Old Hardware Stores

JK Knives

JK Knives

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Does anyone else have a fascination with these? When I was growing up (and until the mid 1980`s when it burned down), we had a family owned hardware store in our town. It was one of those places where if you looked long enough you could find almost everything. Back in those days you could go there to pay your utility bills instead of mailing them. I bought my first pellet gun there 48 years ago, and still have it. I can remember two big floor model knife displays, one for Case knives, and one for Kabar knives. They carried everything, we used to buy Christmas gifts there for my Mom and Dad.
One of the things Connie and I love to do is travel the back roads through small off the beaten path towns. A lot of them still have family owned (not big chain stores like Ace or True Value) hardware stores. Some still carry knife displays, and sometimes at old prices. There was one store in Du Quoin Illinois that when Schrade knives went out of business (the USA made Schrade), I offered to buy the few remaining knives if they would sell me the countertop display case, which they did. Anyone else enjoy doing this sort of thing?
 
We had a hardware/feed store like that in my hometown when I was a kid, it has long since become a Southern States. They still had a display of glass jars of hard candy sticks that I got to choose from every time I went in with Dad. As I recall they never let Dad pay for the candy, always telling me that they were "putting it on my tab". I never did settle my debt there.

Now I'm on the road a lot, not like a truck driver but I put 40k on a vehicle for work every year, all over the state. I enjoy stopping in local gun stores, pawn shops, and variety stores in the small towns I pass through. I rarely buy anything, but I like looking and speaking with the folks that work in and hang out around those places.
 
IN TINLEY PARK, IL WE HAD:
BETTENHAUSEN HARDWARE (THEY WERE AN ACE OR TRUE VALUE AFFILIATE) huge Case knife display and lot's of Schrade and Camillus
WESTERN AUTO STORE (Great bike parts section) best price on .22 pellets, lots of Colonial and Imperial knives,
I.N.R. Beatty Lumber & Hardware Best prices on Blake & Lamb traps
FS feed and farm supply.. good source for bulk seed for my green manure and cover crop experiments.

In my dad's home town (Lewistown, IL)there was a Gambles affiliate that had "everyday low prices" prices on Hiawatha Brand Shot shells, and if you were old enuf to reach the counter, you were old enuf to buy them!
All now gone........ f/u Menards, Home Depot, Builders Square
I do business with an old family owned Ace affiliate in Lansing, but they don't have that old time look.
 
Love em, found a great I've in Georgia when we went to visit saint Simons, stocked up on some stuff even though it just meant carting it all back to Kentucky, always rather buy from There then a chain.
 
Heck yah !

Shock's Hardware !
That was a REAL hardware store. I bought my favorite little pocket knife there, a small Western Stockman with blades that actually rust. Remember those ? (ha, ha, of course you do I'm just blabbing).

Mr. Shock, short guy that was about as wide as he was tall and all muscle, really great guy and smart, he would thread pipe for you or advise you on any number of house hold needs.

Mrs. Shock, smart as a whip, photographic memory (all her kids went to college and played the piano) . . .
people off the street (touristy area in "Old Town") would poke their head in and say "My gosh ! HOW do you ever FIND anything? " (many of the tables were kind of piled up and eclectic). Miss Shock would reply "Because I PUT it there . . that's how".

They retired and closed up many years ago. I MISS THEM !

My first job I had while I was still in High School that I actually liked . . . was in a fairly large hardware store in Pueblo Colorado at 4th and Main. Robinson Gardner Hardware. Closed very long ago.
We sold every thing from fertilizer and nails by the pound to little stuffed birds, place settings and bicycles. We even had a dynamite room. in a tunnel under the street. No dynamite in it then though. Mr. Mac sent me to Schwinn Factory traing Bicycle Mechanic School. It cost him some serious bucks and I made it worth his money.

Those were the days.
My current favorite independent hardware store is McGukin's. If you are ever through Boulder Colorado check them out. First place I ever found that sold Filson wool vests. TOTALLY WORTH GETTING ONE OF THOSE !

 
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When I was growing up there was a neighborhood hardware store that was great. You could find anything there and we used to go there all the time. It is a shame now that everything is cookie cutter and they are all the same.
 
