Marshall Field and Company Building
Encyclopedia
Marshall Field and Company Building or Macy's at State Street is the former flagship location of the former Marshall Field's
department store
and the current location of the Chicago
flagship of Macy's
. The building is located in the Chicago Loop
community area
in Cook County, Illinois
, United States, and it takes up the entire city block
bounded clockwise from the west by North State Street
, East Randolph Street
, North Wabash Avenue, and East Washington Street. The former department store established numerous important business firsts in this building, and it is regarded as one of the three most influential establishments in the nationwide development of the department store. Both the building name and the name of the stores formerly headquartered at this building changed names on September 9, 2006 as a result of the merger of the May Department Stores
(Marshall Field's former parent) with the Federated Department Stores
which led to the integration of the Marshall Field's stores into the Macy's retailing network.
The building, which is the second largest store in the world, was both declared a National Historic Landmark
and listed on the National Register of Historic Places
on June 2, 1978, and it was designated a Chicago Landmark
on November 1, 2005. The building architecture is known for its multiple atria
and for having been built in stages over the course of more than two decades. Its ornamentation includes a Tiffany & Co.
mosaic
ceiling and a pair of well-known outdoor clocks, which serve as symbols of the store.
Although the official corporate name of the retail entity based in this building had been Marshall Field & Company (nicknamed Marshall Field's) from 1881 until 2006, the store has had five different names since its inception in 1852 as P. Palmer & Co. In 1868, after bowing out of involvement in day to day operations with his new partners of Field, Palmer & Leiter, Potter Palmer
convinced Marshall Field
and Levi Leiter
to move the Field, Leiter & Co. store to a building Palmer owned on State Street at the corner of Washington Street. After being consumed by the Great Chicago Fire
and splitting the wholesale business from the retail operations, the store resumed operations at State and Washington in a building leased from the Singer Sewing Machine Company. In 1877 another fire consumed this building, and when a new Singer Building was built to replace it at the same location in 1879, Field purchased it. The business has remained there ever since, and it has added four subsequent buildings to form the integrated structure that is now called the Marshall Field and Company Building.
Chicago's retailing center was State Street in the downtown Loop
after the Great Chicago Fire
of 1871, and this center has been anchored by Marshall Field's
and its predecessor companies in this building. However, commuter suburbs began to have significant retail districts by the 1920s. In the 1920s, the store created new suburban locations such as Marshall Field and Company Store to remain competitive. After 1950, suburban development and the Magnificent Mile
reduced the role of the Loop's daily significance to many Chicagoans as downtown retail sales slipped. Eventually, there was an influx of stores from other parts of the country. Nonetheless, the Marshall Field and Company Building has survived at this location. However, with the conversion to Macy's the emphasis of the store changed and store branded lines replaced many designer labels, such as Dolce & Gabbana
, Prada
, Miu Miu
and Jimmy Choo
, which led to the disassembly of several designer departments (see picture below).
On September 9, 2006, at the time of the store conversion, the name of the building was officially changed to "Macy's at State Street." Around the time of the conversion of Marshall Field's to Macy's the building was the location of picketing and protesting by opponents of the conversion. After buying out his various partners, Marshall Field
founded the Marshall Field & Company corporate entity that survived 152 years and had this building constructed. The sentimental objections to the conversion that both eliminated the existence of the corporate entity bearing his name and renamed the building bearing his name were widely reported in the national media
.
, provided the first in-store dining facilities and established the first European buying office. The former store also was the first to provide Personal shopping assistants. In the early 1900s, annual sales topped $60 million, and buying branches were located in New York City, London, Paris, Tokyo, Stockholm
and Berlin.
