A Year-End Bundle of Nostalgia

    It is another rainy day and you have likely had enough of the holiday season, so I will attempt to offer something for you to do. Although shopping is involved, it is not the kind of shopping you just did in an awful, crowded mall. There used to be better places in which to shop and you can visit a few below.
   One of them is in La Ronge, Saskatchewan, but it will not be there next year. The story about its impending closure was told twice by the CBC and you can read and watch or listen to those stories here. Robertson's Trading Post is worth visiting one last time. (Content Warning: Although I don't usually provide one, I will note that anti-fur, animal lovers might be traumatized by some of the photographs provided. Others may be 'harmed' by learning that for some people, a typical work week was 12 hours per day, 7 days a week. )
   Almost by accident, Mulcahy's Miscellany contains other stories about the general stores of our past. Anyone interested in such ancient emporiums who stumbles upon this post, will find information about the old relics that once were -- village stores, department stores, ranging from Robertson's in La Ronge to Kingsmill's in London.

Meet the Robertsons
   On Dec. 3, 2023, the CBC offered this story: “The Trading Post: An Iconic Northern Store is Shutting Down After 56 Years,” by Kenneth Latimer. Apart from the excellent photographs, you will also see a video of the Robertsons (7 min.) Here is a bit from the piece: 
   Alex and Phyllis Robertson moved to a small community in northern Saskatchewan with little more than dust in their pockets, big dreams and dedication.
   They started up a tiny general store and fur trading post, not knowing that Robertson Trading would still be running strong 56 years later in La Ronge, Sask., or that it would come to be regarded as a gem of the north. 
   Their son Scott Robertson has worked at the store since he was a child and has been managing the iconic shop for decades. He’s tormented by his decision to shut the store down.
   The store, known locally as the Trading Post, is technically a general store, but it’s also an Indigenous art gallery, a genuine Canadian antiques show, a bucket-list destination for tourists, and an outfitter for camps and people heading into the bush.
   The unofficial museum operates on the town’s main street across from Lac La Ronge, which is on the edge of the Canadian Shield.

   On December 6, the CBC presented this story which contains an audio account (50 min.) of "Blue Sky" with Leisha Grebinksi: "People Reflect on Legacy of Robertson Trading As Store Winds Down After 56 Years: It's the End of an Era for Iconic Trading Post in Northern Saskatchewan."   Additional information about La Ronge and Robertsons is found on the website of Tourism Saskatchewan. 

General Stores in General
   In the post mysteriously hidden under the title "Dorfläden,” you will learn that the Germans are favouring village stores over "Big-box" ones. As well, it contains descriptions of some that are left in Ontario and books about them. In the usual "Post Script" it is noted that those in London years ago, used to sell booze and soon "convenience" stores here may be able to do so again. 

    During the pandemic I did a post called "Detour" which showed how one could go out and about by using Google maps and Google Street View. As an illustration I chose Kingsmill's, a "Department" store, and indicated that the Google people had even gone inside it. Unfortunately, I could no longer find the interior image by using Google maps and the Kingsmill's link no longer exits. But, if you do google "Kingsmill's" on Google maps, links are offered to two articles about that store. The picture above is from one of them: "The End of a Department Store, and a Way of Life: Kingsmill's - as Art Deco Heritage Building and One of Canada's Few Remaining Family Owned Department Stores, Is Closing," Francine Kopun, Toronto Star, July 2, 2014.

   More recently I discussed the leaving of Nordstrom from Canada and the return of Zellers in, "Nostalgia Isn't What It Used to Be." I also mentioned Shnurr's which has been in Linwood, Ontario for 165 years. Fortunately I also provided the image of the interior of Kingsmill's which I captured earlier from Google Maps. 

What About the Windows?
   The larger department stores often featured elaborate Christmas displays and older Londoners will remember the ones at Simpson's. Recently, the Canadian correspondent for the New York Times offered some suggestions about where to see them - not new real ones, but old displays: "In Search of Vintage Window Displays: The Mechanically Powered Holiday Scenes That Once Filled Department-store Windows in Canada Are Still Humming. Here's Where to Find Them," Ian Austen, Dec. 16, 2023. Here are some examples.
 Some of these are done for Christmas and will disappear next month, but keep the sites in mind for your grandkids for next year. 
I hope you have a good one.

