All right, well, thank you for agreeing to talk with us today. Uh, we were
talking about Park Central mall, but it would start a little background
information. So first, if you could tell me your name. Naomi rumor, uh,
tell me a little bit about your family. Are you phoenix natives? You grew
up in the area? My, my family, Well, I'm one of 9 Children. I was married
in Tucson and then we heard about parque Central and that's how come we
moved up to phoenix?
We moved to phoenix specifically because of the absolutely came up here
for that. The opening
and what in particular drew you up for the opening? I'm sorry. What reason
? What specifically because of the mall opening brought you up from Tucson
? Is it just the opening of the, well, I mean, yes, we, you know signed a
lease and we were here to do business and We've been here since 1957. Okay
, so you were in Tucson and then essentially, originally I am from New
Jersey, but we met in Tucson were married there and they really came up to
phoenix.
Were you at the University of Arizona when you were in Tucson? No. Okay.
So what brought you from New Jersey? Oh, I had a sister. I have a sister
at that time. She was young and she was having a baby and my mother said,
um my parents said we want you to go um to be with her. And so I came when
people didn't fly
and came to Tucson and absolutely fell in love with Arizona and I knew
that's for me. So
and then you mentioned that you had heard about Park Central before
actually being in phoenix, you've heard about that, they were going to
build it. This was before the malls, you know, I'm not really too sure.
Just my husband was kind of, I guess he heard about the mall and through
sales people that were, there was a store in Tucson that belonged to his
parents and was called the Hall of Cards. And so my husband did a lot of
the buying and I guess he heard that there was a store coming in phoenix,
a shopping center and he became very interested. Okay, and what was your
husband's Bruce Bruce? And so he signed a lease and you open a store in
which store was that? And that was rumors, rumors, rumors, distinctive
gifts. Okay, it's probably, I haven't um I brought this,
so if you want to take but this was his business card. Wonderful. And then
this is his stationary,
60 Bucks Central. Right. Yeah.
Wonderful. They took a copy of that, so. Okay.
Mhm. Okay. Um so
he operated a store here in the mall, correct? And were you involved with
this? I was, he taught me the businesses I was working and I was very
involved. Uh do you remember what the other stores were like, What the
mall was like at that time? First of all I know a lot of the stores. Right.
A lot. Okay. Yeah. Um You probably have a list of, a lot of them. Yeah.
Actually we have Ok yeah, let's try it here. Um So you mean in terms of
like your store specifically, what was the shopping experience for
shoppers there? It was great. It was an outdoor mel's. It was a
neighborhood, it was the first shopping center of course in phoenix so all
the stores from downtown moved what they called uptown. There was another
mall that opened and that was uptown plaza but it was just like a strip
and of course the leads here was Goldwater's and diamonds and pennies also
did come but a little later. But these were individual, a lot of not
change stores. A lot of individual people that only stores and maybe had
been in business before they opened up in Pakistan Shal. Okay. What was
your typical customer you like back then? Everybody? Young old because we
had a big greeting card business. So of course attracted a lot of people
and we were on a very good corner. Okay, in addition to greeting cards,
you mentioned gifts. We have gifts and greeting cards, independent
apartment and leather goods. And we did
wedding others and anything that had to be printed through albums,
catalogs that we took orders. Yeah graduation announcements, things like
that and of course cards for all the different seasons were always big and
lots and okay. Um We've seen photos of them all having special events for
those. They did they did they tried yes they did.
I actually can't think of any that would be so specific but they did have
attractions and people just came to the mall to eat to walk. They saw
people they knew people. It was very friendly mall. Okay.
Some of the things that we know happened here, they would have car shows,
they had some antique car shows, they actually had
the phoenix auto show was here for many years. They did other things with
like florists and Disney and things like that. Did you find that those
events tend to attract a lot of people? Yes. Yes it was you know families
came saturday. Yeah that was a big thing again around the holidays. They
also decorated and had nice things for families to come to. Uh huh. A lot
of modern malls open seven days a week. Was Park center mall in the early
days it was closed on Sundays how to kind of operate in terms hours and
days. Well at first when it opened there was no night hours and definitely
not sunday and slowly It started to be one or 2 nights a week and then it
was sunday and on and on as different places opened and required it so.