The building has hosted the first escalator
s in a department store and continues to be the second largest store in the world. Marshall Field took over the operations of the store in 1881 and became the first merchant to post the price of the goods in plain sight, which eliminated the common practice of haggling and charging whatever the buyer would pay. On top of that, Field stood behind his product with his famous slogan that symbolized his willingness to refund the full price of all merchandise (a policy inherited from Potter Palmer) purchased in his store:
building was constructed in stages between 1892 and 1914 on a partitioned block with sections that were added to the building in 1902, 1906, 1907, and 1914. Although he died before they were constructed, Charles B. Atwood
of D. H. Burnham & Company
designed the two primary sections along State Street (The north building built in 1902 and the south in 1907). For a time, the building was the largest store in the world at 73 acres (295,420.8 m²) of floorspace, with the largest book, china, shoe, and toy departments of all the world's department stores.
The current building has several atria: A Tiffany & Co. mosaic dome caps a 5-story atrium in the southwest corner; the northwest section has a 13-story skylit atrium, and a newer atrium with a fountain in the center is bridged by double escalator banks. The Tiffany Dome is over 6000 square feet (557.4 m²), and it is the first iridescent glass dome and it continues to be the largest glass mosaic of its kind. Only Egypt
's 3,000-year-old Temple of Karnak, with its 70 feet (21.3 m) columns rivals the four 50 feet (15.2 m) Ionic granite columns on the State Street façade
.
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The building is known for its clocks, which weigh about 7.5 short tons (6.7 LT) each, on its northwest and southwest corners along State Street at both Randolph and Washington. The southwest clock, known as the Great Clock, was installed on November 26, 1897. Marshall Field envisioned the clock as a beacon for his store which he viewed as a meeting place. The clock was installed after the southwest corner of the store had become a popular meeting place and people began leaving notes for one another on the Marshall Field's windows. The clock was an attempt to end this practice, and encourage punctuality.
Today, the building is located at 111 North State Street within the Loop Retail Historic District
of the Chicago Loop across State Street from Block 37, across Randolph Street from the Joffrey Tower
, and across Wabash Avenue from The Heritage at Millennium Park
. An underground public concourse connects the basement to 25 East Washington, which used to house the Marshall Field's Men's Store. The building is a major hub of the Chicago Pedway
.
traditions: it is known as the former production site of Frango
and for the Walnut Room Christmas tree
. It also hosts an ornate window display at the street level. The window display includes thirteen themed windows along State Street that in recent years have displayed the unfolding of stories of Snow White
, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
, Paddington Bear
, The Night Before Christmas, Harry Potter
, and Cinderella
. Annually a three-story tall Christmas tree is brought in for the holiday season. With all the opposition to the conversion, Macy's made a formal statement of their intent to continue the traditions of a 45 feet (13.716 m) Christmas tree, a seventh floor Frango viewing kitchen, and animated holiday window displays.
On November 3, 1945, Norman Rockwell
drew a picture of one of the Marshall Field Building clocks on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post. The Rockwell painting shows a man perched atop a ladder and adjusting one of the Marshall Field's clock to correspond with his own pocket watch. The Oriental Theatre
in the background proves this depicts the matching Great Clock at the northwest corner of the building at State & Randolph. In 1948, Rockwell donated the original painting, The Clock Mender, to the store, where it had hung on the seventh floor ever since. After Target Co. sold Field's to May Department Stores, which merged with Federated Department Stores
in 2005, the Federated discovered a reproduction on display. Federated removed the fake and asked Target to return the original. The painting has been donated to the Chicago Historical Society, which had from February 26, 2000–May 21, 2000 been the second stop of the seven-city national Pictures for the American People tour of the first comprehensive Rockwell career exhibition that had been organized by the High Museum of Art
and the Norman Rockwell Museum
and that had also visited the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
, Corcoran Gallery of Art
, San Diego Museum of Art
and Phoenix Art Museum
.
In John Dos Passos
' novel The 42nd Parallel (1930), character Eric Egstrom is employed at this building. G. K. Chesterton
and Sinclair Lewis
met in the building's book department, which resulted in their collaboration on the unpublished play Mary Queen of Scotch.
