree I felt like it must have reached into the heavens. I still remember it well to this day. We also went to Higbees, Halles, Im sure others. It was such a magical time. Halles 7th floor was the toy floor. They had this guy there called Mr. Jingaling who was dressed in a costume supposed to be one of Santas elves. You could ride around the toy dept. on a little train and when you got off the train his helper would give you a little paper cup of Jordan almonds (which I disliked but that was a minor thing). Mr. Jingaling also made appearances on local kid TV shows so of course every kid in the area wanted their parents to take them to Halles 7th floor. Also the store had those vacuum tubes to send your payment to the office when you bought something. I was into Steiff stuffed animals back then and I remember my mother bought me a stuffed tiger. It was such a happy time.
Here is the Sterling Lindner tree from 1966.

debm55
(53,665 posts)Wuddles440
(1,937 posts)during the late 1940's and early 50's. He was taking engineering classes at Case Institute (now Case Western) at the time, but said he seriously thought about pursuing a career in retail after his experience at Halle's.
Diamond_Dog
(39,394 posts)My Dad graduated from Case, too.
debm55
(53,665 posts)AllaN01Bear
(28,233 posts)Eugene
(66,648 posts)Jordan Marsh for the more expensive stuff. Both in Downton Boston.
debm55
(53,665 posts)JoseBalow
(9,023 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)line up.
JoseBalow
(9,023 posts)I'm not sure if there is still a Thanksgiving day parade in Detroit anymore, or what it is called, or who sponsors it. But it was a big deal back in the day.
debm55
(53,665 posts)LisaM
(29,450 posts)They call it "America's Parade" now. You can stream it next year on WDIV, which is what I did this year.
JoseBalow
(9,023 posts)Many good memories.
Jacson6
(1,685 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)DBoon
(24,568 posts)When I got a bit older, the Radio Shack catalog
debm55
(53,665 posts)MiHale
(12,428 posts)Michigan department stores.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Cirsium
(3,244 posts)I forgot about Federal's.
JMCKUSICK
(4,752 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)lpbk2713
(43,239 posts)J M Fields, Zayre's, Toys r Us
Many others long gone.
J C Penney is still here, just hanging on by their finger nails.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Wuddles440
(1,937 posts)Really couldn't afford to do much actual shopping, but the atmosphere was magical and exciting.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Wuddles440
(1,937 posts)One of my first jobs after graduating from college in the early 1980s was with Horne's as an Assistant Buyer. They were owned by Associated Dry Goods during that period. I loved that store, but the salary wasn't great and the hours were long.
debm55
(53,665 posts)marble falls
(69,965 posts)And going downtown to see the windows at O'Neil's and Polsky's

If I was lucky, Granma Schenk would take me to the Oak Room for "luncheon".
debm55
(53,665 posts)at the windows and decorations and maybe eat at the Tea Room .
marble falls
(69,965 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)marble falls
(69,965 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)marble falls
(69,965 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)marble falls
(69,965 posts)...the Bethlehem mines one person he worked with until the war was Charles Bronson. Nanty Glo ( a Welsh word) was literally a bump in the road. He died of Black Lung, and Jake Yablonski and the UMW made his last years much better. I am pro union partially from this.
debm55
(53,665 posts)marble falls
(69,965 posts)CanonRay
(15,856 posts)downtown Chi.
Zackzzzz
(214 posts)We went DOWNTOWN to look ALL the Xmas displays;
Goldblatt's and the wonderful windows of Lebolt and Peacock Jewelry.
My brother designed and arranged windows at one of those store....
debm55
(53,665 posts)Diamond_Dog
(39,394 posts)This would have been the early 80s, my son was about 4 or 5. We oohed and ahhed at the Christmas decorations. And we saw Mark Malone sitting at a table signing autographs! There was a long line of people waiting for an autograph. He was quite good looking!
debm55
(53,665 posts)KitFox
(482 posts)and Jay Jacobs were great stores for shopping and looking at all of the lights and decorations inside and in the huge windows. They have all gone out of business. Frederick & Nelson had elaborate window displays with Santa always in one of them. Their windows also had motorized displays that you could activate by pressing your hand on a panel on the outside of the window. When I was a kid, I lived in a small town and J C Pennys was the only corporate chain store but we had many locally owned shops.
debm55
(53,665 posts)regnaD kciN
(27,390 posts)It merged into Federated, which continued running chains under their original identities until a decade or two ago, when they deciddd to rebrand all of them as Macys. Theyre very much still around, although they moved out of downtown Seattle thereafter.
wcmagumba
(5,372 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)BOSSHOG
(44,287 posts)As they say in New Orleans - aint dere no more.