Mhm. My husband didn't love that, especially sunday
were there. What was the mix of stores at that time if you remember in
terms of just type clothing, shoe everything, shoes, jewelry, clothing,
Newbury, five and 10 the department stores
um drugstore
restaurants. Yeah a good mix enough to bring people in. And was it kind of
sort of one of everything or where there multiple multiple dress shops?
Multiple shoe stores? It just depended you know there were sporting goods
store in specialty stores like that and then it was like one of that type
but gift shops, there were several, there were southwest doors, a lot of
clothing stores, shoe stores. Yeah. Good variety. Okay. Did your sort of a
main competitor or it was, what was that like? Did it have a competitor?
Like did you have a main, Well we had
oh yeah a lot of people sold cards and gifts and yes there were yeah there
was but
my husband was an excellent businessman
and he
ran a very good working order business and we had a lot of good business
and um worked hard And I loved it. We did we loved it and we were there
for 20 years a long time. Um Did the store then move to another location?
Well we in the meantime opened because Christiane opened in 1961 and so we
did open in chris town and then from Christiane we went to another and so
on. So but we kept parque central. Okay. Until there were changes after 20
years there were a lot of changes going on possibly even with the
ownership, I'm not too sure so it was time for us to, we didn't sell it
moved on and left. Yeah. And did you shop in the mall as well as me
personally? Oh yeah, me my kids of course, yeah. Yeah. And at that time
did you live locally like in north central phoenix or were you somewhere
else in the city? Where was home during? Oh phoenix, yeah, live nearby.
Yes. Mhm.
Um and so everybody, the whole family kind of also shopped at Park Central.
Okay. Okay. Okay. Was the,
the uptown shopping center much of a competition for that or was Park
central place? Well, I think when chris town opened it was probably some
competition. Chris town was bigger and
indoor park central was outdoor and but then more people had moved and
come and um so I think Park Central never really fell down. It was still
always good and of course office buildings in the hospital and stuff like
that, so Okay. Yeah. When you were, you know, kind of initially in
business in the 60s, what was the, was the fashion like what we're what
customers wear. Oh um yeah,
I don't, you know, just, I don't really specific, you know, casual, but
more dressed up than say, well everything was more dressed up than today.
I mean today, Yes. Yeah, it's and that's why the clothing stores have a
tough time. Yeah, it's a lot a lot of fashion and of course gold voters
with such a leading store and so is diamonds.
Yeah, it was it was good. They were busy. Okay. In terms of
the mall, in terms of your own shopping, did you have a favorite store
that you frequented? Uh Not really, you know, just depending, you know
what I needed. And uh the merchants that privately owned their shops were
very friendly with each other and so I think we shopped there, we
participated in other businesses and stuff, but no real special. Um Right
, I'm not the biggest shopper.
Um and you'd mentioned signing the lease in the early sixties and opening
the shop at Park Central, you're there for 20 years. So would you be well
shop in the eighties, is that the timeline wrestling or I'm not going when
you said you were in Park center mall for 20 about 20 years. Yeah. So
since that's like, is it the early eighties when you closed? Probably
because this was 57 to 67 77. Yeah. Yeah. Um Yeah. Okay. Were there
specific reasons? I mean, business decline, was it just like different
clientele? I mean, what was, what was the reason for closing? Well, our
lease was up and then there were changes like I said, I think that
different people that own them all. There were changes with them as well.
And then of course the leases um the rental lease is quite a bit of
difference in money and then we already had two other stores in phoenix,
One in Christiane and then one in Los Arcos which is got stale. And we
also had some shops in san Diego. So
it was sad, very sad when we left Uh for us but it was the time was right
there were other stories leaving around the same. Um there were changes.
