Industry Retail | Type of business Department store | |
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Fate Merged with J.W. Robinson's Products Clothing, footwear, bedding, furniture, jewelry, beauty products, and housewares. Headquarters Los Angeles, California, United States Founded 1881, Los Angeles, California, United States Successors Robinsons-May (1993), Macy's (2006) | ||
May Company California was a chain of department stores operating in Southern California and Nevada, with headquarters in North Hollywood, California. It was a subsidiary of May Department Stores and merged with May's other Southern California subsidiary, J. W. Robinson's, in 1993 to form Robinsons-May.
May Company California was established in 1923 when May acquired A. Hamburger & Sons Co. (founded in 1881 by Asher Hamburger). The company operated exclusively in Southern California until 1989 when May Department Stores had dissolved Goldwater's, based in Scottsdale, Arizona, and transferred its Las Vegas, Nevada store to May Company California.
The May Company store which was in Whittier, California, at The Quad at Whittier opened in 1965 and closed on March 31, 1987, just six months before the Whittier Narrows earthquake which took place at 7:42 a.m. October 1, 1987. The store's three-level parking structure fell almost flat to the ground as a result of this quake, and the store itself suffered internal damage but remained intact until its controlled implosion (via dynamite) a few years later.
Two well-known stores were the flagship Downtown store on 8th Street between Broadway and Hill streets, and the May Company Wilshire at Wilshire Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue. The 1926 garage building at 9th and Hill Streets was one of the nation's first parking structures (Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument No. 1001). The Wilshire location has been featured in several vintage films, including Behave Yourself!
History
May Company California can trace its roots to the store that Asher Hamburger and his sons Moses, David and Solomon had established in Los Angeles after their recent move from Sacramento. This store first opened on October 29, 1881, in a 20-by-75-foot room on Main Street near Requena Street and was original known as The People's Store. In a short time, the store expanded into adjacent store fronts. Within three years, the store had moved to a larger location on Spring Street.
By the start of the 20th century, A. Hamburger & Sons had even outgrown the Spring Street location, which had 520 employees working on five floors. The Hamburger family decided to build a much larger store at the southeast corner of Broadway and Eighth, a location that was outside of then current retail district. Construction started in 1905 with a grand opening held in 1908. This location, which was also known as the Great White Store, was the largest department store building west of Chicago at the time and would eventually become the flagship location for the May Company California. At the time that the Great White Store was opened, the store could boast of having one of the first escalators on the West Coast, several restaurants, a drug store, grocery store, bakery, fruit store, meat market, U.S. post office, telegraph office, barber shop, a dentist, a chiropractor, a medical doctor, an auditorium, an electricity and steam power plant in the basement that was large enough to support a city of 50,000 inhabitants, a private volunteer 120 men fire brigade, 13 acres of retail space (482,475 sq.ft., larger than all the department, clothing and dry goods stores in the city), and 1200 employees. The Los Angeles Public Library was also located on the third floor from 1908 until it was forced to move to a larger location when it outgrew the Hamburger space by 1913. For a short time, Woodbury Business College briefly was also located on the fifth floor.
In 1925, the Hamburgers sold their store to the May family of St. Louis for $8.5 million. Thomas and Wilbur Mays, sons of the founder of the May Company, were sent to manage the former Hamburger store. One of the first things that they did was to expand the store again by building adjacent additions on the other parts of the city block. After several more years, the May Company store eventually occupied almost the entire block between Broadway and Hill and between 8th and 9th Streets. The old Hamburger store was officially renamed the May Company in 1927.
To keep pace with the extreme growth in population within Southern California during the Great Depression, May Company opened the first branch store in 1939 on Wilshire at Fairfax at a cost of $2 million.
After World War II, a second branch store was completed in 1947 on Crenshaw. A proposed store in Hollywood that was planned at the same time was never built.
A third branch store opened in Lakewood in 1952, followed by stores in North Hollywood in 1955, West Covina in 1957, and Redondo Beach in 1959.
The end of the 1950s saw May Company's expansion into the San Diego market with the opening of its eighth store at Mission Valley in 1960. Other stores that followed during the 1960s included Buena Park in 1963, Canoga Park in 1964, West Los Angeles in 1964, Whittier in 1964, Costa Mesa in 1966, Arcadia in 1966, San Bernardino in 1966, Montclair in 1968, and Carlsbad in 1969.
During the 1970s, stores were opened in Oxnard in 1970, El Cajon in 1972, Riverside in 1973, Eagle Rock in 1973, Orange in 1974, Westminster in 1974, Culver City in 1975, Brea in 1977, Thousand Oaks in 1978, Mission Viejo in 1979 and La Jolla in 1979.
During the next decade, stores were opened in Sherman Oaks in 1980, Pasadena in 1980, National City in 1981, Palos Verdes in 1981, Palm Desert in 1983, Montebello in 1985, and Escondido in 1986.
After a long period of declining sales, the original Downtown flagship store at 8th and Broadway was closed and replaced by a smaller store at Seventh Market Place in 1986. The parent company had previously relocated the main corporate offices for the May Company California division from the former Hamburger Building to the North Hollywood store at Laurel Plaza in 1983.
A new store was open in Bakersfield in 1988, while a store in Las Vegas was acquired from sister company Goldwater's in 1989 when parent company May Department Stores decided to cut costs by consolidating divisions. The Las Vegas store is the only location in which a pre-existing store was acquired from another organization instead of being built from scratch.
In the early 1990s, new stores were opened in Santa Ana in 1990, Valencia in 1992, and finally Moreno Valley in 1992.
At the same time, under-performing stores were closed in Arcadia in 1988, and Orange in 1991.
On October 17, 1992, May Company California's parent, May Department Stores, announced the merger of May Company California with its sister company J.W. Robinson's to form Robinson-May, thus ending the May Company California existence. It was also announced that the Wilshire store along with the stores in West Covina, Buena Park, Santa Ana, and San Bernardino were scheduled to close by the end of January 1993.
During the early part of this division existence, May Company was also the developer of some other early shopping centers and malls which grew around the initially stand-alone stores, with the Crenshaw location being the first example.
The first May Company store, the original Hamburger's, at Broadway and 8th in downtown Los Angeles was closed when it was replaced by the just opened 7th Market Place store in 1986. This building is designated as Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument No. 459. Since its sale, the building is primary used by small clothing manufacturing companies. In 2013, the then current owners were trying to sell the building since the surrounding area is being actively redeveloped. It was announced in April 2014 that Waterbridge Capital agreed to purchase the property, but had not given out too many details on how they might go about to develop it.
During the 1980s, the parent corporation tried to replace the iconic Wilshire store for several years by getting involved with mall development at Farmers Market. However the development that eventually became The Grove at Farmers Market was delayed for nearly two decades. The St. Louis-based parent company eventually withdrew from the project and the Wilshire store was never replaced when May Company California was later merged with Robinson in 1993. After closing, the Streamline Moderne style building was sold to Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1994 and is currently slated to house The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.