Could this really be the last Christmas with Sears? | Rolando's Roadside Roundup
Plus, a whale of a Route 66 holiday tradition; farewell to a beloved antique mall; sweet love for a beloved candy shop; and more headlines from the road.
This time of year was the Sears time of year. I can remember the cheery commercials from the 1980s, promising a shopping experience that equated Sears with Santa himself.
The jingle went, “There’s more for your life at Sears,” and that was more than a slogan — it was a promise. You named it, Sears had it. Even then Sears still mailed out its weighty Wish Books, with thin, glossy sheets that had a particular smell that was redolent of yuletide promise. (I loved the Spiegel catalog, too, for similar reasons.)
As far as I was concerned, those Wish Books might as well have been printed by Santa’s elves in the North Pole, and circling what I wanted in the tantalizing toy section was like telegraphing my wishes directly to Jolly Old Saint Nick himself.
The collapse of Sears has been astonishing, unthinkable, but slow enough that we’ve had time to accept it. There are only 15 stores left, where not long ago there were thousands.
CNN asks the provocative but inevitable question: Will Christmas 2022 be the last Christmas we have Sears?
Check out the piece here, and read these comments from a retail expert, Columbia University’s Mark Cohen, who sums up the spectacularly missed opportunity of Sears in the age of digital shopping.
He said that Sears’ experience operating its catalog, which had an all-encompassing list of products, positioned it better than other traditional retailers to make an early move into online sales. And he said Sears had better lease agreements than competing department store chains.
“It could have been a rival to Amazon. It had been the Amazon of its day,” Cohen said. “No doubt that Sears would have needed to close stores and consolidate holdings, but their real estate holdings would not have been the albatross they were for other department store chains. Nothing would have stopped it from having a second life as a world beater. At the end of the day, this was all about the incompetence and malfeasance of its leadership.”
I’ve said much the same in previous essays on my Instagram page about Sears. When bemoaning the loss of the Sears in Flatbush, Brooklyn, above, I observed:
Times, they have changed, and Sears didn’t. But Sears’ slow death, some observers suggest, was not inevitable. Don’t forget that Sears was once the Amazon of its day, starting as a breathtakingly comprehensive catalog-based mail-order business selling everything you might ever need or desire. Flipping through its pages was sort of like typing whatever you need into Amazon.com and having it magically appear at your door step in no time flat. Even a house in kit form!
There’s hardly anything left for your life as Sears.
And that’s just sad.
Must see: Old Sled Works, a fascinating Pennsylvania antique mall that’s set to close
Oh how sad I was to read this. The Old Sled Works antique mall in Duncannon, Pennsylvania, is closing Dec. 31. Not only is it a cool antique mall — where I bought my treasured Speedy Alka-Seltzer doll — it is home to a wonderful collection of Americana, including a soda fountain and vintage arcade games, including a functioning Pong.
My photos, more information as well as a roadside guide to the area near Duncannon in case you want to visit (and you should!) is available below, a service to my paid subscribers. Please consider upgrading from free for valuable extras like this, as well as my guidance in helping you plan trips or learn more about all things roadside Americana.
Community rallies around Ray’s Candy Store, East Village mainstay since 1974
The beloved East Village mainstay Ray’s Candy Store, around since 1974, has hit a rough patch in our inflationary times, and a crowdfunding campaign has raised over $50,000 to keep it going.
But the heart of Ray’s, of course, is Ray Alvarez himself, who turns 90 this month. My former colleague at PIX11, Greg Mocker, stopped by for this report. [PIX11]
Notes From the Road
The Burgen Lake rest area near Alexandria, Minnesota, has architecture that is “considered a gem of 1970s modernist “funk/revival." Its buildings and grounds, largely untouched in 50-plus years, are candidates now for the National Register of Historic Places.”
The creator of the term is Joanna Dowling, and it’s so perfect I may start using it to describe McDonald’s and Pizza Huts in my quest to preserve those mansard buildings!
“It’s a pseudo-revivalism of the French mansard roof — this is the 1970s version of that,” said Dowling, a Chicago-area consulting cultural historian. “The funk term came in as a play on 1970s funk — funk music, and it’s also just funky, the funky version of French revivalism.”
In the ‘70s, Dowling said, these roof lines could be seen everywhere, from Pizza Huts to dentist offices and, of course, rest stops.
One more fun fact from this excellent MPR article: The United States only has 10 rest areas on the National Register, and nine are in South Dakota. File that under “things I learned today!” [MPR]
This is a pretty good lead on this story about the Hotel Chelsea.
There's a building in Manhattan like no other in the world, where Mark Twain slept, Madonna posed, and Jimi Hendrix roamed. It's the Hotel Chelsea, otherwise known as the Chelsea Hotel. For more than a century it's been a wonderland destination for celebrities and visionaries. [CBS News]
Take a tour of the world's skinniest skyscraper, the Steinway Tower. How do you feel about the skinny skyscraper trend? [ABC7NY]
Hidden Casper: A tour beneath Casper’s midcentury landmark bank building. [Oil City News]
Eyesore no more: Couple restoring Alexander Hotel and Alice Theater in Leitchfield, Kentucky. [WFPL]
Joplin, Missouri's long-vacant downtown train station, the Union Depot, assessed as being in good condition. What now? [Joplin Globe]
Forty years ago, a massive Thanksgiving fire destroyed a block of downtown Minneapolis. [MPR]
A fire has destroyed a 1930s-era gym in Santa Paula, California. [LA Times]
In Boston, they "dropped" a new building on top of an old building. Inside this "Façadectomy." [Bloomberg]
The Woman’s Club of Redondo Beach celebrated Arts and Crafts building’s 100th anniversary. It’s listed on the National Register. [Easy Reader News]
The former Red Baron Diner at Southbridge Municipal Airport in Massachusetts reopens as Josh's Place. [Telegram]
In Lake Worth Beach, Florida, a history in pictures of an Art Deco building captured in 1990 by the great John Margolies. [Palm Beach Post]
Historic Nashville has published its 2022 list of nine endangered buildings. [Historic Nashville]
Worrisome: I did not realize that last year, Historic Nashville flagged the Woolworth Building on its list of endangered structures.
As of last year, Historic Nashville said the interior of the building was undergoing “extensive renovations” as it prepared to return as the Woolworth Theatre, prompting preservationists to remind the owners “they are stewards of one of the most important spaces in this city’s history.” [WKRN]
Something I’d love to see: The Catoosa Blue Whale, an icon of Route 66, lit up for the holidays! Above is my picture from my Route 66 road trip in 2013. (How was this almost 10 years ago! I digress.) [News 9]
Scrapping paint on the side of their historic building in upstate New York, they uncovered traces of a Gold Medal Flour ghost sign. They scrapped their plans to advertise the current tenants and restored the Gold Medal sign. [Orleans Hub.]
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