"Eaton's Once Upon a Christmas Exhibit" by the Western Development Museum in Saskatoon. 
Since 1987, the Eaton’s Once Upon A Christmas exhibit has delighted visitors, young and old. The exhibit continues to be a major attraction for those who visit the WDM during the holiday season. It offers an opportunity for parents to share with their children memories of their childhood and it allows children to enter a world of make-believe and magic.
We encourage you to visit the WDM Saskatoon from November 2, 2023 through January 7, 2024 with your family and enjoy this wonderful Saskatchewan tradition.

The Manitoba Children's Museum - Eaton's Fairy Tale Vignettes
The Children’s Museum is pleased to be the home of the last original Eaton’s Fairytale Vignettes Display from the ninth floor annex of the Eaton’s downtown store – fully restored and open to the public for a limited time only.

OGILVY'S CHRISTMAS MECHANICAL WINDOW DISPLAYS, McCord Stewart Museum - Montreal.
Montrealers have been spellbound by the mechanical displays in Ogilvy’s department store window for over 70 years — a Holiday tradition that began in 1947. The Bavarian scenes, custom made by the German toy manufacturer Steiff, feature dozens of handcrafted animals working and playing.In 1911, the firm began producing mechanical windows featuring moving animals, which stores could rent or purchase – an effective way of entertaining children while promoting their merchandise. James Aird Nesbitt, who owned Ogilvy’s department store from 1927 to 1985, bought two – The Enchanted Village and The Mill in the Forest.Similar to those of department stores in other parts of the world, such as Macy’s in New York or Galeries Lafayette in Paris, these window displays are among the last of their kind in North America. They were donated to the McCord Stewart Museum in March 2018 by Holt Renfrew with the goal of preserving and ensuring the continuation of the iconic Montreal displays.

Hudson's Holidays - Detroit Historical Society.
   Founded as a humble clothier for men and boys in 1881, J.L. Hudson Company reportedly racked up an average of 100,000 sales per day by the 1950s, and its 25-story building was the world’s tallest department store until 1961. Visitors will learn what made Hudson’s so popular, like its huge selection of merchandise and full-service approach, which went beyond with in-store restaurants, salons and alterations departments to offer amenities like a circulating library, a writing lounge and an in-house dry cleaner.
   The exhibition features a selection of must-see items from the Detroit Historical Society collection, including the toys and decor that made the holidays at Hudson’s so magical, the fashions and accessories that made the store a year-round shopping destination, and some artifacts from the downtown store that evoke the massive building’s distinctive features. Revisit traditions enjoyed by generations of Detroiters, like seeing the World’s Largest Flag, visiting Santa in Toy Town and shopping for deals in the Basement Store>
Also see this from the Encyclopedia of Detroit.

Post Script:
   We now have "dollar stores" among the tattoo parlours and payday loan shops and about them, I don't think we will ever feel nostalgic. Here is a paragraph about Dollar General from a book review I did of, The National Road: Dispatches From a Changing America by Tom Zoellner:
   The next essay is the titular one, but it is more about the "little-box" chain, Dollar General, than it is about the 'National Road'.  There are now more of them than there are McDonalds and that is not a good thing. For the reasons why, read this essay and these more recent ones: "The True Cost of Dollar Stores: Discount Chains Are Thriving. But, What Do They Do To Poor Communities," by Alec MacGillis, The New Yorker, June 29, 2020, or "How Dollar Stores Became Magnets for Crime and Killing," Alec MacGillis, ProPublica, June 29, 2020. 

Nostalgia Isn't What It Used To Be

 Nordstrom and Zellers

   This post is not about either of those commercial establishments since you will already have read a lot about them over the last few weeks. If you haven't, I will say simply that the purveyor of luxury goods (Nordstrom) left Canada, while the discount chain (Zellers) returned. Zellers, by the way, closed hundreds of stores about a decade ago, and was bought by Target which more recently closed shop and left to go back to the more robust southern market. Sears had already gone and Lowes and Bed Bath & Beyond are also exiting. What this all means I will leave for the more mercantile-minded to explain to you, but to put it in balance sheet terms, I think it likely constitutes a 'loss.'  I could be wrong. Apparently nostalgia-seeking Canadians are lining up for Zellers-branded red sweatshirts and Dollar General stores and pay-day lenders are multiplying quickly enough to more than fill the commercial real estate spaces left empty by Nordstrom. 

But What About Schnurr's?

   My real intention, which is not clear from that digressive first paragraph, is to bring to your attention a story you did not read. It is about a General Store that is located in Linwood, Ontario. It has been there for 165 years and if you are a fan of true nostalgia, you can go shop there or, in September, take a tour during "Door's Open Waterloo Region." 