Marshall Field's
Marshall Field & Company was a department store in Chicago, Illinois that grew to become a major chain before being acquired by Macy's Inc...
department store
Department store
A department store is a retail establishment which satisfies a wide range of the consumer's personal and residential durable goods product needs; and at the same time offering the consumer a choice of multiple merchandise lines, at variable price points, in all product categories...
and the current location of the Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
flagship of Macy's
Macy's
Macy's is a U.S. chain of mid-to-high range department stores. In addition to its flagship Herald Square location in New York City, the company operates over 800 stores in the United States...
. The building is located in the Chicago Loop
Chicago Loop
The Loop or Chicago Loop is one of 77 officially designated Chicago community areas located in the City of Chicago, Illinois. It is the historic commercial center of downtown Chicago...
community area
Community areas of Chicago
Community areas in Chicago refers to the work of the Social Science Research Committee at University of Chicago which has unofficially divided the City of Chicago into 77 community areas. These areas are well-defined and static...
in Cook County, Illinois
Cook County, Illinois
Cook County is a county in the U.S. state of Illinois, with its county seat in Chicago. It is the second most populous county in the United States after Los Angeles County. The county has 5,194,675 residents, which is 40.5 percent of all Illinois residents. Cook County's population is larger than...
, United States, and it takes up the entire city block
City block
A city block, urban block or simply block is a central element of urban planning and urban design. A city block is the smallest area that is surrounded by streets. City blocks are the space for buildings within the street pattern of a city, they form the basic unit of a city's urban fabric...
bounded clockwise from the west by North State Street
State Street (Chicago)
State Street is a large south-north street in Chicago, Illinois, USA and its south suburbs. It begins on the Near North Side at North Avenue. For much of its course, it lies between Wabash Avenue on the east and Dearborn Street/Lafayette Avenue on the west...
, East Randolph Street
Randolph Street (Chicago)
Randolph Street is a street in Chicago. It runs east-west through the Chicago Loop, carrying westbound traffic west from Michigan Avenue across the Chicago River on the Randolph Street Bridge, interchanging with the Kennedy Expressway , and continuing west. It serves as the northern boundary of...
, North Wabash Avenue, and East Washington Street. The former department store established numerous important business firsts in this building, and it is regarded as one of the three most influential establishments in the nationwide development of the department store. Both the building name and the name of the stores formerly headquartered at this building changed names on September 9, 2006 as a result of the merger of the May Department Stores
May Department Stores
The May Department Stores Company was a national department store chain in the United States, founded in 1877 by David May. The company ceased to exist in 2005 when it was merged with Federated Department Stores, Inc . Prior to the merger it was headquartered in Downtown St. Louis, Missouri...
(Marshall Field's former parent) with the Federated Department Stores
Federated Department Stores
Macy's, Inc. is a department store holding company and owner of Macy's and Bloomingdale's department stores. Macy's Inc.'s stores specialize mostly in retail clothing, jewelery, watches, dinnerware, and furniture....
which led to the integration of the Marshall Field's stores into the Macy's retailing network.
The building, which is the second largest store in the world, was both declared a National Historic Landmark
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark is a building, site, structure, object, or district, that is officially recognized by the United States government for its historical significance...
and listed on the National Register of Historic Places
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...
on June 2, 1978, and it was designated a Chicago Landmark
Chicago Landmark
Chicago Landmark is a designation of the Mayor of Chicago and the Chicago City Council for historic buildings and other sites in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Listed sites are selected after meeting a combination of criteria, including historical, economic, architectural, artistic, cultural,...
on November 1, 2005. The building architecture is known for its multiple atria
Atrium (architecture)
In modern architecture, an atrium is a large open space, often several stories high and having a glazed roof and/or large windows, often situated within a larger multistory building and often located immediately beyond the main entrance doors...
and for having been built in stages over the course of more than two decades. Its ornamentation includes a Tiffany & Co.
Tiffany & Co.
