Day 33: It's Field's, not Macy's!

     One of the most groundbreaking department store chains in history had a relatively auspicious start.  In 1852, Potter Palmer opened up a dry goods store at 137 Lake Street.  Four years later, a 21-year-old kid from back East named Marshall Field showed up in town and started working for the largest dry goods outfit in Chicago: Cooley, Wadsworth, & Co.  While working there, Field rose up the ranks accompanied by Levi Leiter.  Eventually, Field was promoted to a marquee partner, however he and Leiter left the company in 1864 to assist Potter Palmer with his dry goods enterprise, thus creating Field, Palmer, Leiter, & Co.  Three years later, Palmer withdrew from the partnership to focus on retail opportunities on State Street(he may have also found time to build a hotel or two).  However, in 1868, Palmer convinced Field and Leiter to lease a building he had built at the corner of State and Washington Streets.  Eventually they moved, and by 1871 they were thriving in their new location.

     Of course fate(and maybe Mrs. O'Leary's cow) had other plans.  On the evening of October 8, the Great Chicago Fire swept through the city with an otherworldly rage.  Seeing the oncoming conflagration, Levi Leiter ordered the store's workers to haul out as many items as they could possibly handle, and take them to his house(which was out of the path of the flames.) An enterprising young salesman ran down to the basement in order to bring the steam pumps online.  This effort was ultimately successful, as so many wares were saved that the store was able to open in a temporary location until the renovations were done with.  In the aftermath, the store was rebuilt on the same location, but was destroyed in another fire in November of 1877.

     To prepare for the Colombian Exposition of 1893, the architectural firm of Daniel Burnham was tasked with building the new building. After the construction, Field & Co. were left with what some called the largest department store ever.  On Janurary 16, 1906, Marshall Field died, and the board appointed John Shedd to be his successor.  John Graves Shedd had come to Chicago in 1871 and started working for Field as a stock clerk.  At the time of Field's death, Shedd was a vice president in the company, and by Field's own admission, "the greatest merchant in the United States".  This honorific proved to be no misnomer, as the company enjoyed its rise to national prominence under Shedd.  Over time, the store would pioneer many firsts in the department store world, such as:

• The first department store "tea room"
• The first bridal registry
• The first store to feature personal shoppers
• The first store to have escalators
• Marshall Field's book department pioneered the idea of the book signing
• And many other historic firsts

     After several cycles of expansion and contraction, the company was subjected to a series of sales starting in the 1980s.  Eventually, the company was sold to Federated Department Stores, the parent company of Macy's.  As a result of that acquisition, the name of the State Street store was changed to Macy's on September 9, 2006 in one of the more controversial moves in Chicago retail history.  However, even though the name is gone, it still lives on in the memories of Chicagoans, as well as in a plaque on the building, which was placed there upon notice that the building had been named a Historic Landmark.