Clothes stores
In the 1950s Calgary had several clothing stores.
Eaton’s and Hudson’s bay had departments for women, men and children’s wear.
Simpson’s had clothes departments and in the 1960s Woodwards had great clothes and sometimes $1.49 day sales.
The Parisian,the Sally Shop and Silkolina had specialty clothes for women. Riley and McCormick had western wear.
In the 1960s when boys wanted to dress up more as adults, O’Connor’s men wear, McLeod Brothers and Don Forster’s.
Shoe stores
Shoes were available also in specialty stores. Downtown you had the British Boot Shop
and Amantea Shoes, Sterling Shoe Ltd and Empire shoes.
Shoe repair places abounded. This may have been a sign of Depression era’s care with money but you did not throw away a pair of shoes that got a flaw. You fixed it. There were in downtown Calgary in 1953 within just a few blocks Mayfair Shoe Repair, Star Shoe Repair, Empress shoe repair and Nick’s Shoe repair. Fast forward a generation or so and we teens often do not go to shoe repair places. There are some but not many. Old shoes are often given to charity and people just bought new ones. It is not that people were so rich. It was often that because of mass production, there are a lot of inexpensive shoes around. A shoe repair may cost as much as the shoe did.
Making purchases
When my parents were young a purchase was made in cash and sometimes on credit. At the little stores a person would buy items ‘over time’. My grandfather ran a small store in northern Alberta and when farmers were struggling he made sure they still could get the food and often gave some free. That is kindness.
In the Depression when things were very tight, having debt became its own problem and many people after that hesitated to get back into debt. There was a kind of pessimism about future ability to repay and banks were not keen to give loans.
So my parents had seen difficult cycles. Their generation had become very cautious about carrying debt. Slowly in the post war years they were willing to take that small leap again and to buy a home, buy a car, and face payments over time. It was a leap of faith.
But at my house we were very cautious about daily purchases.
1950s- a main way to pay for purchases was the personal cheque. I saw my parents writing cheques and admired it so much, the big meaning to an account number and a signature.
1958 – it seemed that for the rich there were Diner’s Club and American Express but we did not have them at my house
1959 – some credit cards were now made of plastic not cardboard any more
1960 – IBM put magnetic tape on plastic cards to secure payment methods.
1960s – grocery stores, jewellery stores, shoe stores accepted cheques. Some even had a special counter and pen to help you write the cheque. You usually had to show ID.
1968- Chargex became Canada’s first credit card, linking several banks including the Royal Bank of Canada and the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. ( we were 19) I still remember the slogan “Will that be cash or Chargex?”
1979 – Master Charge in the US came to Canada and became known as Mastercard
By the 1970s so many stores had their own credit cards that in my cohort the wallet was full of cards – Canadian Tire, Simpson’s, the Bay, Eaton’s, cards for gas companies, bookstores.
Types of stores
Calgary had many neighborhood stores, many large grocery stores and some very large department stores. There were specialty stores also for furniture or jewellery or shoes.
We had bakeries and meat markets.
What stores were we shopping at?
1950s – Jenkins was Canada’s first self service grocery store and eventually they had 50 outlets in Alberta
Lang’s Grocery was a famous corner store. There were about 100 small neighborhood grocery stores. Leong’s in Killarney was popular.
1953 – We had furniture stores Williams Brothers( since 1909), Crown Furniture, Cristy’s Furniture
1953 – We had Premier Cycle and Sports
1953 – We had Empire shoes, British Boot shop, Amantea Shoes, Sterling Shoes
1953 – We had Harry’s News, Jaffe’s books and Music, Billy’s Newsstand, United Cigar store
1953 – We had Lewis Stationery (since 1933)
1955 – We had J. Vair Anderson Jewellers (since 1925) Calgary JewelleryCalgary Co-op began operation in the 1950s
1955 – Don’s Hobby Shop on 1st street SW
1960 – Woodward’s opens its first Calgary store at Chinook Centre. It has a Food Floor and a new conveyor belt system for groceries. It has Parcel Pickup for groceries
Canada Safeway, IGA, Super Value, Jenkins’ were all grocery store options and Calgary Co op had outlets now at North HiIl, by 1963 on Macleod Trail and in 1965 in Brentwood
1969 – Calgary’s first 7-Eleven store is at 23 avenue and 4 street NW
Store and brand slogans
The slogans come to mind still. Some had been created years earlier.
1870 – Goods satisfactory or money refunded -Eaton’s
1905 – Covers the Earth _Sherwin Williams paints
1948 – A diamond is forever – De Beers
1950s – Dominion stores- it’s mainly because of the meat
1950s – It takes a lickin and keeps on tickin (Timex watches)
1957 – Nothin says lovin like something from the oven (Pillsbury)
1960 – $1.49 day Woodwards!
1964 – For those who think young (Pepsi Cola)
1960s – It’s hard not to think of the Bay. Bay Days (Hudson’s Bay)
1969 – Thank heaven for 7-11
In our childhood we had stores, had to have stores, had to go to the stores to get items. The shopping experience was itself a social joy. To ‘go shopping ‘meant to look at the range of items and dream, and then select what we wanted. It was our social exposure into the vast market, hands on.
Grocery stores of the 50s and 60s
The major chains were Jenkins, Dominion and Safeway’s
Jenkins had had stores since the 1930s including on Westmount Road, 7 avenue NW, Centre Street North
Empress had outlets on Kensington Road and 9 avenue SE since 1935
Red & White had a store on 16 avenue at 3 street NE in 1953
Dominion set up at 14 avenue NW in 1960 and had a store on Centre Street north in 1968
Safeway’s had stores around the city by the 1930s and in 1950s there were a lot. Center Street North Safeway in 1951 was the first to offer self-serve.