Tiffany & Co. is an American jewelry and silverware company. As part of its branding, the company is strongly associated with its Tiffany Blue , which is a registered trademark.- History :...
mosaic
Mosaic
Mosaic is the art of creating images with an assemblage of small pieces of colored glass, stone, or other materials. It may be a technique of decorative art, an aspect of interior decoration, or of cultural and spiritual significance as in a cathedral...
ceiling and a pair of well-known outdoor clocks, which serve as symbols of the store.
Business history
Potter Palmer
Potter Palmer was an American businessman who was responsible for much of the development of State Street in Chicago.-Retailing career:...
convinced Marshall Field
Marshall Field
Marshall Field was founder of Marshall Field and Company, the Chicago-based department stores.-Life and career:...
and Levi Leiter
Levi Leiter
Levi Ziegler Leiter was a Chicago businessman. He co-founded what became the Marshall Field & Company retail empire.-Biography:...
to move the Field, Leiter & Co. store to a building Palmer owned on State Street at the corner of Washington Street. After being consumed by the Great Chicago Fire
Great Chicago Fire
The Great Chicago Fire was a conflagration that burned from Sunday, October 8, to early Tuesday, October 10, 1871, killing hundreds and destroying about in Chicago, Illinois. Though the fire was one of the largest U.S...
and splitting the wholesale business from the retail operations, the store resumed operations at State and Washington in a building leased from the Singer Sewing Machine Company. In 1877 another fire consumed this building, and when a new Singer Building was built to replace it at the same location in 1879, Field purchased it. The business has remained there ever since, and it has added four subsequent buildings to form the integrated structure that is now called the Marshall Field and Company Building.
Chicago's retailing center was State Street in the downtown Loop
Chicago Loop
The Loop or Chicago Loop is one of 77 officially designated Chicago community areas located in the City of Chicago, Illinois. It is the historic commercial center of downtown Chicago...
after the Great Chicago Fire
Great Chicago Fire
The Great Chicago Fire was a conflagration that burned from Sunday, October 8, to early Tuesday, October 10, 1871, killing hundreds and destroying about in Chicago, Illinois. Though the fire was one of the largest U.S...
of 1871, and this center has been anchored by Marshall Field's
Marshall Field's
Marshall Field & Company was a department store in Chicago, Illinois that grew to become a major chain before being acquired by Macy's Inc...
and its predecessor companies in this building. However, commuter suburbs began to have significant retail districts by the 1920s. In the 1920s, the store created new suburban locations such as Marshall Field and Company Store to remain competitive. After 1950, suburban development and the Magnificent Mile
Magnificent Mile
The Magnificent Mile, sometimes referred to as The Mag Mile, is a neighborhood in Chicago, Illinois, that runs along a portion of Michigan Avenue extending from the Chicago River to Oak Street in the Near North Side community area. The district is located adjacent to downtown; it is also one block...
reduced the role of the Loop's daily significance to many Chicagoans as downtown retail sales slipped. Eventually, there was an influx of stores from other parts of the country. Nonetheless, the Marshall Field and Company Building has survived at this location. However, with the conversion to Macy's the emphasis of the store changed and store branded lines replaced many designer labels, such as Dolce & Gabbana
Dolce & Gabbana
Dolce & Gabbana is an Italian luxury industry fashion house. The company was started by the Italian designers Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana in Milan, Italy. By 2005 their turnover was €597 million....
, Prada
Prada
Prada S.p.A. is an Italian fashion label specializing in luxury goods for men and women , founded by Mario Prada.-Foundations:...
, Miu Miu
Miu Miu
Miu Miu is a high fashion brand from the Prada fashion house, opened in 1993 and headed by Miuccia Prada. The name of the collection is taken from Miuccia Prada’s nickname.-Stores:...
and Jimmy Choo
Jimmy Choo
Dato' Jimmy Choo, OBE, born Choo Yeang Keat, is a Malaysian fashion designer based in London, United Kingdom. He is best known for founding Jimmy Choo Ltd that became known for its handmade women's shoes....
, which led to the disassembly of several designer departments (see picture below).