  More importantly, if you read the article I will provide about Schnurr's, along with my earlier post about “Dorfläden,” you will learn a great deal about the history of 'General Stores', which is more interesting, I think, than knowing about the current retail environment. 

Sources:

   "This Family-Owned Grocery Store Has Been Serving the Linwood Community for 165 Years," Carmen Groleau, CBC News, Mar. 23, 2023.

   “Dorfläden, is the German term for "village stores", which appear to be coming back. The post about it is Here and if you are interested in old-timey things like "Service Stations", see Here. 

The Bonus:

   The picture of Schnurr's is from Google Street View. If you are longing for the good old department store days, here is a scene from inside of Kingsmill's which used to exist in London. It is also from Google and more about that is found in this post: "Detour."

Cathedrals of Consumption

 Happy New Year. 

   I will begin slowly and likely stay at that pace. There are not many incentives to action and we are being actively encouraged to remain inactive and inside. I suppose this should mean that I could blog more, but even an unread blog, about nothing in particular, requires some effort and more effort would be required should I attempt to edit it, out of fear that someone might stumble over one of my posts. I am not too concerned about libel suits, or posses consisting of those out chasing the politically incorrect, but I am worried about the odd, enraged grammarian, even though I have the Internet to help me figure out what the plural of posse is.

   That is a very slow start and now I will back up a few days and discuss a couple of the emails I received at the dawn of the New Year. Reading and answering emails is another reason I am not a very productive blogger, that along with the fact that I don't get paid for blogging.

   One email was from THE BAY and the one immediately following it was about the Hudson's Bay Company. THE BAY was reminding me that I could still take advantage of Boxing Day, if I missed Black Friday and they will soon be letting me know about the wonderful sales to be had at Easter. They will probably even let me know that they will host the President's Day sales that are held on Washington's Birthday, since we can't go across the border.

   The second email was nostalgic in nature and it came in the "Canada Letter" which is a weekly column sent out by Ian Austen, a columnist for the New York Times.  Ian is a local boy (born in Windsor) who cobbles together items for the benefit of the Canadian subscribers. He let us know that the old bricks and mortar version of the Hudson's Bay Company is not doing so well and that the big old branch in Winnipeg is no more. 

   Here is what he had to say: While it was already on death row, Hudson’s Bay Company’s presence in downtown Winnipeg, ended with unexpected abruptness. After announcing that its much diminished former flagship outlet would be shut in February, the retailer permanently locked the doors of the 600,000 square foot store at the end of November. As the caption hints, the Winnipeg store was valued at $0.00.

   Ian, like many of us, has "a soft spot for large, downtown department stores" and remembers going to that other old Canadian department store, Eaton's, and even venturing across the river to visit the other Hudson's, the J.L. Hudson store on Woodward Avenue in Detroit. As, he points out, they were where Santa could be found, perhaps when he wasn't in the one in Winnipeg or London.

   The old days were good as the picture above indicates. Kingsmill's in London is also gone. As the days go by, things become less good as the photo below illustrates. Simpson's is also gone. 

   I shouldn't have my first post be a negative one, so let's look at the bright side. It's not like The Bay is Canadian. As well, we can't go shopping anyway and you are probably broke because of Christmas and all those other sales. Perhaps we should also find something to do other than shop. Environmentalists warn us to cut back on our consumption and the earlier critics of consumer culture asked us to consider rejecting "the cult of the new, the constant pursuit of mere comfort, the culture of desire." As one of those critics said, "we have become a society preoccupied with consumption, with comfort and bodily well-being, with luxury, spending, and, acquisition, with more goods this year than last, more next year than this. American [and Canadian] consumer capitalism produced a culture almost violently hostile to its past and to tradition, a future-oriented culture of desire that confused the good life with goods." 

Perhaps the current pandemic will force us to examine some less acquisitive options.

Source: The quotation is from: Land of Desire: Merchants, Power, and the Rise of a New American Culture, by William Leach. p. XIII.

There is a book with the title of: Cathedrals of Consumption: European Department Stores, 1850-1939. 

The Bonus: 

It appears that the bonuses were good for Canadian CEOS as these free Factlets will indicate.  1) After working just a couple of hours on Jan. 4,  the average top Canadian CEO had already earned as much as the average Canadian will make all year. 2) At the top of the list is Jose Cil who made $27,482,409. He is the fellow who runs Tim Hortons, Burger King and Popeyes.

The source for the above: The Golden Cushion: CEO Compensation in Canada, David Macdonald. Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.