1956 – Calgary Co- op operated with a slogan “Every day low prices”
Meat markets
Burns Meat was a chief supplier to stores
Bon Ton meat market had been operating already for 30 years by the 1950s, at 7 avenue and Centre St SE
General stores and Department stores
Hudson Bay Company had been in Calgary for decades . The wood building of 1886 was replaced by a magnificent sandstone one in 1890. In 1951 it expanded its downtown location and added a parkade.
Eaton’s had existed in Canada since the 1870s. The Calgary store was the first in the city to have an escalator and it featured the Alhambra Tea Room. It developed a slogan “Goods satisfactory or money refunded ‘ and many stores adopted similar slogans.
1958- Sears had an outlet at 16 avenue NW
1965- S.S. Kresge operated
Bakeries
The companies that baked bread and buns sold them to grocery stores and most families did not go directly to a bakery in my cohort. Weston Bakers (Golden West) was a common supplier.
However thanks to our immigrant community we did get exposed to wider varieties, and artisan breads. The Calgary Italian bakery opened in 1962.
National Bakery offered cookies to people downtown on 7th avenue
Shopping malls and shopping centres
Our winter climate made having an indoor shopping area quite appealing. Some were built with indoor walkways, plants and restaurants. There were many types of stores – anchor stores like a department store or a big food store but also specialty stores like jewellers, toy stores, clothes stores, shoe repair shops, book stores, pharmacies.
1880 – Stephen Avenue is a busy shopping area
1886 – Eau Claire Lumber company was built and stores eventually came around it
1904 – Mount Royal is a busy shopping district near 17 avenue SW
1914 – there is a pedestrian walkway between two warehouses downtown
1956- Stephen avenue has become a big shopping district downtown- 8 avenue
1959 – North Hill Shopping Centre opens as the city’s first indoor mall (we were ten)
1960- Brentwood mall is built in NW
1960 – Chinook shopping centre opens
1960s – Calgary has 27 strip malls , little groups of stores in a neighborhood
1964 – Westbrook mall is built in the SW
1965 – Southridge shopping opened on Macleod Trail just beside Chinook mall ( we were 1)
1967- Calgary builds a plus 15 walkway system linking 130 buildings in the downtown area.
1967- Lake Bonavista mall is built
1970 – Sunridge Mall opens in NE
1971 – Market Mall opens in NW and Marlborough Mall opens in NE
1972 – Bow Valley Square is a downtown shopping area
1973 – Penny Lane is an indoor mall on west end of downtown
1974 – Village Square mall is built
1977 – Westbrook Mall opens in the southwest
1977 – The Core shopping centre is an indoor complex on 8 avenue SW
1981 – Sunridge mall is built in NE
Drugstores
1951- Luke’s Drugstore opened in Bridgeland
1956- Calgary Co op opened a pharmacy
1960s – Super S Drug store opened
1960s- Shoppers Drugs opened, run by Murray Koffler
Tucker Drugs was at 14 street and 36 avenue SW
Westgate Drugs was on Bow Trail SW
Tamblyn’s drugs was on 8th avenue at 1 street SW
Crook’s Drugs was at 14 street and 17 avenue SW
Dairies
In the 1950s there were no specialty cheese stores in my childhood. Yogurt was not very well known. You did not go to the store to buy milk as much as got it delivered to your home.
Local farmers would sell their milk to the dairy, the diary would process it and then a delivery person would bring it to our homes
The main dairies in Calgary during my childhood were:
Model Dairies
Palm Dairies
Union Dairies on 5 avenue SE
Crystal Dairies
Corner stores
There were many. For my cohort the ones closest to King Edward school were not familiar to me because I did not shop as a small child. But the ones my mother went to were along 33avenue SW.
Near Viscount Bennett the corner store we went to was just a few blocks east of us in a strip mall at about 30 street SW. Some of the corner stores that became well known were
1953- Alberta Corner Store at 19 street NW
1968- Lucky store at 20 avenue NW
I am sure that we felt we had the widest possible range, given that our parents had lived in times of much less choice.
In the 2020s, in our senior years things have changed again but who would have known it? The mom and pop corner store disappeared. The strip mall is still around but the concept of a huge shopping mall actually shifted. Many malls over our adult years grew, faltered, and closed. Some have been bulldozed or redesigned such as Northland Village . The idea that it was luxury itself to drive to a big centre and park your car then wander indoors a huge community of stores, was rejected by many customers who wanted to drive up to the store and park near it. On the other hand there are now super malls. In Edmonton The West Edmonton Mall was opened in 1981. It occupies 5.3 million square feet and became the holder of many world records. It was at one point the world’s largest indoor shopping mall. It had an indoor lake, the world’s largest indoor wave pool, a bungee tower, a parking lot for 20,000 vehicles and overflow lot for 10,000. It at one point had the world’s largest indoor roller coaster. In 2026 it is still the second largest indoor shopping mall in North America, second only to Mall of America in Minnesota.
Calgary we got on the northeast outskirts the massive Cross Iron Mills in 2009. It had some anchor stores nearby like Bass Pro Shops, and had six themed areas, with 200 stores. In 2016 it got a 1200 seat food hall addition.
In the 2020s we have seen declines in many ‘brick and mortar ‘ stores given that many people preferred to buy items online. The surge of popularity of home delivery of groceries, furniture, toiletries, even pharmacy products has made many places rethink having a actual physical store for the public at all.
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