There were changes. Yes because we didn't have a 20 year lease. We
started with the 10 and then had to release. So I imagine other stores, I
don't know what kind of leases they had. But yeah there were changes
definitely. was Goldwater still there. Yes when you even in the early 80's
can I tell you a nice story about the Goldwater's okay in our store at
busy times there were long lines because we sold cards and they had to be
added up you know and not like on the register of 25 cents and 50 cents
you did it in your head. And Peggy Goldwater who was Barry Goldwater's
wife came into the store and the line was long. She didn't take what she
had in her hand and come up to the register and say I'm mrs Goldwater and
can you help me this? She stood in line with all the people and people
knew her hi Peggy hi Peggy and I thought oh my God she's a real lady right
and I didn't ask for anything special no matter who she was? I thought
that was great. Did barry Goldwater ever come to the store? Did you see
him at the mall? Um mm I don't really remember
him but she, she came to them all I'm sure she shopped at her store. Yeah.
Okay, wonderful. Um so we have other filters that kind of show them all
being decorated for holidays, like christmas and things like that. Can you
describe, do you remember that? Can you describe what it looked like kind
of how it was decorated? I'm not following like you've seen some photos
where they put up christmas, lights, holidays. I'm wondering if you have
like specific memories of that. Oh yes, definitely. They decorated, they
also had booths were they gift wrapped and the charge was to a group and
the money went to charity. So they did charitable things and it was a good
mall. It was, yeah. Okay.
Running down, was there a specific um way they would decorate like a style
that they have sort of a southwestern yet christmas style? Um Not not
specifically just different things I don't really remember but it was
always decorated and people would bring to show the tree and the, you know
and stuff like that. It was, it was the very first class, high class small.
Would they have a santa claus? And do the pictures with santa and things
like that. Do they do they have like a santa claus at the mall? Oh yes. Oh
yes. Oh yes, photographs. Oh yeah. everything.
Um Yeah. So do you have a particular like sort of fond memory like what's
your fondest memory of either running the store or shopping at the mall or
both? Uh Nothing specific you know I mean you know we called shoplifters
in our store. We had a very nice class of people. Uh We became friendly
with the customers. Um It was good it was we loved our work, we loved our
store and it was good. It was in the park Central mall was your first
store? Yes it was. Okay. Um Do you and your husband primarily continued to
work at that store? Like when you opened the others there we'll know when
we open chris town that my husband went to chris towns. I had Park Central
and then he had chris town and then divided his time with Los Arcos. We
also have two grown Children at the time. And they also worked in the
stores alone. So that was a great help as well. Okay
and are some of your store is still in operation today? Pardon me are some
of your store's in the other locations still open today? Um Yeah no he
must have opened the doors are open today. Oh today today. Oh no no no.
Yeah we closed the Park Central and I really don't know what went in after
we left because once I leave I'm gone I can't handle going back so I never
went back and I have no idea what went in and
that was it. Okay. Right So really your association with them all ended in
the early 80s when that store closed? Yes. Okay so my mind I'm sure my
husband went back. OK so you didn't come back to shop or anything like
that? Okay. Mhm. Were you still living in the area locally or had you
moved? You know we still live in I still live in phoenix. Okay. Uh huh.
Okay but you shifted your shopping to another area. Well you know the
older you get you don't really need too much shopping and I do spend some
time in san Diego. I have some Children there too and so yeah. Oh no I
didn't come back that was
over. Okay. Uh huh.
So phoenix was obviously very different in the early sixties. Oh yes yes
it was right when I first came to phoenix before we even opened up the
store I went to pennies and there was an escalator and people didn't even
know how to get on and off the escalator and when you went down the
escalator there was a big big portrait of J. C. Penney that you had to
look at and it just changed. Well first of all in parque central opened in
downtown took a real beating and a lot of the stores came to park Central
and eventually they did close downtown. Yeah it was too close to. Yeah so
in terms of the growth, You know in the early 60's
the city certainly kind of petered out around Northern Avenue and
obviously now goes much much much farther. Um Can you describe a little
bit about that? Just like the the phenomenal growth that was happening in
terms of housing and building? Um
Yeah I don't really know um you know there were houses and developments
and stores but I was so busy that I really you know um didn't pay too much
attention to how things were growing because it didn't affect me.
Okay. Um Did you find that other developments that happened during that
time period like the freeway building? They were doing affected business?
Lot more people to come in the store that, well I'm sure there was a
certain percent but was that percent where more people were moving in
because at the time also there was the west side which was Maryvale and
there was a shopping center there too which I don't even remember. But I
know there was one so I imagine people could um not come to Park Central
but people like Park Central they they liked it definitely.
