Montgomery Wards
University Avenue and Hamline Avenue, St. Paul, MN
The name may fall on deaf ears for those of the internet generation, yet Montgomery Wards is a powerhouse in the history of American retailing. Stretching coast to coast long before Wal-Mart, Target, or other big-box retailers existed, Americans across the nation fondly remember Montgomery Wards as a place to find anything.
The company was first to issue a mail-order catalog—a veritable book that offered everything from toys to furniture to entire houses.(1) Upon receiving the catalog, customers simply filled out a form, mailed it with payment, and awaited a shipment of their desired items. Catalogs were shipped to even the most remote American families—the now-defunct company helped to decentralize goods distribution and to spread consumerism beyond urban centers.(2)
Mongotmer Wards on University Avenue in 1950, when the site was part of a queer sexual underground. Image courtesy of the Minnesota Historical Society. |
St. Paul’s Montgomery Ward building was the tallest structure between downtown Minneapolis and downtown St. Paul—the building was a reflection of the Sears and Roebuck building (now the Midtown Exchange) on Lake Street in Minneapolis.
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Along with many other sites in the queer history of St. Paul, Montgomery Wards was part of an underground network of queer male cruising.(3) Men met and engaged in furtive sexual activity in the “Wards” toilets long before The Town House Bar opened across the street in 1969. Like department stores, Wards was an enormous place of constant activity. Unlike high-end department stores, the inexpensive nature of the retailer likely permitted poor men to participate.
The advent of big-box retailing spelled doom for mail-order catalog companies in the 1980s. With a regrettable lack of foresight, The City of St. Paul demolished the behemoth structure in 1996 and replaced the landmark with Montgomery Wards’ successor—Wal-Mart.(4)
(1) Alxelrod, Alan and Phillips, Charles. What Every American Should Know About American History: 225 Events That Shaped the Nation. Massachusetts: Adams Media, 2008. Pages 162-163.
(2) Blanke, David. Sowing the American Dream: How Consumer Culture Took Root in the Rural Midwest." Ohio: Ohio University Press, 2000. Pages 182-220.
(3) Brown, Ricardo J. The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's: A Gay Life in the 1940s. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2001. Page 8.
(4) Millet, Larry. Twin Cities The and Now. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1996. Pages 179-180.
Part of Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN: 100 Queer Places in Minnesota History, (1860-1969), (1969-2010)