On September 9, 2006, at the time of the store conversion, the name of the building was officially changed to "Macy's at State Street." Around the time of the conversion of Marshall Field's to Macy's the building was the location of picketing and protesting by opponents of the conversion. After buying out his various partners, Marshall Field
Marshall Field
Marshall Field was founder of Marshall Field and Company, the Chicago-based department stores.-Life and career:...
founded the Marshall Field & Company corporate entity that survived 152 years and had this building constructed. The sentimental objections to the conversion that both eliminated the existence of the corporate entity bearing his name and renamed the building bearing his name were widely reported in the national media
News media (United States)
Mass media are the means through which information is transmitted to a large audience. This includes newspapers, television, radio, and more recently the Internet. Those who provide news and information, and the outlets for which they work, are known as the news media.Some high-quality news media...
.
Business legend
The store housed a business that established new retailing standards and broke many retailing conventions of the day. The company quickly became successful, and by the 1880s it was one of the three largest retailers in the country. Before Marshall Field's death in 1906, his company became the largest wholesale and retail dry goods enterprise in the world. The Marshall Field's & Company offered the first bridal registryBridal registry
A bridal registry is a service provided by a website or retail store to assist engaged couples in the communication of gift preferences to wedding guests. Selecting items from store stock, the couple lists desired items and files this list with the chosen merchant. The list is then made available...
, provided the first in-store dining facilities and established the first European buying office. The former store also was the first to provide Personal shopping assistants. In the early 1900s, annual sales topped $60 million, and buying branches were located in New York City, London, Paris, Tokyo, Stockholm
Stockholm
Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...
and Berlin.
The building has hosted the first escalator
Escalator
An escalator is a moving staircase – a conveyor transport device for carrying people between floors of a building. The device consists of a motor-driven chain of individual, linked steps that move up or down on tracks, allowing the step treads to remain horizontal.Escalators are used around the...
s in a department store and continues to be the second largest store in the world. Marshall Field took over the operations of the store in 1881 and became the first merchant to post the price of the goods in plain sight, which eliminated the common practice of haggling and charging whatever the buyer would pay. On top of that, Field stood behind his product with his famous slogan that symbolized his willingness to refund the full price of all merchandise (a policy inherited from Potter Palmer) purchased in his store:
Building details
The 12-story graniteGranite
Granite is a common and widely occurring type of intrusive, felsic, igneous rock. Granite usually has a medium- to coarse-grained texture. Occasionally some individual crystals are larger than the groundmass, in which case the texture is known as porphyritic. A granitic rock with a porphyritic...
building was constructed in stages between 1892 and 1914 on a partitioned block with sections that were added to the building in 1902, 1906, 1907, and 1914. Although he died before they were constructed, Charles B. Atwood
Charles B. Atwood
Charles B. Atwood was an architect who designed several buildings and a large number of secondary structures for the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. He also designed a number of notable buildings in the city of Chicago....
of D. H. Burnham & Company
D. H. Burnham & Company
D.H. Burnham and Company of was an architecture firm based in Chicago, Illinois. As successor to Burnham and Root, the name was changed once John Root died in 1891. Root was the chief consulting architect for the World's Columbian Exposition. After Root's death, Daniel Burnham took that title...
designed the two primary sections along State Street (The north building built in 1902 and the south in 1907). For a time, the building was the largest store in the world at 73 acres (295,420.8 m²) of floorspace, with the largest book, china, shoe, and toy departments of all the world's department stores.
The current building has several atria: A Tiffany & Co. mosaic dome caps a 5-story atrium in the southwest corner; the northwest section has a 13-story skylit atrium, and a newer atrium with a fountain in the center is bridged by double escalator banks. The Tiffany Dome is over 6000 square feet (557.4 m²), and it is the first iridescent glass dome and it continues to be the largest glass mosaic of its kind. Only Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
's 3,000-year-old Temple of Karnak, with its 70 feet (21.3 m) columns rivals the four 50 feet (15.2 m) Ionic granite columns on the State Street façade
Facade
A facade or façade is generally one exterior side of a building, usually, but not always, the front. The word comes from the French language, literally meaning "frontage" or "face"....
