Marshall Field & Company (Marshall Field's) was a
department store in
Chicago, Illinois that grew to become a major chain before being acquired by
Macy's Inc. on August 30, 2005.
The former flagship
Marshall Field and Company Building location on
State Street in
The Loop of downtown Chicago was officially renamed
Macy's on State Street on September 9, 2006, and is now one of four national Macy's
flagship stores — one of two within the company's
Macy's East retail division alongside its New York store at Herald Square. Initially, the State Street store was the lead store of the Macy's North division, immediately following the merger.
History
Early years
Marshall Field & Company traces its antecedents to a dry goods store opened at 137 Lake Street in Chicago in 1852 by
Potter Palmer, eponymously named
P. Palmer & Co.. Four years later, in 1856, 21-year-old
Marshall Field moved to
Chicago from
Pittsfield, Massachusetts, finding work at the city's then largest dry goods firm, Cooley, Wadsworth & Co. Just prior to the Civil War, in 1860, Field and bookkeeper
Levi Leiter became junior partners in the firm, then known as Cooley, Farwell & Co. In 1864 the firm, then led by senior partner
John V. Farwell, was renamed Farwell, Field & Co. only for Field and Leiter to soon withdraw from the partnership when presented with the...
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