Anyone know this book?

pastperfect2

pastperfect2

Alumni +
Service and Style by Jan Whitaker. It's a history of department stores in the US.

Anyone know it and can recommend it?

Hollis
 
No, I don't know it but I was thinking there needs to be a good book on the history of American department stores. Not so much the usual top 4 (Neiman Marcus, Saks, Bergdorf, L&T) that are still around but all those department stores that were in specific cities that have gone under like Hudsons in Detroit and Bergers in Buffalo etc. You see those labels in suits and coats and hats but don't know when the department stores were founded and closed (although the majority of them seem to have been founded around 1900 and closed around 1990)
 
Hollis, I don't have it, but have seen it offered and have been tempted to buy it.

There is a great little book about Rich's in Atlanta called "Dear Store".
 
I may just have to try it.

Jonathan - did you tell me long ago you had a Louisville store label in your collection? I have some infomation on Louisville stores as of yesterday.

Hollis
 
I used to have a Louisville label in my collection -- it was a red and blue shot taffeta quilted evening coat from the mid 1920s but it was fragile and wouldn't have put with much wear or handling so I sold it on eBay. Sorry but I don't remember what the label was anymore. However, I remember I found a dress from the same period in the identical fabric with the same label in it on another seller's store.
 
I would dearly love a book on department store history. I think I will look it up.

My husband and I bought a small department store building in Gardner Ma. The old J.A. Le Blanc building they call it around here . My shop is in one half and Bob works out of the other half.

There is a spacious apartment upstairs, where we live. The whole building cost us less than a single family home so it made sense for us. I have lots of people come in to reminisce about the old store that was here. They carried better-moderate priced clothing and was considered THE place to shop.

This is an old furniture manufacturing town (Heywood-Wakefiield among others) so folks here considered it a splurge to shop there. The owner kept a wish list for the ladies in town so at Christmas their husbands and boyfriends could come in and "buy with confidence" the perfect gift.

I often get clothing and hats in that came from here. Lots of times the hats come in their old J. A. LeBlanc boxes! It is kind of neat to be selling garments that were originally sold in this exact spot way back when.
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Melody
 
Looks interesting but it may not go into the old store as much as we would like.... Who would obsess about old store more than us? LOL....

Lord and Taylors is still around but I remember my grandmother taking me there and the service she used to get. Like she was a queen..... I would buy the book because it will probally go more into the changes of the shopping experience.

-Chris
 
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