.
Today, the building is located at 111 North State Street within the Loop Retail Historic District
Loop Retail Historic District
Loop Retail Historic District is a shopping district within the Chicago Loop community area in Cook County, Illinois, United States. It is bounded by Lake Street to the north, Congress Parkway to the south, State Street to the west and Wabash Avenue to the east...
of the Chicago Loop across State Street from Block 37, across Randolph Street from the Joffrey Tower
Joffrey Tower
The Joffrey Tower is a high-rise commercial real estate development on the northeast corner of North State Street and East Randolph Street in the Loop community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States that is the permanent home of the Joffrey Ballet...
, and across Wabash Avenue from The Heritage at Millennium Park
The Heritage at Millennium Park
The Heritage at Millennium Park located at 130 N. Garland Court is a relatively new mixed use tower in Chicago. Completed in 2005 with a height of 631 feet and 57 floors, the building was designed by the architectural firm Solomon Cordwell Buenz .The tower's success lies mainly with its location;...
. An underground public concourse connects the basement to 25 East Washington, which used to house the Marshall Field's Men's Store. The building is a major hub of the Chicago Pedway
Chicago Pedway
The Chicago Pedway is a network of tunnels, ground-level concourses and overhead bridges connecting skyscrapers, retail stores, hotels and train stations throughout the central business district of Chicago, Illinois. Having a length of more than 40 downtown blocks, it contains shops, restaurants...
.
Traditions and popular culture
The building has several ChristmasChristmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
traditions: it is known as the former production site of Frango
Frango
Frango mints are a brand of chocolate truffles first created for the Frederick & Nelson department stores. Traditionally flavored with mint and widely popularized by the Marshall Field and Company department store, they are now produced and distributed by Macy's department stores...
and for the Walnut Room Christmas tree
Christmas tree
The Christmas tree is a decorated evergreen coniferous tree, real or artificial, and a tradition associated with the celebration of Christmas. The tradition of decorating an evergreen tree at Christmas started in Livonia and Germany in the 16th century...
. It also hosts an ornate window display at the street level. The window display includes thirteen themed windows along State Street that in recent years have displayed the unfolding of stories of Snow White
Snow White
"Snow White" is a fairy tale known from many countries in Europe, the best known version being the German one collected by the Brothers Grimm...
, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a 1964 children's book by British author Roald Dahl. The story features the adventures of young Charlie Bucket inside the chocolate factory of the eccentric chocolatier, Willy Wonka....
, Paddington Bear
Paddington Bear
Paddington Bear is a fictional character in children's literature. He appeared on 13 October 1958 and was subsequently featured in several books, most recently in 2008, written by Michael Bond and first illustrated by Peggy Fortnum....
, The Night Before Christmas, Harry Potter
Harry Potter
Harry Potter is a series of seven fantasy novels written by the British author J. K. Rowling. The books chronicle the adventures of the adolescent wizard Harry Potter and his best friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry...
, and Cinderella
Cinderella
"Cinderella; or, The Little Glass Slipper" is a folk tale embodying a myth-element of unjust oppression/triumphant reward. Thousands of variants are known throughout the world. The title character is a young woman living in unfortunate circumstances that are suddenly changed to remarkable fortune...
. Annually a three-story tall Christmas tree is brought in for the holiday season. With all the opposition to the conversion, Macy's made a formal statement of their intent to continue the traditions of a 45 feet (13.716 m) Christmas tree, a seventh floor Frango viewing kitchen, and animated holiday window displays.