Gibsons similar to Walmart 50+ plus years ago. Charmingly cluttered like todays Dollar General.
wcmagumba
(5,372 posts)We had a small one in my little Kansas town, I bought a lot of record albums there...
debm55
(53,665 posts)RazorbackExpat
(821 posts)The Fayetteville store was on College Avenue, the Springdale store was in a shopping center just off Thompson Avenue, and the Rogers store was on South 8th Street. I remember getting some Mighty Mites firecrackers at the F'ville store, a Monster Magnet at the S'dale store, and an LP record at the Rogers store
After that, Gibson's became Howard's, and then Howard's just kind of faded away
debm55
(53,665 posts)RazorbackExpat
(821 posts)Gibson's was trying to compete with a local mom-and-pop shop called Wal-Mart Discount City, and local residents were placing bets on which store would come out on top. I doubt that anyone back then imagined that Wal-Mart would get as big as it did
debm55
(53,665 posts)RazorbackExpat
(821 posts)Two dime stores, two hardware stores, two shoe stores, three pharmacies (two with soda fountains), two barber shops, three clothing stores, two jewelry stores, 4 gas stations, 3 supermarkets, one bookstore, one seed store. There was also a Sears catalog order store (which burned down). And all of those stores are long gone
debm55
(53,665 posts)BOSSHOG
(44,287 posts)Had lunch at Mr Quick across the highway. My grandmother and her sisters all said they could have married Sam Walton. Gibsons was so bad it was good. And there was the Pizza Hut down the highway near Gibsons which had a basement were the bar was. Geez Louise I had a helluva time.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Niagara
(11,241 posts)Bon-Ton, K-mart, RadioShack, Schultz's, Fisher's Big Wheel and On Cue.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Niagara
(11,241 posts)You're welcome
debm55
(53,665 posts)johnp3907
(4,185 posts)
Though we probably bought more from the G. C. Murphys in West Newton.
debm55
(53,665 posts)beautiful displays.
AllaN01Bear
(28,233 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)tavernier
(14,139 posts)Lerner, Five and Dime, Gilmore, JC Penney, Robert Hall. There were several shoe stores named after shoe brands but I dont remember the names now.
debm55
(53,665 posts)duckworth969
(1,037 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)Mother would buy their god awful hoagies to eat when we came back home. I would take all the mystery meat off and have a vegetarian sub.
applegrove
(129,485 posts)friends and I would go swimming at a local hotel when we were tweens and then go to ogilvies for french fries.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Linder
(7 posts)The Fair Store, Goldblatt's. Marshall Fields windows. We would stop at a small store for freshly made Carmel Corn. The Walnut Room in Marshall Fields. Skating, the Chicago Tribunes 'Silver Skates'.
debm55
(53,665 posts)chowmama
(949 posts)They had a special area for children to buy for their parents. The doorway was only 3 feet high and only children and a few store advisors were allowed in. You went in with a little cash (nothing was over about five dollars, which at that time was high end for most children) and came out with a completely gift-wrapped and tagged item for under the tree. The parents had no idea until Christmas what their present was going to be. It was really special.
After we moved across state, we went to Minneapolis to see the Dayton's Christmas exhibit, but I don't remember shopping there. My parents did, but we just wandered and watched. Mostly wandered.
debm55
(53,665 posts)wcmagumba
(5,372 posts)Great toy dept. for a kid, back in its own corner of the store...We always got popcorn and a soda on the way out...The company sponsored the "Santa's Workshop" show on local TV station, on daily in Dec. The show had a little talking puppet they called KAKE Man (after the station name). They later changed the puppet's name to Toy Boy...He was always pushing a particular product which he and Santa would play with...as an adult in my 30s I worked with a guy who did the voice of KAKE Man, woo hoo. I tried but couldn't get him to do the voice...oh well...
debm55
(53,665 posts)LisaM
(29,450 posts)And on Thanksgiving Day, we would watch the then-national coverage of all four Thanksgiving Parades - the Detroit one, of course, but also Macy's in New York, Gimbel's in Philadelphia, and Eaton's in Toronto. They'd switch between all four.
It was a big deal and it's still a little shocking to me that those days are gone forever. It all seemed so permanent. Now the only one with an original sponsor is Macy's, and their parade is more like an ad for Broadway, at least the part they show on TV.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Pittsburgh had one today. But it is put on by, I think , KDKA.
Cirsium
(3,244 posts)The J. L. Hudson Company department store, on Woodward avenue in downtown Detroit.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Deep State Witch
(12,492 posts)In Pittsburgh. We'd also go to Murphy's Mart, Claber's, or David Weis for stuff, too.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Bluestocking
(442 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)Bmoboy
(595 posts)Stewart's
Hutzlers
Hochschild Kohn
Luskins
Acme
Read's
debm55
(53,665 posts)Norrrm
(3,627 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)displacedvermoter
(4,039 posts)It had an ice cream fountain, you could get a hot fudge sundae and then pop a balloon to see how much you had to pay. Maybe 49 cents, maybe ten cents, maybe free! They had candy cane ice cream at Christmas.
debm55
(53,665 posts)you displacedvermoter.