Did you find that when they built chris town did that effect business at
Park central or like or did it not really draw business away? I don't
think well it didn't I can only talk for our business, it didn't affect
our business. It really did not because it drew people safe from the north
and the west side. And parque central um you know kind of took another
group. So did the Crystal Mall have a similar mix of stores? Do they have
a Goldwater's? They didn't have Goldwater's, they had a store at that time
called Corks and um
which was later Macy's
I think whatever but it was not the quality or the elegance of gold wars.
I mean Goldwater's what's good
and um but I think the malls did well because there was an influx of
people, a lot of people. I mean it gru gru
okay did you find over time that like even the park Central the the
business just kept growing in terms of volume. It was good. Yeah it was
good. But you see we owned it and we paid attention to it and we did the
buying. We were very involved. So when there was a problem we were able to
take care of it and then when new things came out we did our buying. We
were the ones that did the buying. So we were on top of all the new stuff
and we my husband was very good business man. Yeah was the primary
customer where the women men who were the um a lot of women but men too
because they would come from the office buildings on central so during
lunch hour they would come if they needed cards or if they needed a gift.
A lot of offices you know they exchanged gifts. I mean it was it was busy
, it was busy was saturday that particular busy day? Well family day you
know. Yeah saturday probably was always a good business day but was the
volume pretty steady even during the week? Was the volume fairly steady
even during the week? During that time period? Yeah. Oh
you know it um during the week we we had a lot of office and business
people and then like I say the weekends and then the nights they weren't
great but you know the stores started to stay open. So of course one
follows the other and there are certain rules when you're in a mall. Yes
you open if that's what's happening and you don't have a choice
was there when you made the decision not to renew your lease at Park
Central? Had there been
other businesses that we're making sort of the same decision at the same
time? Ah Is there kind of a turnover of original businesses from the early
60s? Not too many, not too many. Um Some but not not the majority. The the
people that we're the originals and had small businesses worked them in
other words, they didn't own them and then have managers so that helps the
business quite a bit. Yeah.
Okay.
Does Park Central have a particular meaning to you? Do you think about it
have do you have sort of a general feeling about them all in general? I'm
sorry, I'm not, did they, does the does them all sort of have a
association? Oh yeah. Oh definitely. They had an association and of course
they all participated. We had um uh
an occasion once a year where we party all participated. It was a party
night kind of and it was a good mall, it was people that were interested
in. People like I say that ran their businesses rather than managers.
There were some of course. And but when you're there on the premises it
makes a difference when you think back on it, does it have a sort of
special meaning to you? Does it? How do you feel about, Well, I never
really went to the special meetings. I went to the party the once a year,
but my husband was the one that participated at the meetings. And Yeah, so
I really what about the mall in general? Like if you think about it, like
if you think back on the mall then now, what do you kind of feel about the
mall in general? Well when I came here today, I didn't know that it was
all blocked off. So I thought I was gonna walk down and look at my store.
Um You know it's progress. I mean, you know, I don't know if they're
putting shops in, I don't know if it's going to be a shopping center, I
don't know
anything about it to be honest with you. My understanding is the
revitalization plan is similar to what they did to the shopping center at
camelback and central where they're trying to restore it back to the the
look and had originally and try to revitalize it as a retail. Oh you mean
uptown plaza? Yes, so uptown Plaza about two years ago or so was
completely redone and restored back to its original look and they got a
whole new group of restaurants and other retailers in. I think they're
trying to do the same thing here. So I'm really trying to bring it back to
the way it was sort of in the sixties. Well maybe the layout is similar
but they've also expanded of Town Plaza and there's a lot a lot of
restaurants and there's still some stores that are empty because the rents
have gotten very very high and
you know it's limited parking, you know Park Central, you had parking a
lot of parking and then they had a second level of parking where they
wanted the owners and employees to park. So there would be enough for the
customers. But I don't know too much about uptown Plaza because we came,
we were so involved. You know. Uh Yeah, I
I don't know I thought that uptown Plaza was just like kind of an L. Shape.
Yeah, but I think it's more than that now. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. They
expanded in the back and stuff like that.
