Goldsmith's

Goldsmith's was a department store founded in Memphis, Tennessee in 1870 by German immigrant brothers Jacob and Isaac Goldsmith. With a $500 investment, they opened a dry goods store on a muddy lane called Beale Street. It grew into a chain largely located in the Memphis metropolitan area, until 2005, when the nameplate was eliminated and replaced by Macy's. Goldsmith's stores were subsequently folded into Federated's Macy's Central division, reorganized into Macy's South, and today into a differently configured Macy's Central, the current division encompassing the stores.

Goldsmith's original store on Beale Street was relocated in 1895 to a larger facility at Main and Gayoso, which it occupied through most of the 20th century. In 1952 Goldsmiths expanded its downtown location, expanding into the adjoining former Gayoso Hotel. The department store began to build suburban locations in the 1960s, beginning with its Oak Court store at Poplar and Perkins. By 1978 Goldsmiths occupied of retail space and of warehouse space in the city.Sigafoos, R.A. Cotton Row to Beale Street: A business history of Memphis. Memphis State University Press, 1979.

Goldsmith's was acquired by Federated Department Stores in 1959, and added in 1988 to an Atlanta, Georgia-headquartered division led by that city's Rich's chain. The downtown Memphis location was closed in 1993. The division expanded to include Cincinnati, Ohio-based Lazarus in 1995, with all of the division......
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