Former Carson's Building, Soon to Be City Target
When it was first built in the late 19th century, it was Schlesinger and Mayer, but ever since I can remember (late 50's) it was Carson Pirie Scott & Co. It was one of SIX department stores within six blocks on State Street between Congress Pkwy and Lake St. The others were: Sears, Goldblatt's, The Fair (later Montgomery Ward), Wieboldt's, and Marshall Fields. Five are gone now; after closing its Congress Street store back in 1981, Sear's reopened in the early 2000's at the northwest corner of State and Madison, and closed AGAIN in 2013.
You could find anything you wanted or needed in the Loop, and I mean anything. There was Bailey's Army Surplus, Stebbins Hardware, gourmet grocery store Stop and Shop on Washington between State and Dearborn, with a Hillman's grocery store in the basement (there was also a Hillman's in the basement of Sear's, on the Van Buren side under the Loop el tracks). Zoe's Shoe Repair in the Stevens Building (one of the last buildings in the city in the '60's and '70's with actual human operators to work its antique, wrought-iron-gated elevators). Zoe's had its own line of shoe polishes and dressings, the kind in glass bottles with an applicator ball on a braided metal rod under the cap. Fox Millinery Supply, if you were a woman and you made your own hats. Every department store had dedicated year-round sewing, book and toy departments. Wieboldt's had an awesome pet department on the second floor right by the escalators. For a time, in the late 70's, Goldblatt's even sold mopeds.
My mom and I came downtown every Saturday when I was growing up. We either took the 22A Wentworth bus, or rode the 47th Street trolley bus to what is now the Green Line el station (the Dan Ryan el had not been built yet) and took that downtown. Those old green and yellow 6000 series cars, with their plush vinyl seats and windows that cranked open, made quite a racket as they hung the curves at 40th St, and the nonstop roar once they descended into the subway at 15th Street was deafening. What a blast :D
We went mostly to shop, but also to go to the movies, to museums (all of them were free), always finishing up with a meal (for me it was always a Hamburger Deluxe) at one of Walgreen's three State Street lunch counters, on Jackson, Madison or Randolph.
All gone. Vapor. Ghosts. It's like that world never even existed. Wal-Mart and Kohl's will never replace it, no matter how hard they try. For a young, book-smart, artistic, unathletic black kid growing up on the south side of Chicago, it was magic to experience a wider world.
It's a sad retail fact that most businesses these days would rather struggle on North Michigan Avenue than thrive on State or Wabash, where rents are lower. Nice to see Target thinking outside the (big) box.
Tentative opening date: Sunday, July 29.
Former Carson's Building, Soon to Be City Target
When it was first built in the late 19th century, it was Schlesinger and Mayer, but ever since I can remember (late 50's) it was Carson Pirie Scott & Co. It was one of SIX department stores within six blocks on State Street between Congress Pkwy and Lake St. The others were: Sears, Goldblatt's, The Fair (later Montgomery Ward), Wieboldt's, and Marshall Fields. Five are gone now; after closing its Congress Street store back in 1981, Sear's reopened in the early 2000's at the northwest corner of State and Madison, and closed AGAIN in 2013.
You could find anything you wanted or needed in the Loop, and I mean anything. There was Bailey's Army Surplus, Stebbins Hardware, gourmet grocery store Stop and Shop on Washington between State and Dearborn, with a Hillman's grocery store in the basement (there was also a Hillman's in the basement of Sear's, on the Van Buren side under the Loop el tracks). Zoe's Shoe Repair in the Stevens Building (one of the last buildings in the city in the '60's and '70's with actual human operators to work its antique, wrought-iron-gated elevators). Zoe's had its own line of shoe polishes and dressings, the kind in glass bottles with an applicator ball on a braided metal rod under the cap. Fox Millinery Supply, if you were a woman and you made your own hats. Every department store had dedicated year-round sewing, book and toy departments. Wieboldt's had an awesome pet department on the second floor right by the escalators. For a time, in the late 70's, Goldblatt's even sold mopeds.
My mom and I came downtown every Saturday when I was growing up. We either took the 22A Wentworth bus, or rode the 47th Street trolley bus to what is now the Green Line el station (the Dan Ryan el had not been built yet) and took that downtown. Those old green and yellow 6000 series cars, with their plush vinyl seats and windows that cranked open, made quite a racket as they hung the curves at 40th St, and the nonstop roar once they descended into the subway at 15th Street was deafening. What a blast :D
We went mostly to shop, but also to go to the movies, to museums (all of them were free), always finishing up with a meal (for me it was always a Hamburger Deluxe) at one of Walgreen's three State Street lunch counters, on Jackson, Madison or Randolph.
All gone. Vapor. Ghosts. It's like that world never even existed. Wal-Mart and Kohl's will never replace it, no matter how hard they try. For a young, book-smart, artistic, unathletic black kid growing up on the south side of Chicago, it was magic to experience a wider world.
It's a sad retail fact that most businesses these days would rather struggle on North Michigan Avenue than thrive on State or Wabash, where rents are lower. Nice to see Target thinking outside the (big) box.
Tentative opening date: Sunday, July 29.