I probably shouldn't be talking about them, but they also are probably
seen some changes. A lot of changes because they have opened up to doing a
lot of outside things that they never did before. Okay. Um Are there other
sort of things we haven't talked about about Park Central or your store at
Park Central that you'd like to mention?
Yeah. Okay. Oh, I have understood that. No, I don't think I do understand
the question. Just in terms of the conversation we've had so far, either
Park Central Mall or your store specifically, are there things that we
haven't talked about that we would like to mention? Oh um yes, I can't
think of anything, you know, it was just it was a good ball, it was a good
mall, very accessible. Um
It was hard to go to parque Central and not find what you were looking for.
Yeah, I mean, I feel that the people didn't have to go downtown and that
is what happened because then they started to close. Youngtown folks
Central took over. Do you think that's essentially what sort of led to the
decline of parque Central is when the stores started to leave Park Central
, then they didn't have as much. Well, I'm I'm sure there were, you know,
changes, like I say, I didn't go back, but I'm sure a lot and then, you
know, different things happen with individuals when their leases are up
and they think that maybe it's time to say goodbye and I think that that
was some of it. Um Yeah. All right,
okay. Um well thank you so much. Oh my pleasure. I hope I answered some of
your questions and I know that I I can only tell you that from what I told
you that it was a great place and we were very fortunate that we not, we
my husband made the decision to come here to phoenix and open park central
and he and one of the owners ralph Birnbacher, which I'm sure you've heard
the name. Um he had partners, but ralph would be the one in town. They got
along well and respected each other and it was it was it was good, it was
very good for us, you know um I know that she's aren't they done are you
done with that? So I just have a couple of things to add because I was
very involved with the business as well. But um so, but a cute story is I
live when you said that it left in northern, you know that the end was
northern. So I live At 15th Avenue in northern right in that area and
there's a part called Butler Park and I walked my dog all the time and I
was walking, you know, walk every day. So one time this lady finally says
to me she goes I've been dying to ask you this for so long. She goes, are
you a reamer? Because my mother and I look a lot alike and probably at
that time I was on the same, I was the same age as my mother. Probably was
, I said, I am and she said, I knew it. I kept telling my daughter your
that's a rumor. That's a rumor. She says I used to shop in your store all
the time and I recognized you. And I knew and I just didn't have the nerve
to ask you. So All those years later, I mean, we've been closed since 1977
or 78 at park central. And all I have to do is still get people. Yeah. The
band that was sitting there, right that I was talking to. Um he said to me
, I know, I know man said and I said who I was and then he said, I'm
trying to think of your husband's name. And then his wife was talking to
somebody probably interviewing like you have you know, whatever people,
they will repeat customers. They will repeat people coming into them all.
It was just a gathering community. It was a community. Yeah. It was a
gathering. It was a gathering place. I mean it was great. Let me tell you
is this recorded. I hope, Oh it is okay. Even the owners didn't expect it
to be what it turned out to be. They were like in shock. That's my opinion.
And I was young, I was 30 years old. And when you ask about the events
that went on, so I was little, you know, at the time when we moved here, I
was five. So El Rancho was the market here and so I remember they had
easter egg hunts where they closed the grocery store and all these kids
came to the easter egg hunt. Do you remember that? And they gave at
christmas time they gave, they had our easter maybe it was, they had the
easter bunny giving away rabbits. And my brother Ben angled a rabbit for
us.
So they had a lot of promotional things that went on in the mall. My mom
stayed in the store, we roam them all because you could do that when you
were kids back then and so on. And we went, we were at the mall a lot
because if we didn't have a babysitter or something like that. Well if
they had to shop they could go into the stores. I mean it was that kind of
the thing that they could go into diamonds especially and try clothes on
and put them tell the girl who they were and tell them that your mother
will come up and look at him and today the kids have the charge cards and
they just, they don't meet the mothers and um they would and I would go up
with them and then try the dresses on, they tried them on and then I would
pick what I thought was proper and the price was right and identify, yeah
it was good times it so it was it was a good life. Great wonderful lucky
right corner, right place. And let me tell you that's a good part of life.
You don't have to be overly smart but you have to be it just has to be
the right timing and for us it was and we appreciated it and made the best
of it and it worked out so great thank you. Thank you.