A precursor to Kmart
debm55
(53,665 posts)Raven123
(7,358 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)GP6971
(37,398 posts)Bambergers was at the Garden State Plaza shopping center and Sterns was in the Bergen Plaza shopping center.
debm55
(53,665 posts)vanlassie
(6,206 posts)Sadly missed to this day.
😢
debm55
(53,665 posts)electric_blue68
(25,213 posts)maybe at holiday time, too ;
Gimbels, Alexander's, Korvette's.
While not shopping there (usually too expensive) it's always fun to see Sak's Fifth Ave Holiday windows, and facade.
debm55
(53,665 posts)I was young I thought I wanted to do that as a living.
Paladin
(32,122 posts)Within spitting distance of The Alamo.
My mother and grandmother (and usually an aunt or two) started dragging me there when I was maybe five years old, back in the 1950's. As was the custom back then, they were always immaculately dressed for the occasion: their best dresses, hats, stockings, etc. I look back on it with fondness, but I hated it, at the time. Whole different world...
debm55
(53,665 posts)downtown Pittsburgh. It was an experience.
lastlib
(27,293 posts)Also Montgomery Ward's and Sears.
And a local entity, Wild Woody's.
debm55
(53,665 posts)had all the toys. Went by myself and would just look around. They are long gone.
WestMichRad
(2,837 posts)Coldwater Michigan. A old 3- floor department type store that specialized in millinery, i.e. carpet and flooring, draperies, and the like, but also a host of other home furnishing things. On the ground floor, they had an overhead cable system for sending a capsule to another room, for cash and receipts
operated until they closed in the mid 80s. Might have been the last operating capsule system, or whatever it was called, of that type. It was pretty cool!
My one purchase there was a stereo receiver
one of the best buys in my life. Still in occasional use!
debm55
(53,665 posts)them too.
OldBaldy1701E
(9,721 posts)My home area was too rural for a K-Mart. But, in the town 26 miles away we had a Roses and a Sears. A J.C. Penny's opened up when I was around twelve.
My home town had a Western Auto, and a Pope's. That was it at the time.
debm55
(53,665 posts)beaglelover
(4,396 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)LogDog75
(1,012 posts)so we shopped at the base exchange. The other store was Sears.
debm55
(53,665 posts)KC Shell
(3 posts)Montgomery Ward. It was a huge department store in my neighborhood, in Northeast, KCMO. They even had and a white Santa and a black Santa. Fancy....
debm55
(53,665 posts)doc03
(38,707 posts)had everything, now there is nothing. Back then the downtown was shoulder to shoulder crowds
and cops directing traffic at crossings.
debm55
(53,665 posts)no_hypocrisy
(53,942 posts)when I was 17 and it was Christmas, I was really pissed at my father.
So I went to the local drugstore and bought two men's colognes: Brut and English Sterling ("Make him a legend in his own time" )
My father was so obtuse. He never got the underlying message.
debm55
(53,665 posts)MustLoveBeagles
(14,120 posts)Is Bergners still around?
debm55
(53,665 posts)Redleg
(6,791 posts)Used to be the main mall in Ogden Utah but now it is gone.
debm55
(53,665 posts)Thunderbeast
(3,741 posts)Portland, Oregon downtown anchors.
debm55
(53,665 posts)dem4decades
(13,465 posts)debm55
(53,665 posts)Xavier Breath
(6,328 posts)Both were founded in Ohio, but I believe Hills was present in Pennsylvania, New York, Virginia and the South as well. They've both been gone for decades, but I miss them still.
debm55
(53,665 posts)ProfessorGAC
(75,481 posts)All gone, the latter 2 for 45 years.
debm55
(53,665 posts)31st Street Bridge
(42 posts)Kaufmann's windows and Gumbel's basement and Horne's classy wooden cases on the first floor. Add the streetcars, the lights, the small independent retailers and Pittsburgh was a holiday treasure chest, even into the 1980s. I miss it all so.
But as a kid, those wooden escalators at Kaufmann's upper floors scared the heck outta me!!
debm55
(53,665 posts)the wooden steps at the Noah's Ark at Kennywood.
Abstractartist
(398 posts)Sears, Montgomery Ward, Hutzlers, Hecht Co., Macys, Target.
I grew up in the county outside of Baltimore, Md.
debm55
(53,665 posts)markodochartaigh
(4,742 posts)When they were closing in the mid 80's I remember reading that shopping malls weren't doing so well anymore because women were spending less time shopping and more time working.
debm55
(53,665 posts)macwriter
(253 posts)When I was a kid, in the run up to Christmas and Easter my family went to Filene's Basement store in Newark. It was a madhouse, but there were bargains plenty. I hated shopping for Easter bonnets, in particular
debm55
(53,665 posts)And ship to us.
