 |
|
Amuse
Blogs
Food
Life
Links
News
Pictures
Rants
Site
Tech
Words
This short American Heritage web article (via) talks about the rise and fall of one of the first major national retailers in the United States: F. W. Woolworth's.
The American Heritage article doesn't go into a lot of detail except to point out that the culprit behind Woolworth's demise was suburbanization. The actual discount retail concept itself hasn't even remotely gone away, it has just reshaped itself into Wal-Mart and has even found a niche in the flourishing "dollar store" retailers. Some local "five and dime" stores remain even to this day, particularly in towns that go out of their way to retain "local character".
Among my own earliest memories is being taken to Woolworth's by my grandmother and riding the escalator. Sometimes we would even eat at the lunch counter. Marcel Proust would be pleased to know that my strongest memory of the place is the smell, which includes the unmistakable aroma of stale buttered popcorn, the mingled perfume of hundreds of old ladies, and a je ne sais quoi that I can only call "department store". I've never been in a Wal-Mart that smelled like a Woolworth's, although I have found the same aroma in other department stores.
Even though Wal-Mart seems invincible, I think the take-away from this article is that all things must pass, and the greatest giants are often humbled even as they seem most powerful. Nice to know that insignificance is an equal-opportunity effect.
© BrianKaneOnline.com 2000-2007