Schlaffer's Hardware in Appleton, Wisconsin. Down in the basement there was a catacomb said to extend underneath College Avenue, lined with musty bins full of left-hand hinges and brass doo-dads. You could get anything necessary there, like steel ball bearings when spirng came and it was time to play marbles. Sniff. Gone now.:upset:
 
Really enjoying reading about these. B JACKSON, I remember some of those stores, when we were young we would ride the train from Mokena to Tinley Park to do some Christmas shopping. There used to be a department store right by the railroad station (the building is still there), where I bought my Mom a glass Prancer Junior knick knack for Christmas when I was 10 years old (52 years ago), which I am looking at on the shelf right now. Then there was the soda fountain in the drugstore and the old Ben Franklin, good memories!
 
The dept. store mentioned was called Vogts, earlier on was know as Bremen Cash Store. went out of business mid 60's. Building got some crappy restoration's and then a few years ago was torn down to make way for new downton development that never happened. Here is a pic from it's last moments. The old Rock Island train station that was across the street is also gone, they knocked that down & built a new, more modern one about 1/2 block north. the Farm Supply store was demolished to make room for the station parking lot.Bettenhausen Hardware is now a restaurant, Western Auto is now a closed up jewelry store. Ben Franklin is a resale shop. The soda fountain hung in there (Cavete's Drugs) until the 80's. Progress






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That's the one, I was thinking it was still there, last I remember it was some kind of paint store, I think.
 
Looks like Cotter & Co. (True Value) may become the next ones to move their HQ out of Illinois (Kansas City). Poor Rahm!
Thought you might like this pic I found!


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Mr. Carol Johnson painted this scene of the interior of his family's hardware store in Alta Vista, Kansas. Johnson was a commercial illustrator who lived on the East coast for many decades but always claimed to be a Midwesterner at heart. This delightfully detailed painting depicts his love for the small town life he left behind.

Wolgast Hardware served town dwellers as well as area farmers for about fifty years beginning in the 1920s. Located on Main Street, the store was operated by Johnson's uncle, Lawrence Wolgast. Johnson was living in Connecticut when he created the painting from a salesman's snapshot. Although largely true to the photograph, the painting does incorporate a clerk and customer modeled after two of Johnson's neighbors. Wolgast Hardware closed in the 1970s and the building was torn down.

Johnson lived and worked in New York and Connecticut for over 50 years, illustrating for magazines and advertising agencies. He always flew a Kansas flag in his backyard. This painting was included in his professional portfolio and featured in a 1982 calendar. It is oil on cardboard, and was painted in 1955.

Johnson painted this work after World War II, at a time when small town life was in the decline. After years of rural flight, though, cities and their suburbs began to look tired and worn to many people. Some small towns started to experience a renaissance in the 1980s, when a poll indicated most Americans believed the ideal place to live was in the country.

Depopulation of rural areas continues today, and there are worries that small town living is an endangered lifestyle. Johnson's work is both an exceptional document of his family's business and a testament to a way of life. It is in the collections of the Kansas Museum of History.
 
An old time store was closing here so my brother and I checked it out .Packed with all kinds of stuff to the ceiling !! Most people just looked at the visible stuff.What fools because behind the counter , in the drawers were lots of goodies ! Good brands and I still have the knives I bought there. If you had something old that needed repair you might find the parts in a place like that.
Even in antique shops look in the corners .When my brother was married we were checking out some places. At the bottom of a display case mostly hidden was a fine carving set.I asked him if he had a set ? No, but now he has one !! Excellent condition ,excellent price ! Check them out, they are disappearing fast !
 
The local hardware store in my area, Fredericksurg Hardware (in Fred. Va),lasted into the late 90's and early 2000's. It was the place I would love to go when I worked downtown to check out the knife display. They would have Boker, case and some others in the turnabout display case. Old Mr. Quann used to let me look and handle some pieces, quality pieces, and I actually got my first real knife, a Blackjack 1-7 with leather handle there. I had enough to buy it, but not enough to pay the tax on it, so he just told the cashier to ring it up as is. Still have it and still one of my favorites. In the store, another older gentleman named Rudy would always know where to find the hard to find pieces to finish a job or get everyone their seeds for the garden. The building is gone, but has a lot of memories.
 
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