On November 3, 1945, Norman Rockwell
Norman Rockwell
Norman Percevel Rockwell was a 20th-century American painter and illustrator. His works enjoy a broad popular appeal in the United States for their reflection of American culture. Rockwell is most famous for the cover illustrations of everyday life scenarios he created for The Saturday Evening...
drew a picture of one of the Marshall Field Building clocks on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post. The Rockwell painting shows a man perched atop a ladder and adjusting one of the Marshall Field's clock to correspond with his own pocket watch. The Oriental Theatre
Oriental Theatre (Chicago)
The Ford Center for the Performing Arts Oriental Theatre is a theater located at 24 West Randolph Street in the Loop area of downtown Chicago, Illinois. Opened in 1926 as a deluxe movie palace, today the Oriental is operated by Broadway In Chicago, a subsidiary of the Nederlander Organization...
in the background proves this depicts the matching Great Clock at the northwest corner of the building at State & Randolph. In 1948, Rockwell donated the original painting, The Clock Mender, to the store, where it had hung on the seventh floor ever since. After Target Co. sold Field's to May Department Stores, which merged with Federated Department Stores
Federated Department Stores
Macy's, Inc. is a department store holding company and owner of Macy's and Bloomingdale's department stores. Macy's Inc.'s stores specialize mostly in retail clothing, jewelery, watches, dinnerware, and furniture....
in 2005, the Federated discovered a reproduction on display. Federated removed the fake and asked Target to return the original. The painting has been donated to the Chicago Historical Society, which had from February 26, 2000–May 21, 2000 been the second stop of the seven-city national Pictures for the American People tour of the first comprehensive Rockwell career exhibition that had been organized by the High Museum of Art
High Museum of Art
The High Museum of Art , located in Atlanta, is the leading art museum in the Southeastern United States and one of the most-visited art museums in the world. Located on Peachtree Street in Midtown, the city's arts district, the High is a division of the Woodruff Arts Center.-History:The Museum was...
and the Norman Rockwell Museum
Norman Rockwell Museum
The Norman Rockwell Museum is home to the world's largest collection of original Rockwell art.-History:Founded in 1969, the museum is located in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, where Rockwell lived the last 25 years of his life. The museum has been at its current location since 1993. The museum...
and that had also visited the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum is a well-known museum located on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, United States. It is the permanent home to a renowned collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, early Modern, and contemporary art and also features special exhibitions...
, Corcoran Gallery of Art
Corcoran Gallery of Art
The Corcoran Gallery of Art is the largest privately supported cultural institution in Washington, DC. The museum's main focus is American art. The permanent collection includes works by Rembrandt, Eugène Delacroix, Edgar Degas, Thomas Gainsborough, John Singer Sargent, Claude Monet, Pablo...
, San Diego Museum of Art
San Diego Museum of Art
The San Diego Museum of Art is a fine arts museum located in Balboa Park in San Diego, California that houses a broad collection with particular strength in Spanish art. The San Diego Museum of Art opened as The Fine Arts Gallery of San Diego on February 28, 1926, and changed its name to the San...
and Phoenix Art Museum
Phoenix art museum
The Phoenix Art Museum is the Southwest United States' largest art museum for visual art. Located in Phoenix, Arizona, the museum is . It displays international exhibitions alongside its comprehensive collection of more than 18,000 works of American, Asian, European, Latin American, Western...
.
In John Dos Passos
John Dos Passos
John Roderigo Dos Passos was an American novelist and artist.-Early life:Born in Chicago, Illinois, Dos Passos was the illegitimate son of John Randolph Dos Passos , a distinguished lawyer of Madeiran Portuguese descent, and Lucy Addison Sprigg Madison of Petersburg, Virginia. The elder Dos Passos...
' novel The 42nd Parallel (1930), character Eric Egstrom is employed at this building. G. K. Chesterton
G. K. Chesterton
Gilbert Keith Chesterton, KC*SG was an English writer. His prolific and diverse output included philosophy, ontology, poetry, plays, journalism, public lectures and debates, literary and art criticism, biography, Christian apologetics, and fiction, including fantasy and detective fiction....
and Sinclair Lewis
Sinclair Lewis
Harry Sinclair Lewis was an American novelist, short-story writer, and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, "for his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of...
met in the building's book department, which resulted in their collaboration on the unpublished play Mary Queen of Scotch.